on communication
Two things happened in the past 24 hours that got me thinking about communication. First, the friendly folks at scatterplot posted a link to Lindsay Waters’ essay on Inside High Ed calling for greater clarity in the humanities. Second, the political world has been rocked by a speech by Barack Obama on race that goes beyond the typical tendency toward sound bites and actually proposes a nuanced and complex take on the issue. So, I’ve had several ideas bouncing around in my head about the constant balancing act between clarity and complexity in communication.
Like Waters, Jeremy seems to endorse the ideal of “plainspoken social science.” This is an old debate that Stephen K. Roney summarizes well in his article, Postmodernism and George Orwell. Essentially, he pits George Orwell’s argument for simplicity and clarity in writing (spelled out in Politics and the English Language) against the case for obfuscatory language supported by thinkers like Teddy Adorno and Judith Butler. Butler, for example, is paraphrased as saying, “Difficult ideas must necessarily be expressed in difficult language” (pg. 14). While I certainly wouldn’t want to oppress anyone by rejecting his/her right to use impenetrable language, I tend to agree with Orwell that clear expression is essential to putting ideas into practical use. Ideas that are communicated in an obtuse manner are rarely absorbed by the general public (I’m thinking of Marcuse’s One-Dimensional Man in the 1960s as an exception). Because Orwell was more interested in developing ideas for the purpose of political action – rather than knowledge for knowledge’s sake – he advocated a plainspoken writing style that could be widely read.
Unfortunately, to reverse Butler’s formulation, simple writing is often associated with simple ideas. Politicians are masters of developing easily absorbed, media friendly sound bites that communicate very little meaningful substance (see, for example, any sentence ending with “… or the terrorists win”). Even at moments of crisis (maybe especially then), politicians seek to paint a black and white picture with simple answers. As James Carney wrote for Time magazine yesterday, “politicians routinely seek to clarify, diminish and then dispose of the problem. They play down the conflict, whatever it is, then attempt to cut themselves off from it and move on, hoping the media and electorate will do the same.” And this is precisely what made Barack Obama’s very long speech on race so stunning. Though he spoke in perfectly clear language, the speech he gave did not simplify the issue; it revealed it to be more complex. Carney continues:
What [politicians] don’t do is give a speech analyzing the problem and telling Americans that it’s actually more complicated than what they believed. They manifestly do not denounce the offensive comments that stirred up the trouble to begin with and then tell Americans to grow up and deal with the fact that those same remarks, however wrong and offensive, are an elemental part of who they are, and who we are.
How the public reacts to this speech is still an open question. Will people reward Obama pointing out the continuing tensions of America’s racial divide? When Obama says, “We can tackle race only as spectacle — as we did in the O.J. trial — or in the wake of tragedy, as we did in the aftermath of Katrina, or as fodder for the nightly news … Or, at this moment, in this election, we can come together and say, ‘Not this time,’” will people take up that challenge? It’s probably too early to say. However, what’s obvious is that his clear, beautifully-phrased, and breathtakingly inspiring speech has the potential to affect change in much the same way JFK’s inaugural speech pushed a generation into community service. This is a power that scholar writing in recent years has lacked. Scholars like John Kenneth Galbraith have, at times, used the power of clear and inspiring language to move society and policy. But who today has that gift?
On the other hand, maybe social scientists tend to see their obscure and expert language as way of protecting their supposed objectivity. It’s possible that our often incomprehensible sentences and extensive use of the passive voice reflect our desire to appear as scientists and not radicals or “policy entrepreneurs” (as Paul Krugman referred to Galbraith in Peddling Prosperity). To me, this practice seems wrongheaded. As Marx famously wrote, “Philosophers have hitherto only interpreted the world in various ways; the point is to change it.” To do so, we’re going to need some nice lucid writing, Obama-style.
