Don’t you just abhor those sesquipedalian hotshots who use unnecessarily long words like “lugubrious” instead of “sad”? Do you feel as if the vast majority of concepts can be said using words that are five letters or less in length? Well, so do I. But I have a confession. Sometimes, I use long words too.
It’s not because I want to make myself sound smarter. It’s not because I want to confuse the people I am talking to. I just like the way certain words sound in the context of the sentence.
When I get excited by academic topics I am passionate about, I tend to lapse into high-level, technical jargon, but I don’t mind people telling me to dumb down my vocabulary. When people get annoyed with high-level words, they should try a few things to lower the complexity themselves.
1) Hit the offender over the head with a thesaurus. This is a somewhat violent path, but it works effectively. You can’t do this if you aren’t near a reference shelf or don’t have a thesaurus conveniently in your pocket, but when you happen to have one nearby you should take advantage of it.
2) Learn more words. Perhaps the problems lies with you, not the person speaking above your reading level. Plus, it’ll do wonders for your SAT writing score.
3) Casually mention that you have hippopotomonstrosesquippedaliophobia, or fear of long words. If they persist on using high vocabulary, you can run away screaming without hurting their feelings.
4) Kindly ask them to cease their convoluting, elementary discourse, or “stop using big words.” You could also advise them to “shut up.”
Note: At all costs, avoid using four of these tactics at the same time. As a thesaurus wielding individual who can intelligently debunk pretentious highbrows, you will sink to their level of cleverness.
People like me who occasionally use big words and complex sentences are either seen as excessively academic or merely showing off, but don’t be intimidated by our bookish veneer. Many of us, myself included, aren’t much smarter than the average Joe. All facetiousness aside, you are welcome to tell us our speech is absurd, but don’t be rude. After all, we are people too. Besides, we don’t really appreciate the brain damage from thesaurus attacks.
