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The Current Transcript for August 2, 2021

Host: Rosemary Barton

STORIES FROM THIS EPISODE

Prologue

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Despite more female competitors, sexism remains prominent in women's sports

Guests: Michelle Donnelly, Kavitha A. Davidson

ROSEMARY BARTON: So we are just past the midway point of the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo, and way back when organisers were planning these games, they wanted this to be a landmark for gender equality. Events were added for women. The competition schedule was made to give equal prominence to men and women. Sports on the Canadian team. Women have been excelling in case you didn't see that soccer game this morning, winning the vast majority of Canada's medals. And yet.

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VOICE 1: The Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games president Yoshiro Mori earlier announcing he's to resign from his post, is following his recent sexist remarks about women. The eighty three...

VOICE 2: All I've ever wanted on my basketball career has been to Canada at the Olympics. Last year, my team-mates and I qualified for Tokyo. But right now I'm being forced to decide between being a breastfeeding mom or an Olympic athlete. I can't have them both.

VOICE 3: She just doesn't--.

VOICE 4: She's going off the floor.

VOICE 3: Something's up. I don't know what it is.

VOICE 5: Simone is stepping back from the team and individual all around because of her mental health.

VOICE 6: And if you've been on social media, there have been some mixed reviews about all of this and the move. This is from Aaron Wright, who is a Texas deputy attorney general. He called her a, quote, selfish, childish, national embarrassment.

RB: Sexist remarks, rules that discriminate against nursing mothers and conversation around an elite female athletes, quote, mental toughness. These might be the gender equality games on paper, but on the pitch, the balance beam or the court, things look awfully different. Kavitha A. Davidson is a sportswriter for The Athletic and she's the co-author of a recent book called Loving Sports When They Don't Love You Back. And she joins me from New York. Good morning to you.

KAVITHA A. DAVIDSON: Good morning.

RB: Thank you. You're a journalist. Obviously, you must be a sports fan, too, given you spend so much time writing about it and thinking about it, how do you think the Olympics are living up to their goals so far when it comes to gender gender equality?

KAVITHA A. DAVIDSON: Well, you know, the Olympics have been working toward this point for quite a while now. London 2012 was actually the first time that every country had sent a woman who had female representation in their ranks. Three countries had to be forced by the IOC to do that. It was also the first time that women's boxing was added to the Olympic programme so that every event now had equal representation as well. So this has been in the works for for almost going on 10 years, if not longer. At the same time, I think we're seeing that some of the old tropes, some of the old narratives have definitely taken shape. And you just played some comments made about about athletes that I think you can you can definitely point to progress. Still needing a ways to go.

RB: Yeah. And we'll get we'll get to some of those specifics. But the IOC did give guidelines. This is kind of incredible. But they gave guidelines to journalists about how to avoid sexist, sexist narratives and stereotypes when talking about female athletes. I mean, just the fact that they had to give those guidelines tells you something. But how has the commentary been in general from what you've been hearing?

KAVITHA A. DAVIDSON: I think it's very country specific, frankly, here in the U.S. I think that we've had a lot of conversations about how that language needs to be tweaked, about how language matters in in what we're covering. And I think that it also matters that a lot of the journalists who are covering the Olympics in the states are women themselves. And that that will always obviously make a difference when it comes to specific language. At the same time, again, narratives are taking shape that even if the specific language isn't offensive, you can can sometimes point to offensive the offensive nature of how of how women's sports are not covered in the same way.

RB: So let's start with sort of the most glaring example or the most obvious example. And that's the issue of what women are wearing when they compete. What do you make of the pushback that we are seeing? For instance, the German gymnastics team all wore like one piece to compete. Is that is that a change? Is there is there a benefit when we see those kinds of double standards?

KAVITHA A. DAVIDSON: I think the only benefit of upholding a double standard in uniforms is to sexualise female athletes. And this is something that has been going on for years. Several years ago, the Australian women's basketball team was forced by their National Governing Committee to wear these kind of skin tight body suits. And they they they rejected it. They had to wear them, but they did not. They were very outspoken about how uncomfortable they were, about the fact that it didn't actually help them perform better on the floor. And the officials in charge flat out said that this was a marketing push, that their number one priority in governing female athletes was to make them as sexualised and as sexually marketable as possible. Now we're seeing that to this day, we're obviously seeing that in the most glaring example with the Norwegian beach handball team that rejected the bikini requirement. And I think the idea is just that it should be a choice, it should not be mandated, and there should be the same standards of uniform for men as there are for women. And there probably and most likely are women who would prefer to wear bikinis, not because it sexualise them, but because it makes them comfortable. And that's OK, too. But I think the idea of having some kind of standard is really important here.

