Whatever, Reader

A few years ago, the study of English changed my life. During the 19th century, Ferdinand de Saussure, a Swiss instructor of linguistics (commonly known as the father of modern linguistics), taught a pivotal course in clarifying the general operations of human language and, consequently, a general course in existentialism. In brief (if at all possible), Saussure detailed the arbitrary nature of language. Take a look at the following word: run. Run is a combination of a vowel and two consonants, three letters from the Latin alphabet, possessing a single syllable. This small word also contains many, many different meanings. In fact, according to New York Times author Simon Winchester, in his article, “‘Run,’ a Verb for Our Frantic Times,” the word run contains no fewer than 645 meanings, making it #1 of words with the most meanings. Of what did you think upon first seeing this word? Did you think of going for a run? A running computer? A test run? Running out of ideas? Running a ris