Picturing The Lost Words
Buttercup
Over the past 12 years, children's natual world has been truncated by a linguistic assualt from the Oxford Junior Dictionary (OJD). The OJD, published by Oxford University Press, is intended for children 7-9 years old, and in recent editions scores of natural words have been removed from the dictionary. Acorn, brook, buttercup, heron, pasture, tulip, wren and many living words from nature were lost; replaced by allergic, blog, bullet point, MP3 player, and voicemail. I don't have anything against these words, but introducing blog and voicemail, should not come at the expense of limiting nature's vocabulary.
I learned about the Lost Words during a book signing by Terry Tempest Williams. She read a passage on the Lost Words from her book the Hour of Land, a wonderful tribute to our national parks. On pages 360-361 she wrote:
"If you can remove words from a dictionary that are so alive with meaning and withhold them from our children, removing what is alive in the world becomes easy... The wild is no longer part of our vocabulary; nature becomes a forgotten language."
I was unexpectedly moved and saddened by this loss, which seemed senseless. I know editors have finite space. If you add words, some will need to be deleted; I get that. But these words. Fern, kingfisher, pelican and violet were each expunged. Moreover, words like cauliflower, leek, spinach, radish were all removed as well. I wondered what the OJD had against vegans.
This book reading occurred at Book People in Austin, TX, one of the great independent bookstores in the country. Along with places like Powell's in Portland, and Collected Works in Santa Fe, these independent bookstores are like pollinators of their communities, spreading the written word so that seeds of wisdom, imagination and joy can flourish. I hope that these special places aren't lost like the acorn and the wren.
The empty caps weep
What are we without our mates
Birthing oaks no more
Shortly after first encountering the Lost Words via The Hour of Land, I met them again at the Santa Fe Botanical Garden. Michael Namingha, a local artist, created an installation called AWOL that placed signs in the garden for lost words like acorn, ash, buttercup, dandelion, fern, ivy, pasture and willow. Experiencing this exhibit shortly after hearing Terry Tempest Williams cemented the impact of what had been stolen. it was more than simply words in a dictionary. It was one more step in the continual distancing between ourselves and the natural world, the wild, in our daily lives.
I wanted to memorialize the Lost Words in photographs and mourn their passing with prose and poetry. When Eddie Soloway encouraged alumni of his Natural Eye photography workshops to pursue a book project, I quickly knew that the Lost Words would be my focus.
The nameless bird sings
Its song once beautiful
Now mournful and aching
Singing for the lost words
As I started the project, I realized I wanted to include the actual definitions that were removed. I couldn't find a previous version of the OJD online so that meant trying to find an earlier print edition. Thank you eBay.
I then came across the original story in the Guardian about the removal of these words. Next, an Amazon recommendation revealed Robert McFarlane's Landmarks work, which discusses changing language and its connection--or increasing disconnection--from the natural world.
Lastly, I discovered Robert MacFarlane and Jackie Morris' marvelous book, The Lost Words, a Spell Book to conjure these missing words, it was gracefully written, beautifully illustrated and, quite frankly, intimidating. It was well beyond my talents. While I knew I could not create something so eloquent, I was still inspired to document lost words and share their demise with more people through an eBook called Picturing The Lost Words and through an image gallery on this Web site.