My articles appear online on Thursday mornings. Every Thursday by dinner time, my mom has called me twice, each time with a different review. She shares praise first — the argument is strong, good opening sentence, the piece is well organized. Then criticism — your counter argument needs work, your introduction is boring and, invariably, your language is too wordy.
“Why you are using such big words? Are you trying to confuse me and your dad?” she asks.
She hands the phone to my dad, and he repeats my mother’s critique. “Omar, use smaller words, and fewer of them. I don’t understand what you are writing.”
“Okay, Baba. I’ll keep that in mind,” I always say with feigned understanding.
My mother prefers to speak in her native Arabic, in which she is eloquent and witty. But when she translates her thoughts to English, the meaning falters. Her lively personality is dampened by fear of humiliation. When spoken to in English, her mind still turns to Arabic, taking in English thoughts, translating them into a familiar language for comprehension and reverting them to English for verbalization. All of this happens in the half second it takes to say “hello.”
But after last week’s call, I gave their advice some more serious consideration. My mom and dad are physicians with doctorate degrees — proof that they can grasp complex ideas and abstract thoughts. So if they can’t understand the comparatively basic arguments I make, then perhaps their call for more straightforward words is warranted. The linguistic divide shouldn’t separate our shared cognition.
Big words, I slowly realized, do not equate to big thoughts. While it is easy to complicate an already complex issue, it is more difficult to make a complex problem simple. The late CEO of Apple Inc. Steve Jobs said, “Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.” Fortunately for my parents, they found the truth in Jobs’ statement sooner than I did.
Using language that is easy for the reader to understand is more important than using diction that gives the impression the writer has something to prove. The reader assumes intelligence — wordiness isn’t necessary to demonstrate it. Simple language is appealing in its universality.
If I can make my articles easier for my parents to understand, then I can make them more accessible to others, reaching more minds and influencing more people. Here’s hoping my epiphany scores more positive reviews on my weekly phone calls.
A version of this article appeared in the Thursday, Nov. 7 print edition. Omar Etman is a staff columnist. Email him at [email protected].
