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coming up with new ideas and expressing them to others requires new vocabulary. You can’t simply say things in “plain English” especially when you want to communicate with peers.
This is why academia is so often refereed to as a discipline; you must train yourself in new ways of thinking. Making it accessible to the layperson is the job of scientific communicators, not scientists at large.
And it’s not like this is a unique issue with acedemia, every organization I’ve ever participated in had special vocabulary if it was necessary or not.
exactly, i’ve noticed some people on youtube can be REALLY good at this, like Your Dinosaurs Are Wrong for example. Just introduce your jargon the first time it’s used and put up a little explanation every time afterward.
Every single word in the original post clarifies more than plain English. It is more specific and has better nuance than a plain translation.
That doesn’t make it a useful explanation because the audience of the statement is not the in-group using the jargon.
One part of my daily job is translating “technical” into “manager”. The translation always loses fidelity to the original. Jargon exists because it’s useful, not because there’s a deliberate attempt to keep others out. Some will then use it as a shibboleth but that does not mean it’s original purpose was such.
For what it’s worth: that’s true of all translations. I’ve done real time translation from Italian into English and it’s always missing the nuance of the original. I’ve read the divine comedy in English and Italian and the English is always missing the context and nuance.
Language is an abstract representation of concepts and never maps faithfully.
In defense of jargon:
coming up with new ideas and expressing them to others requires new vocabulary. You can’t simply say things in “plain English” especially when you want to communicate with peers.
This is why academia is so often refereed to as a discipline; you must train yourself in new ways of thinking. Making it accessible to the layperson is the job of scientific communicators, not scientists at large.
And it’s not like this is a unique issue with acedemia, every organization I’ve ever participated in had special vocabulary if it was necessary or not.
Jargon is only legitimate when it clarifies more than plain English. If it does, fine, use it.
exactly, i’ve noticed some people on youtube can be REALLY good at this, like Your Dinosaurs Are Wrong for example. Just introduce your jargon the first time it’s used and put up a little explanation every time afterward.
Every single word in the original post clarifies more than plain English. It is more specific and has better nuance than a plain translation.
That doesn’t make it a useful explanation because the audience of the statement is not the in-group using the jargon.
One part of my daily job is translating “technical” into “manager”. The translation always loses fidelity to the original. Jargon exists because it’s useful, not because there’s a deliberate attempt to keep others out. Some will then use it as a shibboleth but that does not mean it’s original purpose was such.
For what it’s worth: that’s true of all translations. I’ve done real time translation from Italian into English and it’s always missing the nuance of the original. I’ve read the divine comedy in English and Italian and the English is always missing the context and nuance.
Language is an abstract representation of concepts and never maps faithfully.