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In anthropology we had this discussion on how the English language reflects and increases the subjugation of women.  I began to realize how our language limits and changes the “truth” of our stories.  All of our experiences are reshaped in our ability to tell them and recount them in words, but since no experience can be fully and accurately explained through words, language alters our memory of events. 

            This reminds me of my math teacher senior year.  The girls in my grade had the tendency to overuse the word “awkward”.  Whenever an experience was uncomfortable in any way we would label it as awkward, rather than taking the time to think of a more accurate word.  One day after we referred to some event as awkward my math teacher began to yell at us about how the word awkward was ruining us.  He claimed that by not looking for the word the better fit the situation we were severely limiting our vocabulary, because every time we did not call up the correct word from the depth of our brain the chance we ever would again lessened. He continued to explain that by calling situations awkward that were not caused them to be falsely remembered as awkward. 

            After our discussions of “truth” and stories I have come to fully agree with my teacher.  The words we use, even if only in our mind, can completely reshape an event.  Over time the actual experience is lost to us but we will still remember the words we associated with it.  It is frightening how powerful language is controlling the way in which we think and how limited we are by the words we have been taught.