The Power of Language

The power of language to me by definition is prevalent most in the written word; which is carefully constructed for a general cause. Inspirational and persuasive writings (such as poetry, essays, and speeches) are meant to effect change, an idea is first placed on paper and eventually reconstructed over time with the purpose of making others buy into whatever the author is proposing. Great writings like Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have a Dream” had the power to reform laws in the United States and expand civil rights to all people, and the credit is directly related to the emotional impact that it had on a mass amount of people who were ready for the status quo (of that time) to evolve. It is much like the more recent events that took place in Egypt, the people came together for a cause and removed a top authority figure that some may classify as being a dictator; either way, I would be willing to bet something significant that at the very root of all of the organized protest in the streets of Cairo there was some manuscript written by someone who spawned it all. I discovered this power for the first time when I wrote a book report in the 5th grade. I opted to do my report on the book “Gifted Hands: the story of Dr. Ben Carson”, I guess you can say that it was the first time in my life that I had truly been inspired by words. At that particular time in my life I had been struggling in school, and I began to have moments where I questioned whether or not I could even learn what I was being taught. As I read the story of Ben Carson, I was able to relate to what he described as his academic short comings. He was in roughly the same grade as I and was experiencing the same problems, but it was his first moment of retaining information that caught my intrigue. He wrote that the obsidian rock was something that had caught his eye, and after learning about the shiny little black sphere shaped object, he figured that if he could be interested in something like a species of rock, than he could become interested in (and learn) anything. Soon after I read the book in its entirety I began to think about his academic philosophy and started to accept it as my own. After I finished writing the report, I proofed it over and it read like nothing I had ever written before. Of course, the final draft lacked form and had a multitude of punctuation and grammar errors (it was the 5^th grade after all), but it was still the best work I had constructed at the time. To make a long story short, I received an A+ for my efforts; but it was the earning of that particular grade that became a turning point for the rest of my academic career. It was the written language of a person who struggled the way that I did which made me believe that I as well could accomplish great things. I may not be a pediatric neuro-surgeon like Dr. Ben Carson, but I have achieved things academically that I never would have had I not read his book; and personally that is the definition of the power that the written word carries.