I've been thinking hard about the way the young intellectuals speak in this country. Not the words they use or the subjects they choose, but the intonation and the speed.
I've watched Don't Look Back, the documentary on Bob Dylan and noticed how he and his comrades all express their thoughts in a matter-of-fact manner, with tones of "this is the way it is and you've gotta turn on too". They speak in short sentences, in a slightly angry voice, with the occasional hippie catch phrase placed close enough to remind people you're part of the new generation but not close enough to lead them to believe you're a weekend hippie. They strongly emphasize the final word in their short sentences. Instead of making lists of atributes or points in once sentence, they break it up into multiple version of their short sentence. "You don't KNOW. You have no IDEA. Your kids aren't EVIL. We are not HAPPY." The other night I watched an American Experience episode on the Haight-Ashbury community. They interviewed a bunch of the hippies living there and they each spoke the same way.
This got me thinking; what makes up our modern day intellectual dialect? The leading characteristic: short. choppy sentences with. I don't know. a kind of effeminate. almost neo-unisexual intonation. Almost every sentence is draped in political correctness with short phrases guiding listeners to believe the speaker is in no way affiliated with any serious political commitments, only pop and anti-pop politics, depending on your county. Young intellectuals have saved only the concepts of the hippie generation, all the harsh intonation is gone, lost to a tape recorder playing fast.