RB: So let's get into a couple of the specific high profile examples of of tropes and sexism that maybe you think is being displayed here. Some bills being slammed for dropping out of the competition, although I should point out she's she has said she's going to compete in the beam medal event. So that's exciting. Naoma, Osaka, who's the black Japanese American tennis player? She's also faced a lot of criticism this year. How do you think the fact that these elite athletes were also women plays into the criticism they're getting? Is it about them being women? Is it about there? Is it about mental health? Are the two connected?

KAVITHA A. DAVIDSON: I think it's everything wrapped up in one. I think if you look specifically at Naomi Osaka and her pulling out of the French Open several weeks ago, it continued a conversation that we've been having, that we've been having around athletes, male and female, and their mental health and and trying to get over not only the stigma of just talking about mental health, but the idea that mental health should be conflated with weakness. We're talking about elite athletes at the highest levels of their sport. They've obviously proven that they are both physically. And mentally tough and the idea that talking about mental health can signal anything otherwise just shows how how little we understand about the conversation around mental health with Simon Byles. I think the added element that does speak to gender is that so many people who either wanted to separate the mental health from the physical aspect of gymnastics don't give gymnastics their due in being such a dangerous sport. And I think one of the reason that that happens is because at least in the States, you know, the most prominent faces like Simone Biles are women who wear leotards, who wear makeup. And that defies what people might want to point to as as toughness or as a dangerous sport. But don't make any assumptions. Otherwise, gymnastics is an incredibly dangerous sport. And I think that, you know, we can we can go down the line and talk about how mental health, how it's easy to label people as weak when when they are women and when they are talking about mental health, but the courage and the strength that it takes to actually have that conversation. And men have been starting this conversation as well, I will say, starting in the NBA bubble last year. But I do think that it's difficult to separate the characterisation of these women as either, you know, betrayal, betrayers of their sport or betrayers of their country, partly because the underlying assumption there is also that they really weren't proper athletes to begin with.

RB: Yeah, I did see I mean, there was a lot of support for some Monfils as well, I should point out, and from other athletes as well, like Michael Phelps was was very outspoken about his own mental health and and he applauded what she did. How much do you think race intersects with gender, though, when we're talking about Simon or Naomi?

KAVITHA A. DAVIDSON: I think it does a lot. I think especially with Simon, you know, she is the face of for the states. She is the face of our Olympic Games. It was obviously disappointing for a lot of fans that she had to pull out. But I think it also speaks to this larger issue of black athletes in particular are exploited and are only really taken seriously and are expected to be accepted in this athletic realm as as the face of a sport or a face of the country until until they mess up in some way. And I think especially black women who have been talking about this for four decades now, the expectation that black women have to be 100 percent perfect all the time is is such a burden. And one a little bit of that Folger's. What we need to remember is that human athletes are human beings. Athletes don't stop being black women when they step onto the gymnastics floor and that burden comes with them. They carry that burden with them as well. And just recognising the athlete as a holistic human being, their identities and their demographics and their flaws as well is really important.

RB: Yeah. That they can be vulnerable just like everybody else. Given all these issues, gender equality, racial justice, all these different things, these big issues that that do pop up during the Olympics, are you still able to enjoy them or do you only look at them through that lens or are you having fun watching?

KAVITHA A. DAVIDSON: You know, it's funny. This is basically the premise of the book that I co-wrote with Jessica Luther, which is every fan has every chapter is is deals with a different moral dilemma and how we maintain our fandom despite all of these these systemic problems that we see institutions. One chapter is specifically dedicated to the Olympics. The Olympics are highly problematic, even without all of the things that you and I have discussed today. The Olympics are such an economic boondoggle. They militarise local police. There's so many issues there. And yet I love watching that. I really do. And it's very difficult from a from a moralistic standpoint to reconcile those two things. But, you know, on the one hand that the Olympics are also the biggest global showcase for women's sports. It's the only time we get to see not just women's sports, but some of these events that we don't really, you know, we don't really pay attention to. And there is something about having national pride as well. So it is it is always very difficult to reconcile those two things. And it's hard for me as a journalist knowing kind of how the sausage is made and not to think of all of these problems.

