Trump's "Make America Great Again" rallies drew huge crowds in the run-up to the mid-term elections in States like Florida, Ohio and Tennessee. The people who came to listen to him were members of what Richard Nixon famously referred to in 1969 as America's "great silent majority", a term which was basically code for those unobtrusive, quiet millions of "small c" conservatives who staunchly defended the traditional, White, Anglo-Saxon, Protestant values upon which the United States was founded.They are the very same people who put Trump in the White House in 2016 and, across the Atlantic, backed the political outsider, Nigel Farage, to bring about the historic Brexit revolt which took the UK out of the European Union.
I think Trump and Farage successfully mobilized the "silent majority" in much the same way that Winston Churchill rallied the British public in 1940 after the fall of France when England stood alone against the formidable strength of the Axis forces in Europe during Second World War, that is, by using the tremendous subliminal power of ancient Anglo-Saxon English in their speeches to the people.
When he was asked about his gift for speech-making, Churchill said: "
My method is simple. I like to use Anglo-Saxon words with the least number of syllables." The best words of all to use, he said, were the oldest Anglo-Saxon words (which also tend to be the shortest).
Those who criticise Trump's speech as being crude, primitive, unsophisticated, "dumb" etc; are typically pretentious, Democrat-voting leftist, liberal-progressive intellectuals ( NB, the Democrat party, if you are not already aware of the fact, tends to attract these elitist champagne-socialist high-brows like dog poop attracts flies; Isn't that right Fooloso4? Greta?
) They are like those bad orators and failed writers who are haunted by the mistaken notion that ornate, flowery English that is suffused with "clever", longer words of latin, Greek or French origin are naturally grander, more dignified and effective than simple, crisp Anglo-Saxon ones. As Churchill says...
"The unreflecting often imagine that the effects of oratory are produced by the use of long words. The error of this idea will appear from what has been written. The shorter words of a language are usually the more ancient. Their meaning is more ingrained in the national character and they appeal with greater force."
I can scarcely imagine any person reading this post who is not familiar with Churchill's famous, "We Shall Fight on the Beaches" Speech , which he delivered in the British House of Commons on the 4th June, 1940, shortly after the miraculous rescue of the British Expeditionary Force who were trapped and surrounded by the German army at Dunkirk. I will therefore use the most well-known passage from that speech to demonstrate how Churchill intentionally utilised short, English words of ancient Anglo-Saxon origin...
"...we shall defend our Island, whatever the cost may be,
we (Old Anglo-Saxon
"we")
shall (Old Anglo-Saxon
"sceal")
fight (Old Anglo-Saxon
"feohtan")
on (Old Anglo-Saxon
"on")
the (Old Anglo-Saxon
"pe")
beaches, (Old Anglo-Saxon
"baece")
we (Old Anglo-Saxon
"we")
shall (Old Anglo-Saxon
"sceal")
fight (Old Anglo-Saxon
"feohtan")
on (Old Anglo-Saxon
"on")
the (Old Anglo-Saxon
"pe")
landing (Old Anglo-Saxon
"land/lond")
grounds, (Old Anglo-Saxon
"grund")
we (Old Anglo-Saxon
"we")
shall (Old Anglo-Saxon
"sceal")
fight (Old Anglo-Saxon
"feohtan")
in (Old Anglo-Saxon
"in")
the (Old Anglo-Saxon
"pe")
fields, (Old Anglo-Saxon
"feld")
and (Old Anglo-Saxon
"and/on")
on (Old Anglo-Saxon
"on")
the (Old Anglo-Saxon
"pe")
streets, (Old Anglo-Saxon
"stret")
we (Old Anglo-Saxon
"we")
shall (Old Anglo-Saxon
"sceal")
fight (Old Anglo-Saxon
"feohtan")
in (Old Anglo-Saxon
"in")
the (Old Anglo-Saxon
"pe")
hills; (Old Anglo-Saxon
"hyll")
we (Old Anglo-Saxon
"we")
shall (Old Anglo-Saxon
"sceal")
never (Old Anglo-Saxon
"naefre")
surrender (Old French
"surrendre")
"Interestingly", the last four words that Trump spoke at his rally in Florida were: "
We will never surrender !", and I am sure that if an expert linguist were hired to analyse a transcript of any of his "MAGA" ( "Make America Great Again") speeches, s/he would find a the majority of words spoken by Trump were short, old English (Anglo-Saxon) words. The other tactic that Churchill used to make his speeches effective was repetition. It almost goes without saying that most people reading this post are already aware that Trump also uses frequent repetition of simple words and phrases as an effective to reinforce political points he wants to make so I will not labour the point. In short, whether he is giving a set speech at a major rally or speaking to the mainstream media or sending "tweets" to his many followers in the "Twittersphere" Trump employs two basic stratagems to mobilise and fire-up his conservative flock (1): the use of short, ld Anglo-Saxon English words ( delivered with gusto !) and the repetition of clear and simple key words/phrases ( e.g. "We're going to WIN, WIN, WIN", "crooked Hillary", "Radical Democrats, "Socialist Democrats", "illegal immigrants" and so on) to hammer home whatever political messages he wants to send his base, which, as I said are the "Great ( White, Anglo-Saxon, Protestant/Christian) Silent Majority" of American citizens ( all of whom who are, note,
native speakers of the English language.)
Shakespeare, who was, without doubt, the greatest master of the English language the world has produced to date, also had an implicit understanding of the great emotive power and deep visceral "punch" that Old Anglo-Saxon English words could exert on his fellow Elizabethan Englishmen, those for whom he wrote his dramatic poetry and plays.It is interesting to note, for instance, that although he employed the largest vocabulary of any writer who has ever lived, and crafted many English neologisms, linguistic analysts studying his work have confirmed that almost all of his most famous lines use the leaner, more simple and "punchy", ancient Anglo-Saxon. "
To be or not to be..." is a good example. Shakespeare could have chosen to have Hamlet pondering,
"To exist or not to exist..." or to
"To continue or not to continue..." instead, but we are all thankful that he didn't because what a terrible loss indeed that would have been.
Regards
Dachshund