The war over controlling language is deeply rooted in historical and legal implications
By VIOLET ZANZOT— vmzanzot@ucdavis.edu
Hell will be “raised” when a woman is waiting to be made a “girlfriend,” “wife” or “mother” (if she wants it). Hell can “knock on your door” to hand you “drugs” (prescription) when it used to hand you “drugs” (recreational). Hell has “swallowed us whole” when a “poet and mother of three” is made a “domestic terrorist.” Definitions are a powerful tool.
The power to control language is an invisibility cloak. It’s a way to hide in plain sight: to produce into material reality a constructed truth. The war over controlling language is the most important political debate today.
This discourse over discourse is a manifestation of political division and a debate over how we define people, social experiences, political happenings and places. It is putting language to lived realities to identify and explain the world around us. A definition is a “brand” in a singular word — the words I am calling “definitions” are, linguistically, the nouns we use to define proper nouns. For instance, Nestle as a chocolate is clearly distinct from Nestle as a conglomerate. These definitions are crucial to recognize, as their ramifications are both historic and legal.
When we say ‘‘history is written by the victors,” we are perpetuating implications we sometimes do not recognize. The expression cannot fully explain how we are part of a living, ongoing history. Everything that is produced today informs the way you and I perceive the world; it also shapes the way our stories will be seen and picked apart going forward. We learn people to be villains or heroes in real time, and one day, a class on the history of the United States will critically study what we said, broadcast, protested, mourned and celebrated.
Working in tandem with the ongoing social narrative is the legal network. The case Regina v. Ojibway, which discussed whether a pony with a feather pillow as a saddle is a bird, exemplifies my point; the court said, “We are not interested in whether the animal in question is a bird or not in fact, but whether it is one in law.” The law runs on definitions, which then guide conduct. In law, how we choose to define behavior has implications for each case and the overarching framework.
Renee Good’s life and death have been entangled in the battle of definitions, implicated in history and the law alike. Good was shot and killed by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agent in Minneapolis on Jan. 7. At different points, from different politicians, she has been framed as a monster or a martyr. Vice President JD Vance referred to Good’s actions, reversing away from the ICE agent in her car, as “classic terrorism.”
Good is not legally “a terrorist,” so coming from a trained attorney, this is particularly terrifying. She is a woman who has now been enshrined in history next to this definition. It only makes sense that this be considered a mistake, as the law will make known, but that does not relieve her from the ignorant eyes. Definitions have consequences, and there is a particular statutory definition, codified in law, that outlines what it means to be a terrorist. History and the law will wrestle with her — people must be careful how they proceed.
However you may have learned of Good, she can teach us why the war over controlling definitions is one worth the cost. It will be messy, there will be victims (there already have been) and it will mostly be hard: but it is a war that must be fought. Globally, it is clear that how we position people, circumstances, countries or cities shapes a material and social reality. This is a truth we know and live — every time we repost someone like Good’s story on Instagram, or ask someone when they’re officially going to be a couple. Definitions have power; be cautious as to how you define yourself and especially the world around you.
Written by: Violet Zanzot— vmzanzot@ucdavis.edu
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