RB: Well, thank you for getting us thinking about them this morning, Kavitha. I appreciate it very much. Thank you. That's Kavitha Davidson, sports writer for the athletic co author of the recent book Loving Sports When They Don't Love You Back. Jasmine Mian is a former Canadian Olympic athlete who lives in Calgary. She competed in wrestling in 2016 and Rio. She says change needs to come from the top.

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The IOC executive is still two thirds men and coaches. I think 90 percent of the coaches and Rio are men. So have decision makers that are overwhelmingly men. They don't maybe even think that some of this should change or that it's been a problem. And so I think we're slowly starting to see different policies come in and push back. We need decisions to not allow nursing mothers to bring their babies to the games or no consideration in the qualifying processes that might need to accommodate for women being pregnant. You know, it's only also very recent that we had an athlete of both genders carry the flag at the opening ceremonies, and that's how China got their first woman flag bearer. So I think seeing this push back is really important if we want to see the games be more inclusive and I think that's going to also start with not just the medal performances that we see of women. And the push back of the athletes is one thing. But I think where there's still a lot of change to be made is making sure that we have women at the IOC table, women who are women coaches, and that that's how we can start to probably come up with better policies in the first place.

RB: Jasmine Mian was part of a 2016 Olympic team where 16 of Canada's medals were won by women, six by men. If you go by those numbers, Canadian women athletes are making great strides. It's happening again in Tokyo. Canadians have won medals in 14 events so far, all but won by women in Tokyo. Overall, 49 percent of the athletes are women, but those numbers probably don't tell the whole story. Michelle Donnelly is an assistant professor of sports management at Brock University in St. Catharines, Ontario. Good morning, Michelle.

MICHELLE DONNELLY: Good morning.

So 49 percent is actually it's good, it's a long way from the 14 percent that there was back in 1968. How has the push for gender equality at the Olympics helped women athletes, do you think?

MICHELLE DONNELLY: I think absolutely, in terms of numbers is where we've seen the most improvement with respect to gender equality and, you know, having those role models is extremely important, as well as having a national sports system that recognises the need to invest in women's sports because there are medals for women at the games. Right. And when that is the focus, then if you don't make that investment, then you potentially leave a lot of medals on the table. Certainly, as we've seen between Rio and Tokyo, with the number of medals won by Canadian women athletes,

RB: it was actually back in 1996 at the Atlanta Games that they called them the women's games because of the number of athletes had reached 36 percent at that point at these games, nearly half. As I said, half the athletes are women. But what are those numbers not telling us in terms of the full story here?

MICHELLE DONNELLY: Yeah, it's really only a fraction of the story about gender equality is told by the numbers, right. And everything that you've just discussed with the two previous guests in terms of how women are treated, the representations of women athletes in the media. You know, there are differences in uniform requirements in some sports are actually differences in the rules sets that men and women play by or the distances that they compete over, you know, the equipment that they use. So when the discussion about gender equality is limited to numbers, as it really has been by the International Olympic Committee, you know, actually addressing equality in a substantive way. And that's really what remains to be done. And certainly, I think increasing the number of women in Decision-Making positions is crucial there, but also really embracing a definition of gender equality that is about more than reaching 50 percent women, 50 percent men.

RB: Yeah, I mean, there's still these real gender specific controversies that come up. I spoke on on my TV show with the boxer, v, who had to fight to qualify because she had been off part of the time caring for her baby basketball player Kim Gouger, who was fighting to bring her nursing baby with her to Tokyo, which seems sort of like a basic right. What does that tell you about how the IOC views athletes who are women and who also happen to be mothers?

MICHELLE DONNELLY: Yeah, I mean, I think it's really this interesting situation that we have where we've seen on the media representation end of things, some decrease in the sexualization of women athletes, but a real increase in talking about athletes as mothers, certainly women athletes. And then you still have these institutionalised practises in sport that really don't allow space for mothering alongside being an elite level athlete. So definitely we need to see more recognition of that. And really, I mean, expanding the discussion about elite athletes and family in general is going to be crucial. You know, there's sort of a pretence here that really only women have responsibility for child care, child rearing, which is really problematic. I mean, there are a lot of men that Rio who have left small children at home and families at home. And because there's never been an expectation. Right. To make space for that with many athletes, that that lack of attention to family responsibilities has continued along to women athletes. And really what it requires is an overall review to understand athletes more fully as as people who are elite level athletes, but who have families and who have other responsibilities beyond their sport. And that would be beneficial for all athletes, men and women.

