Have you ever struggled reading a book and left the book half way? Did you ever feel oceaned onto a purposeless island not knowing why at all you're continuing to read a piece of article despite not understanding a wee bit of it? If you spend a minute recollecting the reason why you ended up tractor-ing that unduly complicated book onto the bin, you will realize the reason is almost always simply one in number, the_showy_vocabulary of the author.
I am reminded of my friend, who used to call me and ask me to join her for a walk to malleswaram and when I used to deny telling her that I have work flowing out of my working hours for the evening, she used to shout back with an sms:
"I am flabbergasted by your flamboyance, it is condescending on your part to deny my request while I never abnegate yours in the earnest. Your actions are both conundrumic and melodramatic. For your next errand you are not gonna punch my mobile number on your cell."
It might sound all nice and poetic to you provided you have attempted GRE/TOEFL once in your life. If not, you will feel stupid for not having learnt good deal of English during your schooling!
Why does my friend complicate a statement which simply stated would translate to :
" I am bothered by your actions, it is not right on your part to say no when I ask you to join me for my work. I always join you when you ask me to. I don't understand your behavior, I find it both funny and puzzle-some"
Take a moment and watch this clip from friends. It says it all :-)
A very nice question to address would be the reason why people complicate a sentence which otherwise could be stated in all simplicity (worshipping the occam's razor). The idea behind writing is to convey the meaning and not to exhibit one's prowess over the English language. But we all open up our dictionaries/thesaurus to complicate a seemingly simple sentence. Why do we do it? The answer lies in the opinion of the most, which is:
$$\textbox{Simplicity}\implies \textbox{ignorance}$$
$$\textbox{Complexity}\implies \textbox{intelligence}$$
Which entails to complicated writeups, long winded sentences, rarely used words, high-end metaphors etc.
- Is there a way one can engineer to simplify the given text which is un-neededly complicated with vocabulary which is seldom common to most people?
- Can one just parse through the text and replace the more complicated and less frequently used words by its easy synonyms? (Maintaining the grammatical correctness of the sentences. )
Though one might come out with ways to do this, the solution to this problem sounds deeper than it looks.
- One must understand the way in which humans complicate a sentence by adding less frequently used words.
- We must understand tools and techniques that are used to dissect English language. One such kit is the Natural Language Toolkit which is a Natural language processing toolkit for Python.
This project involves good deal of programming and demands reasonable ability to understand English as an evolved and ever-evolving language. A good deal of interest in word etymologies and derivatives would be an added benefit.
This is quite apt as a BE level project and can be completed in less than 3 to 4 months. Write to me in case you are interested.
(Watch this space for updates and progress)
This is a contributory project (and will surely have a lesser academic flavour :-) ). I would be happy if you can contribute your share of ideas in the comments section below. I will duly reply and acknowledge every single comment.
