One Less Word In The Dictionary




Do you ever read those reports about new words that are added to the dictionary? They are usually buzz words that start off as slang or as a word used with a new technology. Now you can “google” something. Now you can “skype” a friend. Such words come into our vocabulary to describe something new- hey “Xerox” a copy for me or send me a “fax.” I think that is the natural evolution of language – sometimes for the worse as slang words become part of proper English. As Jews we create new words all the time- we call Yinglish! Lately, however I have been reflecting on the other side of that process. Words disappear from our speech because they don’t refer to anything that we use any more. After all, when was the last time you used the word “telegram?” The word moves so fast that words (and the concepts behind them) quickly become part of the vocabulary of the past. I want to suggest one more word that we can, in many ways, relegate to the past. That word is “local.”

Remember when the news was local? Remember when an event was local? Yes, I admit it some things still are. When Mrs. Smith’s cat is rescued from a tree it is of local interest only – meaning it is newsworthy in only one location. Most of our news lately is just the opposite- we are forced to see a bigger picture, that events that did not happen in our “local” still impact us.

Last week’s terrible tragedies in Japan seem like a world away but we saw that it took only a few hours for the woes of Japan to impact our country. As I write I listen to the continued speculation of what a nuclear catastrophe in Japan would mean for the entire world. Commentators are also noting the economic crisis hitting Japan will impact the world economy. As a side note- if you have been to the gas pump lately you have been reminded that what happens on one side of the globe dictates what happens a world away!

This new reality we live in called the twenty first century is a new world. It is a world that is inter-connected by more than just the internet. It is a world in which the fate of one country is bound up with the fate of another. I don’t think there is anyone who could not be shocked by the video coming out of Japan. The level of human suffering is beyond our worst nightmare and we feel as helpless as those who lived through it. We also realize that, in ways we never understood before, our lives are bound to the people of Japan and, in fact, people across the globe.

Yes, it is a small world after all. Ironically it is so small that there is very little left that can be described as local.