RB: Can I bring up the issue of safe sport to add sexual abuse in sport? Because obviously that is is part of the conversation. It's certainly become more prevalent over the past number of years, particularly in gymnastics. I would think Jasmine Meehan, who we talked to in the beginning there, The Wrestler, she's also been active on this issue. Here's what she has to say about how it's been allowed to fester.

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And there should be some basic workplace standards, some human rights and human resources practises that you would find in any workplace should be afforded to athletes as well. And I think for a long time it wasn't. And that's why we see these horrible instances of abuse that have happened in sport, because you take a group of people who really want to win a gold medal and you say you have a coach who says I can get you that gold medal, but you just have to listen to every single thing I say. That's a pretty dangerous situation to be in because you have such athletes who just feel so trapped and want to win so badly that I think we've been willing to accept certain practises and standards that we just never should have been willing to accept.

RB: I bring up this question of progress on this issue because over the weekend, Rugby Canada had to fire the head of its National Development Programme, Jamie Cudmore, over remarks that he made about the Canadian women's rugby team that he that he put on social media. How much progress are you seeing on this issue of creating a safe space abuse free space in sports?

MICHELLE DONNELLY: I think some progress. Certainly Canada's adoption of the Universal Code of conduct for the prevention of maltreatment in sport, the CMS is really a move in the right direction, I think sort of expanding our understanding of maltreatment beyond kind of criminal standards for abuse and harassment. That's really a positive. I think we have to recognise the work that athletes and very often women athletes are doing to advocate for this change. And that's progress in Canada, you know, with our athletes being willing to tell their stories and go public and really, you know, put themselves in really difficult situations, as we've just seen with the women's rugby sevens team, to put themselves out there and, you know, advocate for change within their sport. Then has made people call into question their actual performance, which is outrageous and really unacceptable, and it's positive to see that Rugby Canada has, you know, taken an immediate stance against that.

RB: OK, Michelle Donnelly, I got to leave it there this morning. Thank you so much.

MICHELLE DONNELLY: OK, great, thank you, Rosemary.

RB: Michelle Donnelly is an assistant professor of sports management at Brock University. She is, or was, in St. Catharines, Ontario.

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The power of fake words

Guests: Eley Williams

RB: Have you ever heard the verb al na sheraz -- to force one's self to fantasize? Now, If you're scratching your head, thinking, no, I don't know it. There's a good reason why; It's not actually a real word. Fake words like that are at the heart of "The Liar's Dictionary". It's the debut novel by the British writer Eley Williams. This is a book about love, language and identity and Matt Galloway spoke to Eley Williams earlier this year.

MATT GALLOWAY: This is something that has been cooking for a while. I mean, in part, this was based on your PhD thesis. Then, there are the short stories. And now you have a novel. The thesis inspired by something called mountweazels. What are mountweazels?

ELEY WILLIAMS: Yeah, that's right. So mountweazels is a name given to fictitious entries in dictionaries. And those are real things. They are in real dictionaries and encyclopaedias. And they're basically fake words and fake entries that have been included in the text of a dictionary, for example. Really, there is copyright traps. So, for example, if you're writing a dictionary and I'm writing a dictionary, they both should be pretty similar because words are words are words. However, if you've inserted one of these fake words into your dictionary and it pops up in mine, it'll be obvious to everyone that I've pirated the text of your book. And so these fake words, these fictitious entries, exist to really trap would-be pirates. And for me, I was always just fascinated by the idea of these made-up words, really nestling and surreptitiously having this life, this creative energy, in a book that we take as granted to be trustworthy, to be factual. And there was kind of a tension there between trustworthiness and creativity that I, as I say, fascinated by and focussed on for this PhD. The novel kind of bloomed out of that.

MATT GALLOWAY: I think a lot of people will be first hearing about mountweazels in this conversation and in reading this book. When did you first learn about them?

