Tautology; such a lovely word, the sound, the feel of it building deep from within the throat, a delicate sine wave rolling pleasantly across your tongue. Briefly causing it to lick a momentary caress on the roof of your mouth, before flicking sharply at its base and releasing its rotund and pleasant sound upon the world.
Yet its meaning is one of waste, double accountancy, profligacy if you will. A tautologous statement, states the same thing twice, in a different way, and this, they say, is a bad thing.
Her hair was insanely crazy.
BLP - Bad Linguistic Press
However our old and ancient friend tautology is rather viewed in a negative light. If you do a web search for Tautology, English language, you will come across various sites and examples telling you to avoid my beautiful sounding companion.
Apparently it is not, or even, should not be the done thing, according to one such website:
A tautology is an expression or phrase that says the same thing twice, just in a different way. For this reason, a tautology is usually undesirable, as it can make you sound wordier than you need to be, and make you appear foolish. Occasionally, a tautology can help to add emphasis or clarity, or introduce intentional ambiguity, but in most cases it's best to choose just one way to state your meaning and eliminate the extra verbiage.
Pah! I say, poppycock and bunkum! A rabid pox upon you sirs, may all your children have beards, including the girls!!
Verbose The Jealous Ugly Sister
Whereas tautology slips merrily from your tongue in a wonderful, vocabularic, mini-symphony, the uglier twin verbosity, bulldozes its clumsy way around your cheeks and lower pallet, only to stumble past your lips as gracelessly as a new calf taking its first steps.
However tautology is not verbosity, just because I use twenty words where but one will do, does not mean that I am verbose!
Nay! It merely means that I am a fan of our wonderful friend tautology, for it is she that alloweth (my article my made up words), me to spin linguistic threads, evermore searching for that elusive, perfect garment of prose and verse.
The Language Of Love
If I can break character for a moment, just so I can seriously make my point. Shouldn't tautology be celebrated?
An inquiring mind is a healthy one, and looking at things from a different perspective is usually considered a good thing. It helps to gauge the situation and make a more measured decision based on your findings.
My argument is that by exploring different ways of looking at things simultaneously, we are doing something we wouldn't be able to do in real life. Usually it is either/or, with tautology it can be and/and.
Language shapes us in subtle ways, it is intrinsically linked to our past and is a big part of who we are today.
Perhaps I can leave you with a paraphrase from one of the most famous user of tautology in history; William Shakespeare.
Tautology or not tautology that is the question.
Further reading:
Tautology quote - yourdictionary.com: Examples of Tautology
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