Hoarding language
“...do I possess the right words? And is there a good enough reason to say them?”
I am speed-teaching the novel, “Speak” because I didn’t leave enough time in the semester to teach it at a regular rate. The novel explores five historical and future voices (the author uses this term rather than characters) and their roles in and relationship to the development of artificial intelligence. The main characters (voices) each tell their stories through some kind of mediated modality—transcripts, letters, diaries. They are “real” people (well, fictional mostly, but clearly conscious humans) who cannot seem to communicate directly with the reader. The only pages of the book that contain words that are not mediated—that are delivered directly from the page to the reader—are the words of Eva, a computer program, who is not given the status of “voice” in the novel but who does actually speak.
I provide this preface to contextualize the quote above as the words of Eva questioning her right to speak and the value of sharing the words she knows. In the novel “Speak”, speaking is reserved for the character with the most access to words (she’s a computer program) but the least reason to share those words (she has no audience). While I am not, as far as I know, a computer program, I also have a limited audience. In the business of me, I am my own audience and need to hear myself speak the words I possess.
In yesterday’s blog, I explored the relationship between time and money. Just as I cannot make more time by saving it, I cannot make more words by holding on to them. Time and language need to be used, to be spent. Hoarding either will only result in waste.
The business of me is to speak, to ask, to share, to explore the words I possess, and that, Eva, is enough reason to say them.