ELEY WILLIAMS: So I first came across the word mountweazel in an article that appeared in The New Yorker, I think, in 2005 by Henry Alford. And he had come across the first the progenitor of the mountweazels, that is Lillian Virginia Mountweazel, which is an entry that appears in a 1975 encyclopaedia. And as you can imagine, it's an entry about this woman named Lillian Virginia Moutweazel. It says that she was born in Bangs, Ohio, in 1933. And then, tragically, she died while on commission for Combustibles Magazine while in an explosion. And just, as you can tell, it sounds like it could be real, but it has this wordplay. It has this fictional [chuckle] kind of cohesiveness to it and satisfaction as if it's a little short story. And just the delight that clearly had been taken in creating this this potted fiction of this made-up woman with the full knowledge that this was a short story that would never be read because no one was ever really going to look up who Lillian Virginia Mountweazel was because she doesn't exist. That idea of the delights that someone had taken in making up a word just really resonated with me. [chuckling] This this kind of idea of nonsense and a bit of mischief, really, being part of a creative act where you least expect it. It enthralled me as an idea as I read this article, and I jotted it down and ended up looking up the history of fake words and dictionaries and when dictionaries go astray.

MATT GALLOWAY: The novel tells a couple of parallel stories. There's Mallory, who's a contemporary woman whose job it is to uncover the mountweazels that are hidden in this Victorian-era dictionary before it's published online. And then there's Peter Wincetworth, who in 1899 hid those fake words in the dictionary. What does he get out of creating these words and, you know, as you say, sliding them in surreptitiously?

ELEY WILLIAMS: I think with Peter Winceworth, I wanted to create a character who he's quite ground down by his job, he's overlooked at his job, he will be anonymous in terms of his contribution to the dictionary. No one really looks up the names of lexicographers when they want to use a dictionary. And by making up these words, it's his way of having some agency, having some creativity, having some assertiveness that only he is able to enjoy and know about. And in a way, that's how he's able to have a legacy that if these fake words make it into the into the text of the dictionary, no one will ever see them. But they will have a currency. They will have a history to them forever. And so, yes, his his fictional insertions are really his way of trying to make his mark on the world because the rest of his life is really quite downtrodden and quotidian. And he hopes for more than that.

MATT GALLOWAY: Let me ask you about some of the words that he invents. I love this word. And in some ways, people... if you squint, it feels like a real world or it looks like a real word because you can imagine the word actually meaning what it doesn't mean. But but that it could mean, casiculation.

ELEY WILLIAMS: That's right.

MATT GALLOWAY: What does that mean or not mean?

ELEY WILLIAMS: Well, I hope I remember correctl! That is the act of walking through spider silk.

MATT GALLOWAY: Fantastic!

ELEY WILLIAMS: Oh, great! [Matt and Eley chuckle] And I mean, again, with that kind of word, we've all... we all recognize that feeling. And either with... if it's first thing in the morning, a kind of horrified stickiness [chuckling]. And maybe it's peculiar enough to not require a word for us all to know and to have a currency in society. But it also reveals how there are these gaps in language, even though there are shared experiences. And I am drawn to... to thinking about this kind of lacuna, those gaps in language. And so many authors have in novels and in poetry sought to fill those with words of their own creation. And there's the online Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows, which you may have heard of, that this written by John Koenig. He's coming up with words for obscure sorrows that we all would recognize but don't quite have a word for. And, yeah, it was... it was great fun coming up with words and coming up with recognizing where there are these these absences, these gaps that might be filled.

MATT GALLOWAY: Let me ask you about one more, Mamonsomnet, which means to dream that money might make anything possible. [Eley chuckles] It's a word that should exist in some ways, right?

ELEY WILLIAMS: Yes. And I like the idea that it might take off, you know? [laughing] You and I have been broadcasting it out to the nation, and maybe it will be one that has a currency in the same way that mountweazel now has a usefulness as a word. Maybe we can... we can take up the mantle and pass it amongst ourselves.

MATT GALLOWAY: How did you become curious about language and words? I mean, did you grow up in a house of books? What was that... what was that for you?

ELEY WILLIAMS: Yeah, I think I grew up in a house where there was always a dictionary, not necessarily to hand in every room, but we were familiar with turning to a dictionary if we didn't know what a word meant or if it felt unfamiliar. And that sounds very everyday, and it was very normal for us. It's strange now that if I think about how often I use a dictionary, it's honestly probably once a year if it wasn't for research purposes. I'm going to look up a word that I'm not familiar with via my phone. I'm going to use Google. I'm going to use Wikipedia. And I do miss, in a way, the... the tactile and kind of haptic nature of using a dictionary and kind of getting lost in the pages of a dictionary once your... your... you've got it cracked over your knees.

