Guillaume Toujas TOK Essay Rough Draft

7.

The vocabulary we have does more than communicate our knowledge; it shapes what we can know. Evaluate this claim with reference to different areas of knowledge.

I agree that the vocabulary does do more than simply communicate our knowledge; it also shapes the things that we can know. I think that knowledge is both an interior thing and an exterior thing, as we have to be able to communicate our knowledge to others to truly make it knowledge. While there are some things that can be communicated without vocabulary, many things need the proper vocabulary to properly explain the knowledge that you are communicating. I also think that learning the vocabulary validates the knowledge that you have learned. To me it seems as if the vocabulary we have sets a maximum to what we can learn. Once we encounter words that we do not know when studying a certain subject, we then have to expand our vocabulary and learn what these new words mean to fully know the subject that we are learning about. This is the case in many scientific subjects, where there is a precise vocabulary that must be used when referring to different things. If we are not familiar with this vocabulary, then it is not possible to know or to communicate this knowledge. I think that every subject has specific jargon that must be used in certain cases, and so not knowing this terminology does shape what we can know. When we are looking at this knowledge issue, I think there are a few distinctions to be made. One of them is to decide what we mean by vocabulary. We must also decide how the question changes when we change the groups of people that the vocabulary is being exchanged by. For the vocabulary, we can say that it is simply the words that are being used as well as the meaning of those words. This means that if someone does not know the word, then we can assume they do not know the meaning or the ideas behind that word either. This means that if that word is used in conversation, they will not know the ideas or meaning that the speaker is trying to convey. With regards to the people who are using the vocabulary, there are two main variables which can affect the situation. One is whether or not the people are from the same background or not. For example, two people who live in the United States may have completely different backgrounds which could affect the vocabulary and their understanding of other words. The other variable is the respective roles of the two groups of people interacting and what their vocabularies are. These groups can be anything from professors to students to books, as long as there is vocabulary being used between the two groups then it is a situation that we must examine. In general, there are cases when even without knowing the word or phrase that we encounter we can make out the general idea of what it means. This is done by context. So, if in a sentence we see that the tone and mood is very sad and slow, we naturally assume that an adjective or a verb that we do not understand in the sentence will also be sad and slow. However in reality, we still do not know what the word means. Maybe we do have an educated guess, but all we are doing is interpreting the meaning of the entire sentence or paragraph and placing that meaning on the unknown word.The unknown word is not benefitting our knowledge in any way, it is just falsely reinforcing what the meaning of the sentence is, because we have placed an arbitrary meaning on the word, and it may or may not be accurate. This leads towards the

idea that we really do need to know the vocabulary when learning or reading something to fully incorporate the knowledge. Now, let us look at phrases or sentences that we do know all of the words in the phrase, yet we do not understand the meaning because of the way the words are arranged. The most common example of this is with common phrases that we have never heard before. As an example, let us use the phrase, Let me sleep on it. If you have never heard the phrase before, you will think that the person is literally sleeping on something, when that is not the meaning of the phrase at all. The only question here is whether or not we can count these phrases as vocabulary or not. Personally, I think they should count as vocabulary because there are situations where knowing the meaning of these types of phrases will alter the knowledge that you gain, and so it does relate to the title of vocabulary affecting knowledge. We can also examine different areas of knowledge and see if vocabulary plays the same role in all or most of these areas. In mathematics for example, there are many specific words that you must understand to effectively learn the material. Words such as quadrilateral or perpendicular are words that have one and only one meaning in the world of mathematics and so without having these words in your vocabulary there is no way you can full learn the knowledge. I think this goes for all scientific-based classes as well, where there are many specific words that have one distinct and unique meaning that are prerequisites for learning the material. In classes like in English where maybe words dont have distinct meanings all the time, it may important to see if vocabulary affects how much knowledge we gain from a text or poem. I think this goes back to one of my earlier points where I was discussing the importance of not knowing even one word in a sentence. I think this does apply in this case because a good part of English is being able to analyze every word and try and extract all of the meanings that the author places in the text. In all, I think that our vocabulary is definitely a key component of knowledge. Communication with each other is what makes us human, and the main ways we communicate with each other are orally and written. However, when there are words or phrases that you do no understand or that you interpret the wrong way, you are losing this knowledge that the other person is trying to convey. This loss of knowledge means that the absence of vocabulary is directly affecting how much knowledge we take away from certain situations, and so it is shaping what we can know. You have to learn the words and the concepts behind those words, that way when you encounter these ideas in new situations you will be able to learn everything that is being taught and come away with all of the knowledge that was meant to have been taught.