By Peter
Hliqaim
Writing
has transformed over the millennia into the many stylistic forms we know today
such as the official style. Official style is the higher educational approach
many credible individuals adopt to deliver their research and findings. The Death of Language: Listening to the
Echoes (of Georges Bataille) in Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic II—The
Sith Lords is no exception to the system. Author Marcin Hanuszkiewicz uses
official style strategies to address his audience. The article was published in
2020 and made available through the University of Wisconsin - La Crosse’s
Murphy Library. Hanuszkiewicz is a graduate student from the University of
Silesia in Katowice. The article was published in the journal Text Matters: A Journal of Literature,
Theory, and Culture. It compares the similarities between Star Wars
video-game character Kreia and her ideological position regarding the Force, to
ideals presented by philosopher Georges Bataille and the constraints and rules
of language in mankind. Hanuszkiewicz’s text can be used in the context of education,
philosophy, and videogames. Though Hanuszkiewicz’s audience is limited due to
the content of his text, the official strategies prove to be effective for the
intended purpose.
There
is a constant among all official style texts, and that is writing in the
passive voice. This means text is mainly written from the third-person point of
view. Writers are more focused on the subject being acted on and not the action
being performed by the subject. The passive voice strategy helps emphasize
focus on the topic of the text, and in this way, there is less emotional
attachment between the reader and the text allowing for more objective
observations. This is critical to official style texts as most are of
informative nature. Writing objectively is an important element of official
style text and being able to effectively communicate between parties and
professionals is a valued skill.
Official
style has been around for a long time and can be difficult for many individuals
to comprehend. The difficulty makes it apparent that the intended audience is
not geared towards a wide array of groups. Professionals use official language
as a communication tool and it makes sense that not everything has to be
understood by the average person outside the field. It can be argued that the
use of official strategies are not needed to express ideas, but if the reader
is not within the intended audience, then there is no need to have writers
accommodate the general public. Audience is a key factor in every piece of
writing, and though official style limits this, it works for higher education
and professional purposes.
Further analysis of Hanuszkiewicz's text
reveals that the audience does indeed gravitate towards insiders, individuals
who fit into the category of philosophical theorists, Star Wars enthusiasts,
and video gamers. In-depth analysis of texts and inclusion of many
philosophical figures may not make complete sense to individuals unfamiliar
with these kinds of texts and ideals. Hanuszkiewicz includes references to other
figures such Vladimir Nabokov, “Therefore, if one is to listen, then one has to
listen in a way reminiscent of the listening described by Nabokov: ’I am like
one of those inflated pale spiders you see in old gardens...’” (Hanuszkiewicz,
2020, p.264) Readers unfamiliar with Nabokov, would have to research background
information to grasp an understanding of why the inclusion of his ideas make
sense in this text. Again, audience is a key factor in why using official
strategies make sense and work for this text. Not only is the audience
important, but word choice also narrows the scope further.
How an author chooses
to express ideas and emotions through word choice plays an important role in
the level of writing which can be accomplished. Complex word choice can tie in
ideas with deeper meaning. This stylistic approach brings forth the idea of
credibility and appearance of intellect. As an individual who writes at a high
level, there is a component of professionalism to be kept. Academic text is no
stranger to this element, and The Death
of Language: Listening to the Echoes (of Georges Bataille) in Star Wars:
Knights of the Old Republic II—The Sith Lords follows this style.
Hanuszkiewicz displays this with word choice such as “bereft” (deprived
of or lacking),
“etymologically” (relating to the origin
and historical development of words and their meanings), and “vehemently” (in
a forceful, passionate, or intense manner; with great feeling) which he does an
excellent job at expressing more emotion in an official style text. An
inevitable encounter with complex word choice can be the abrupt stop in the
reader’s flow of thoughts. It will cause the reader to seek out the meaning of
the word with the context in mind. An argument can be made as to why the writer
did not choose more easily understood words and phrases because there are
alternatives to which the same emotion can be expressed, but in some cases, one
meaningful word can do the same as a five-word descriptive phrase. There are so
many tools to use in writing an effective official style text, and some are
more effective than others.
Some strategies used in
Hanuszkiewicz’s text help emphasize ideas by adding more details to an
introduced idea or by combining thoughts for fluency. This adds an element of
credibility by showcasing an author’s writing skill, as well as helping the
text be more engaging and not too dry. This is done well in the text as
Hanuszkiewicz uses them effectively to add more details and combine thoughts
that do not need to be separated. In this instance, he uses both appositive and
coordination strategies to effectively introduce the idea of the Force, “The
Force seems to be a life-force, a fabric of energy woven into the matter of
which all things are made, a rhizome of pangalactic proportions, the pulsations
of which can be heard by those attuned to it—Force sensitives.” (Hanuszkiewicz,
2020, p.260) This sentence describes the force in detail by continuously adding
on to what it is, that it actually is something else to make sense of it in terms
of human understanding. The thoughts could be separated at “a rhizome of
pangalactic proportions,” but by combining these like ideas and not separating
them, it adds emphasis to how massive and important the force really is to the
Star Wars universe. Being able to effectively use official style strategies
like this adds so much color, credibility, and understanding to the ideas
presented in a text. Collectively, all of these elements make an effective
official style text because it checks off all the marks for its intended
purpose. Though these make an effective text, some may question the necessity
for official style strategies to be used in communicating ideas.
Realistically, the same
message can be expressed without using official style prose strategies, but
there has to be established credibility beforehand. Official style is used to
communicate professionally, and when ideas are communicated without this level
of formality, the background of an individual comes into question such as their
education, profession, and experience. Once this has been established, this is
where individuals can express their ideas in plain text for the general public
to digest, otherwise, it would be effective any other way.
Overall, official style
strategies prove to positively affect the message intended for its audience.
They provide the desired established credibility individuals seek and
professionalism expected by peers and experts. There may be the limitations of
which audiences can understand these texts, but overall these strategies
provide the necessary basis of professional writing. Arguments can be made to
eliminate official style writing altogether, but that can be said about any
writing style, and it's evident there is a purpose for its continuous
utilization in today’s society.
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