MATT GALLOWAY: I mean, aside from, you know, building up a great vocabulary and being able to win at Scrabble, what did you get from... from browsing a dictionary?

ELEY WILLIAMS: I think in part, in answering that question, one of the dictionaries that we had at home was Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable. So it's... it's not a standard dictionary in that it gave, you know, a monolingual account of the English language, but it was a dictionary to do with idioms and with stock phrases or with sayings that you might hear but not necessarily understand. Say something like to win hands down at something. We all know what that means, but we don't know why it's phrased in that way. And I hope this is right. But that comes from horse racing. So you're so confident that you can win, you can put your hands down, no longer be holding the reins. And for me, this idea of language being something that I was, you know, had a kind of passing familiar with familiarity with and was able to understand much of what was being said to me, but for that being kind of a superficial understanding of language. And that it had these strangenesses that had lost some of their specificity and had lost their metaphoric meaning. It just proves that dictionaries were more than just lists of words and definitions, that they had these histories and these biases and even these ignorances that were particular to their editors. And I guess that's always something that's... that's stayed with me.

MATT GALLOWAY: Tell me more about that. That's one of the themes that runs through this novel, are the biases and again, the real people with real biases and perspectives and lives that they lead that are involved in helping to shape these dictionaries. Because there are words that are considered legitimate. There are words that are defined and owned by certain communities and certain people, and then that can change over time. Why was that something that you wanted to dig into?

ELEY WILLIAMS: Yeah, I think for me, a dictionary had always seemed, I supposed because I didn't really think about it too much, but it always seemed synonymous with authority, as something quite rigid as a... s a text, AS something unimpeachable [chuckling] and monolithic in a way. And I kind of thought of people that worked on them or that created them, curated them as also having these qualities. In Britain, we have kind of Dr. Johnson is, I suppose, the grand figure of lexicography, his 18th-century dictionary. And this idea of quite a dry, austere, prodigious man. But, of course, once you start reading his dictionary, learning more about him is full of these eccentricities and idiosyncrasies. You know, one of the inclusions in his dictionary from 1755 is, is trollmedanes. And that's not a word most of us I think are familiar with.

MATT GALLOWAY: No!

ELEY WILLIAMS: And to be honest, Johnson wasn't familiar with it either. He defined that in these terms, of that word, I do not know the meaning. And this idea of someone setting out to include all words in English, but not necessarily to define them all. This idea of collecting language in order to complete a set and register as much as possible is quite different from the idea of someone being correct all the time or someone being the authority on what language means. And I think that, as you say, what one might hope for if a perfect dictionary could ever exist, would be that it, yes, is authoritative, that it is informed, but that it's done with generosity, with clarity and is inclusive. It isn't looking to be a way of seeing language as a competition and someone using it well and someone using it poorly. Of their being slang words which are bad and proper English, standard English, which is better. That language is something more vivid and vital than that that relies on... on change and mutability. So I think that this this putative and maybe impossible idea of the perfect dictionary would have to be one that could be updated, that could reflect changes both in time and in meaning of words. And that they're... because they're made by human beings, one would have to admit that they're always going to be flawed in some way.

MATT GALLOWAY: I mean, you see now dictionaries, including words like the second gentleman, for example, or BIPOC, being added to the Merriam Webster Dictionary. And in in the novel, Mallory gets these wild, crazy, threatening phone calls from a man who's angry because the dictionary is changing the definition of marriage to include same-sex unions. I mean, is that the suppleness of language that you've talked about, that idea that... that over time it can become more generous, that the definition can become more generous, that it can evolve and not just be locked in one period of time?

