Abstract
Depression, like most words, nests within a semantic web of similar-but-different words—
call this “the language of the downcast.” The language of the downcast lends itself to
nuanced reflection and analysis. Because our ability to manage our lives depends on the
ability to differentiate and articulate emotions and to represent them in scenarios of causation
and action, this is no small thing. Of late, the language of the downcast has been hollowed
out and rendered feeble, eaten away from the inside by the invading language of Depression—
with a capital D, to make the point that the word has changed, becoming the proper
name of a formal disorder. This impoverishment of language entails destruction of thought
and consequent debility of lives. (Robert T. Fancher (2016) The Humanistic Psychologist, Vol. 44, No. 2, 215–219, italics added)
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5viXpvvYMYEbGpqNDlvWHpucXM/view?usp=sharing
