Picture: Lennert Böhmer / youthmedia.eu

Rhetoric: The art of persuasive speaking comes to full effect when you master the power of speaking the addressees' language.

The levers of power are linguistic

Hi everyone! It is quite probable that your digestion – linguistic and real-life – has had lots to do after last time's food talks. Therefore, it will by now certainly be well-trained enough to tackle a subject as heavy and seemingly indigestible as the relationship between language and power on a European scale. Too abstract and complicated? Trust your appetite and your newly acquired digestive top form!

Clearly, the field where the two concepts of language and power enter into most intense flirtation is politics. And the people involved in politics are often examples for good rhetoric – one might suppose. Indeed, it is very often the case that they are brilliant speakers. However, this does not necessarily imply that their ideas are similarly brilliant. Of course, politicians like Martin Luther King promote progressive ideas and, by way of their oratorical skill, make people "dream" with them. Yet, others only use their verbal mastery for far less honourable purposes. Totalitarian regimes, for example, are often led by rhetorical criminals, as it were: In propaganda, speakers may even corrupt or interchange word definitions with the intent to deceive. On the other hand, a bad language competence in a politician can severely backfire on the state of the entire administration of a country. In his time, George Orwell, one of the most influential writers of our age, even proclaimed that "the present political chaos is connected with the decay of language".

We can observe this close link of language and power very clearly in the development of the European Economic Community: Its very first legal act of 1958 actually determined the official languages – at the time German, French, Italian, and Dutch. As the states of Europe moved closer together, it became more palpable to its citizens that linguistic skill provides the power to open up new living and working possibilities. And also to get into closer contact with the people of other nations. Being able to use a "foreigner's" language is an unequivocal statement about your willingness to build up communication and interaction with them. Sometimes, already a single phrase in the foreign tongue has the power to win people over: Just look at the effect of John F. Kennedy's sentence "Ich bin ein Berliner!" ('I'm a Berliner.') in his speech to the German public in 1963. Or take Nicolas Sarkozy, who pronounced "Wir sind Berlin." ('We are Berlin.') at the anniversary ceremony of the Fall of the Berlin Wall in November last year.

Andreas Pöttgen / youthmedia.eu

The limits of your language, here shown as a stop sign in Morocco.

Then again, if you as an individual do not speak every other language in the world, it goes without saying that you are kindly forgiven. But on a European political level, the question of acceptance or not of a language is a hot potato. It can be discriminatory for a speech community to see their language rejected in political discourse. After all, the structures of European power are also intimately linked to the Union’s language policy. That is why the EU includes 23 official languages in its charters. As for the Parliament, multilingualism is a cornerstone – at least for the interpretors who guarantee comprehension among the members of parliament. The MEPs themselves do thus not necessarily have to be multilingual, although their persuasive power is boosted by linguistic versatility, even more so when they go canvassing for their party outside of parliament: Bilingual Daniel Cohn-Bendit, for example, has been a successful candidate and MEP for the Green Parties of both France and Germany. It is largely his effortless switching between German and French which has earned him considerable popularity in both countries as well as a high profile in parliamentary debate. Likewise, the president of the EU commission, polyglot José Emanuel Barroso, likes to respond to questions in hearings in the language in which the question has been posed. Rightly so, because – even if he just throws in a punchline in the style of Kennedy or Sarkozy – he knows about the saluting effect of adopting somebody’s linguistic code. This is what young Europeans studying in foreign countries as well as MEPs experience everyday, whereas the latter do quite often not (have to) pay as much tribute to their colleagues' language due to their assiduous helpers in the interpretor's booth.

On your very own path to Europe, investment in linguistic skills is therefore quite a sensible option. Take this option as a way to enrich yourself culturally and professionally. Take language and power as one concept rather than two. May the force be with you – and with your tongue!