Mind over Memes
Passive Listening, Toxic Talk, and Other Modern Language Follies
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- $39.99
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- $39.99
Publisher Description
Too often our use of language has become lazy, frivolous, and even counterproductive. We rely on clichés and bromides to communicate in such a way that our intentions are lost or misinterpreted. In a culture of “takeaways” and buzzwords, it requires study and cunning to keep language alive.
In Mind over Memes: Passive Listening, Toxic Talk, and Other Modern Language Follies, Diana Senechal examines words, concepts, and phrases that demand reappraisal. Targeting a variety of terms, the author contends that a “good fit” may not always be desirable; delivers a takedown of the adjective “toxic”; and argues that “social justice” must take its place among other justices. This book also includes a critique of our modern emphasis on takeaways, quick answers, and immediate utility.
By scrutinizing words and phrases that serve contemporary fads and follies, this book stands up against the excesses of language and offers some engaging alternatives. Drawing on literature, philosophy, social sciences, music, and technology, the author offers a rich framework to make fresh connections between topics. Combining sharp criticism, lyricism, and play, Mind over Memes argues for judicious and imaginative speech.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Based on a series of courses on the intersection of rhetoric and philosophy, this manifesto from educator Senechal (Republic of Noise) seeks to defend serious, thoughtful discourse from internet memes, managerial groupthink, and other examples of what George Orwell called "the slovenliness of our language." Senechal debunks many of the intellectual clich s that cloud thinking, such as the "pocketable answer" or "takeaway" ("It is the tourist trinket, the mutterable motto"), and in particular criticizes TED talks as directed more toward "selling concepts" than toward disseminating ideas. Subsequent chapters take on the idea of change as inherently good, the current fascination for workplace "teams," the predilection for labeling contrary opinions "toxic," and even the humble pronoun we, which Senechal observes is often deployed to allow one person to speak for another. In each case, she argues that these trendy phrases distract from the hard work of thinking clearly and deliberately. "A life without buzzwords pat solutions," she states, "opens question after question, insight after insight." While ignoring some of the more corrosive forms of internet speech (conspicuously, there is no discussion of trolling), this concisely argued book will nevertheless be of interest to anyone who wishes to deconstruct the truisms that infect so much public discourse.