ELEY WILLIAMS: Yeah, I... I think so. And... and also to acknowledge that sometimes language does have a certain rigidity to it and does encapsulate a certain moment of time. And that that can be comforting because it means that something is clear and demarcated and you can kind of apply it in an informed way, but that that can be weaponized in many ways if it's too rigid, if you cleave to that word as if it was possible to only have one definition or one precise application of that word. That can actually be a way of trying to exclude other people or not letting yourself recognize how things must change, and how words must change if they are to remain meaningful. For example, with the Oxford English Dictionary, in recent years, the Junior Oxford Dictionaries, which is slightly different to the OED, and in a recent edition, the editors decided to get rid of words like acorn and the fruit blackberry and replace it with the noun blackberry meaning type of phone, and include Apple as in the brand. And those are two kind of maybe obvious examples. But the idea that those other words had to be deleted for those to be... for those new tech words to be included, it does seem as if language is being scrubbed a little and not allowing that one's expectations for what a young person would have as a vocabulary could also include acorn, could also include blackberry alongside new words. And certainly in the novel, as you say, the way in which marriage as a word in the modern world has to be different to the way in which it was defined in England in the 19th century. It is not valid to say that it is a union between a man and a woman. And to take umbrage at that change of definition is to be having something like a sinister nostalgia for a society that is conservative and fixed rather than possibly allow for new possibilities of better possibilities.

MATT GALLOWAY: In the novel, Mallory is in a same-sex relationship, but she struggles, and she talks about this, and this comes out a number of times in the book. She struggles to find a word that she really feels expresses her identity. One of the reasons why we turn to dictionaries is because we're looking for a word. What is that right word? Have you ever felt underserved by the words at your disposal?

ELEY WILLIAMS: Hmm, good question. I suppose that rather than feeling underserved, those strange moments of recognition that come when you hear a word that describes a situation or a feeling or an emotion that you didn't even know needed to be defined for you. I'm reminded of a panel in a "Fun Home" by Alison Bechdel, where the protagonist, she, Alison Bechdel, is looking in the dictionary and sees the word queer. And she suddenly realizes that all the definitions of that word in some way apply to her, even if it's talking about strangeness, even if it's talking about how it's an 18th-century slang word for a thief. And she's able to apply it to her father and.... and his gay life that was secret at the time. And it's not that she then resents the dictionary, but rather realizes that there is this richness, both of language and of life, that is just sometimes a page away, and you're never shown which books to turn to or which pages to leaf through. So I suppose to answer your question, rather than feeling that language has undeserved me, that this pursuit of finding ways to define yourself and ways to define experiences can be exhausting, [Matt and Eley chuckle] but it can also involve curiosity. And it can also involve energy. And that's something to... o cherish and to treasure.

MATT GALLOWAY: I mean, there's a line in the book about how a dictionary might be like reading a map or looking in the mirror. And I'm just wondering, in your own life, having been surrounded by words, when that has felt familiar?

ELEY WILLIAMS: Yeah, I think it's interesting that everyone writes in their own way, but some people, you know, they say, I want I want to grow up, and I want to be a writer. That somehow feels very different to say I want to grow up and I want to be an author. But when we say author, are we talking about authority? Are we thinking about the responsibilities that come with authorship, or are we using it as a synonym for writing? We are implying something about the relationship between yourself and the text, and the reader. Or are you saying that writing can be writing for writing's sake? And just the idea of this complexity sometimes being lost on me because I fudge words together is something that it means I have to slow down my thinking quite a lot. And I think in the novel, part of what I enjoyed was having characters that were similarly tentative with language that often mishandled language or misused language or see it being misused when they're meant to be in these positions of authority on how it is used correctly. And I suppose in a way there was some ventriloquism there. [both laughing] Having those characters muddle their way through, rather muddle-hededly and learning about what was possible for me and my relationship with language at the same time.

MATT GALLOWAY: Whose job do you think it is to to take care with the language that we use or misuse? I mean, there's this phrase fake news that's being tossed around right now in Australia. The dictionary there, Macquarie, said that this is the word of the decade in many ways. Words can... can, I mean, they have meaning, and they can have real effect, and they can be damaging and create all sorts of chaos if they're deployed in certain ways and in certain venues. Who is it that should oversee that?

ELEY WILLIAMS: It's a tricky one. I think it's interesting to see how different bodies and... and indeed countries have tried to think about that. So I suppose most famously in France, they have the academy, which comprises of a kind of an elite of lexicographers and people who are very well-versed and educated in certain cultural French values. And that would seem like a way of almost providing the most informed committee for patrolling language. But even I suppose, in using that word patrolling, I am tentative about the way in which language can be policed and that any one person or any one legislative body could be seen as the arbiters of how language is being used correctly or incorrectly. And I suppose ideally something like a open-source but vetted way of ensuring the lexicography is useful, ensuring that a dictionary can be consulted so that someone can clear up maybe an ambiguity about language, but also to register that that ambiguity existed for them, so that there is this sense of I like this idea of a map being possible, a mapping of language as inscrutable as much as it is communicative. I think that could all be part of lexicography. But it be quite a big book if it was printed. [chuckling] So I think maybe that's where the digital comes in.

