Practice Essay There are many ways you can interpret language. Language means something different to everyone and therefore there are many pros and cons that come with it. Since language is different everywhere it creates a lot of controversy. People use language as a way of knowing, we use words for everything and we use them in a way that makes us think we know what we are talking about. The real question is how do decide what we know. Since one word may have a different definition to every person you ask, it makes things very complicated in the terms of knowing. This is a weakness of language. Someone may come up to you and say something that makes complete sense to them and may be of knowledgeable information, and yet you have no clue what they’re saying. It’s a barrier, and really makes it very difficult for people to communicate. Communication goes hand in hand with understanding aka (knowing) and if you don’t know the word or phrase in the way that they know it, it disorientates the entire point of hence conversation. Therefore it makes it a weakness of language.
A strength for language is that there are many things that mean the same thing or that are similar anywhere you go. Language is everywhere, all around us and is constantly being used to communicate and relate. Even if you go to a village in Africa they are going to have language. Now, there language may be different there, but when it comes to language it’s not all verbal, there is body language and hand gestures. It’s a lot easier to communicate with more than just words, and when you go somewhere or meet someone with a different definition or knowing of a word you can try and convey your point through hand gestures and or body language. In the T.O.K book that we used it stated that the woman was trying to tell her persian sister about how frustrated she was, but her sisters language didn't have a word for frustration, so her sister was not able to understand what her sister was trying to tell her because in her language it didn't exist. language is CULTURE. Its strength is that it is a form of communication and that you are able to interpret things in a similar manner if you and the person with whom you speak have a similar cultural background.
Language IS a way of knowing all in itself. We don’t just use it to use it. We use it to gain understanding and knowledge. There is so much to learn and there are so many ways that we can learn, and language by far is one of the most common yet most misunderstood. Language is easily misunderstood because people have different understandings and different perspectives on everything that is knowledgeable. Thats why there are debates and fights and misunderstandings. Everything means something different to everyone. How are we sure of the things we know? How do we know what we know? We associate with others with words and talk about things that others can relate to. Therefore justifying what we know and how we know it. I think that the fact that language is so easily manipulated can be seen as a big weakness towards it as a way of knowing, but in the same respect; the fact that you can manipulate it for your own benefit can have its own welfares towards you.