ELA11, CSS, Cizeron

Diction deals with the literal meaning of words (their denotation), their emotional loading (or connotation), and the sound of the words (rough or smooth being two contrasts). Let's look at two passages that mean approximately the same thing but are written in two different styles.

• I hate it when I have to walk through a crowd of teen punks at a bus stop. They look me up and down. Their eyes are empty. Their faces are blank. They don't move out of the way for me. I feel that they want to hurt me.
  
  
• I strongly dislike the necessity of walking through gatherings of alienated youth at bus shelters. They slide their expressionless eyes over me without reaction, keeping their faces neutral as though I were nonexistent. They decline to recognize my need to walk on the sidewalk. It appears certain that they desire to cause me bodily harm.

Notice that each of these passages represents differences in tone and style.

The first passage contains many one-syllable words that have negative connotations and hard consonant sounds (e.g., hate, punks, empty, blank, hurt). In addition, all the sentences are short and almost curt.

In contrast, the second passage uses many multi-syllable words. This makes it flow smoothly, so it is mellower in its impact than the first passage. None of the words in the second passage has strong negative connotations. Further, its sentences are relatively long. The general effect is one of smoothness and neutrality.

One style is not necessarily better than the other: both could be equally effective if placed in the right context in a work of fiction. The second passage would seem inappropriate if the character were, say, a young teenage boy. The diction and tone should be in keeping with the speaker they represent.

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