MATT GALLOWAY: What about in the commons? I mean, I'm not sure whether you spend any time at all on Twitter. And if you don't, congratulations. But if you do, [both chuckle] you'll know that there's a lot of policing of language that happens there. Are you comfortable with the way that that happens?

ELEY WILLIAMS: It is... I am on Twitter, so I do not deserve any congratulations on that point. [both chuckling] And I... I really don't know the answer to that. I think that often through online communities, people are able to have that moment that we discussed before of recognizing words for themselves that they may not have come across before, and they're able to align themselves with the. And using that that richness, that new richness of vocabulary recognition. But if the flip side of that is people either hyper-correcting or applying labels to other people and kind of barricading oneself in with words, there's a selfishness there. And this is defensiveness there and... and I suppose also weaponization. So I... I think that there must always be playfulness with language and allow for play and curiosity. Otherwise, I think that, yeah, it is about walls going up and things being inscribed rather to didactically that runs counter with what I think is... is marvellous and marvelling about language.

MATT GALLOWAY: Can I ask you about one more word? And that is, baby, you and your wife just had a baby.

ELEY WILLIAMS: Yes, we did. A whole one. [chuckling]

MATT GALLOWAY: Congratulations.

ELEY WILLIAMS: [both chuckling] Thank you very much. Yes, he's 12 years old... 12 years old! gosh, that would be a long time! He's 12 days old.

MATT GALLOWAY: Twelve days old!

ELEY WILLIAMS: Yeah, he's still... I must say his grasp of languages is not yet what I hope it will be, but we're getting there. [laughing]

MATT GALLOWAY: What has his life been like for you? I mean, you have a novel that comes out, and then you have a baby in the midst of a pandemic. What has life been like?

ELEY WILLIAMS: As you say, the pandemic aspect has meant that we haven't been able to introduce him to as many people as we would have liked. And getting hold of various things in a rushed but measured way has been an interesting experience. The word interesting being used generously there. [both chuckling] But it has... it has meant that I've probably had less time to look at the news and probably have been all the better for it.

MATT GALLOWAY: Is there anything in the life of a writer that would prepare you for this moment of, I mean, the cliche is that a writer, you know, works in her or his small room and shuts themselves off from the rest of the world and focuses on this great work of literature and then out it goes. And we're all stuck now at home, and we can't get out. Is there anything that would prepare you for the moment that we're in right now?

ELEY WILLIAMS: Um, what's important for me about writing is that it is an active expression and communication. So to remember that while to write, you do have to scramble occasionally to get time to yourself and space to yourself, do remember that you can make a voice note on your phone when you go for your state-mandated work. [chuckle] You can doodle for half-an-hour while on a Zoom meeting. And if your thinking is based on curiosity and thinking about about playfulness, that's entering a state that is creative and... and that can be a way of energizing that part of you that maybe might be a little bit more sequestered or chaotic because of lockdown.

MATT GALLOWAY: This is a wonderful novel, and a lot has happened to you in the last few weeks. [chuckling] Congratulations on all of that. And it's a real pleasure to talk to you. Thank you very much.

ELEY WILLIAMS: Thank you.

MATT GALLOWAY: Good luck.

ELEY WILLIAMS: Have a lovely day.

MATT GALLOWAY: And you. Bye-bye.

ELEY WILLIAMS: Thanks, bye-bye.

RB: Eley Williams debut novel is called "The Liar's Dictionary." She spoke to Matt Galloway in February. That's our program for today. Coming up next on Radio One is Unforked -- the new show that dives into the culture and politics of what we put on our plates. This week, host Samira Mohyeddin is looking at the pastoral appeal of the farmer's market. Fresh produce, local farmers. It seems idyllic. But Unforked will ask what we're missing when we look at those markets with rose-tinted glasses. And since we've been talking about language this morning, we'll leave you with a song about some lesser-known words. This is the Barenaked Ladies with A Word for That. I'm Rosemary Barton. Thanks for listening to The Current.

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Monday 2 August, 2021 Full Transcript

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