When you're little, teachers stress the importance of building a big vocabulary. They tell you to search out big words, to fall in love with language, and to make use of it.
I was already fascinated by words and stories by the time I entered school, so I was well on my way, collecting big words and new ideas as I absorbed story after story at an alarming rate; my brain was a sponge and words were my water.
I never thought much about the words I used--they came to me as I spoke, and if they were the right words for the situation, I used them. But I often found myself having to stop and explain what I meant using simpler words--when the words I had used were the simplest I could make them without losing the essence of the statement, it sometimes still wasn't enough! There were even times where my teachers couldn't understand what I was saying, or where my attempt to answer a teacher's question left the class more dumbfounded than it had been previously.
These experiences were common all throughout my primary and secondary education, and didn't stop at the schoolhouse doors. In some ways, the awkwardness of these encounters acted as deterrents, especially in such situations as my intellect became a weapon to be used against me in the mouths of some of my more spiteful peers. If I had loved words less than I did people, I may have learned to avoid big words altogether, and boxed myself into the little vocabulary that society had prepackaged for me.
My mother went through similar struggles; as an extremely intelligent and well-read woman by predilection and a Master of Psychology by degree, she, too, had a voluminous vocabulary, which grew each time ours did--she had a great love of learning, which she passed down to myself and my brothers. But in her workplace, my mother found herself at a disadvantage; with more tools to communicate with her colleagues than her colleagues did with her, she was forced to adapt herself to them, and let go of large portions of her vocabulary for the sake of clarity.
All this is to say that we live in a society where we are often expected to pitch to the lowest common denominator, which is not always a bad thing; if your communication isn't clear, then it's not doing its job. Words are there to help us express meaning, not show off. As writers, this is important to keep in mind, and I've come across many an instructional guide that encourages writers to "dumb down" their writing as well--"Throw away your Thesaurus!" they cry! "Burn the ten dollar words!"
There's value to these articles--just as their is value in the request that a Kindergarten teacher not read high school-level stories to their five-year-old students. It's important not to throw a thesaurus at every sentence in your story; if a small word works, it works, and there's no need to gussy it up. You don't put on ten pounds of makeup to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night, after all.
But sometimes ten-dollar words are the most effective means of communication: isn't it much more effective to say "She walked along the parapet" than to try to describe the tiny wall/ridge thing that runs along a rooftop? Isn't it quicker to say "He performed a simple titration" than to try to explain what a titration is?
If one word works better than seven, or seventeen, or seventy, then that word may well be the optimal word to use, whether in conversation or in a story--revenant, for example, is a word that's been passed around a lot since the release of that new movie, and very few people would typically be acquainted with the meaning of the word--one who has returned, or is believed to have returned, from the dead. You could call such a movie "Return of the Dead" or "Dead Man Walking," or "One Who Has Returned From Death," and the simplicity of the words would render the meaning clear to most, if not all, English speakers.
But they wouldn't have the same tone as The Revenant, would they?
Sometimes the right word is a big one, sometimes it's a small one. As a writer, it's your job to figure out which to use, and the more words you know, and the more books you read, the better equipped you'll be to make that call.
As for the question of whether you'll be understood--people are curious, and people are smart; if your meaning is clear enough, they may pick up on what the word means from context clues. If not, they can always look it up. If you write well enough, people with smaller vocabularies will be willing to do the work; Lord knows we readers are willing enough to learn the names of a billion fictional places, people, and things. And if someone does take your command of the English language as a personal affront, then that's on them, not on you. You shouldn't throw away hard-won knowledge just because someone else can't be bothered to do a quick Google search.
I myself no longer avoid big words, either in real life, or in my writing; I welcome questioning stares and cocked heads as invitations to teach, reveling in the act of facilitating another's learning, and when I write, I will write from myself, using the words that are a part of me to make a tapestry that is wholly my own, neither trying to outsmart nor patronize the audience.
It's all about the balancing act. It's silly to gussy up to go to the bathroom, but you shouldn't strip naked as you head out to attend a ball, either.
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