This research is important to the Christian world view because few scholars consider it scholarly to study the use and science behind taboo language, even though it permeates the lives of millions, if not billions, of people everyday. This research is also important in terms of how Christians interact with their community, the world.

This research started off with the assumption that Christians should be at the fore-front of taboo language use, in an attempt to stave off the power behind taboo language. After the research was finished it became painfully obvious that this assumption is not completely valid when viewed through the research. Upon completion of the research there can only be one new assumption, Christianity as it exists in the modern Western world does an exceedingly terrible job of relating to its “mission field.” It seems to have a tendency to view taboo language use as something that needs to be regulated and punished, instead of viewing it as the intrinsic language of those who have a tendency to be the audience for which Christianity has a desire to appeal to.

When taboo language is viewed through Symbolic Interactionism, one comes to the conclusion that the symbol/word has no inherent meaning or power without the interaction of a community, of which Christianity is a participant. If perceived this way it becomes the responsibility of the Christian community to use the power of interaction to nullify the power of the word by ignoring its existence, instead of perpetuating its existence/power by attempting to regulate/punish its use.

What is taboo language and why does it hold such sway over all societies, past and present? This research examines taboo language as a whole and specifically the English taboo word known, throughout this research, as the F-word. It should be noted that the use of an euphemism instead of the actual word is strictly an attempt to broaden the audience of this research and should not be confused as an attempt to regulate the research or as fear of punishment, thereby forcing the research in participating in the perpetuation of the taboo aspect of the word. It is also an interesting note that despite the use of an euphemism instead of the actual taboo word, the audience still has the ability to understand what is being discussed, without any extra effort from the research.

As Patty Campbell (2007) has stated in The Pottymouth Paradox, “A testament to the power of that word [the F-word] is the way the search made me feel paranoid and perverted—as if I might end up on a government list somewhere,” (pg 1). If one looks at the F-word in this way, does this word have any power of its own volition, or does its power stem from the social pressure placed upon those who do use it by those who do not use it. To understand the full range of implications of the F-word, one needs to understand where it has evolved from, as well as what it has evolved into. In terms of the research done here it is highly influenced by and follows closely with the research of Christopher M Fairman and his 2006 article known as F—k. His research is based in the legal realm and implications of the F-word and has been of extreme importance to this research.

The etymology of the F-word is highly debated among etymological scholars.

Some sources point to the poem “Flen Flyys” – a Latin and English mix…composed before 1500. Others claim the first know use of [the F-word] is in a Scottish poem by William Dunbar, “Ane Brash of Wowing,” in 1503. However, it took nearly another century for [the F-word] to make its lexicographic debut in John Florio’s 1598 Italian-English dictionary, (Fairman, 2006, pg. 7)

Although the modern composition of the word as consonant-vowel-consonant-consonant seems to have started sometime in the 16th century, words that shared a common meaning or had placed upon them the same amount of taboo have been recorded throughout history. An intriguing example from history is the Egyptian root word petcha, which means “to copulate,” (Fairman, 2006, pg. “During the last Egyptian dynasties, legal documents were sealed with the phrase, ‘As for him who shall disregard it, may he be [petcha] by a donkey,” (Fairman 2006, pg. The reason this is intriguing to this research is its contrast to our current society’s treatment of taboo language. While our culture seems to spend its time punishing the use of taboo, their culture saw fit to use the taboo in an attempt to help further the society at large.

Scholarly study of the F-word is ostensibly hampered by an overt “attempt to cleanse the language of this word,” (Fairman, 2006, pg. 8). All widely read dictionaries from 1795-1965 contain absolutely no mention of the F-word. “Not surprisingly, when the first American dictionary was published by Samuel Johnson, Jr. in 1798, it omitted [the F-word] in order to inspire modesty, delicacy, and chastity of language,” (Fairman, 2006, pg. 9). Although, “there is no consensus if [the F-word] was ever acceptable or precisely when it became considered offensive,” (Fairman, 2006, pg. it has displayed a surprising ability to survive and thrive while other once-taboo words have faded. The death of the equivalent 16th century words such as jape, sarde, swive, and occupy is the best evidence for the contrast between the inability of those words to continue in the arena of taboo language while the F-word became the king. Occupy has even gone so far as to return “to English with a nonsexual meaning,” (Fairman, 2006, pg. 10).

Why then is this particular word so powerful as to have survived centuries of purging and a lifetime of existing as taboo? This research takes what taboo is, into consideration. “Understanding taboo language is hindered by taboo itself. In other words, taboo speech is so taboo that it hasn’t been regarded as a legitimate topic for scholarship,” (Fairman, 2006, pg. 13-14). Only in the last century has scholarship decided it acceptable to study the taboo expressions that exist in all languages.

Taboo can be divided into two areas of interest: taboo acts and taboo words. Between the two there is the possibility of a correlation, but not always. Take cannibalism as a prime example, the act is taboo in most societies but in our culture there is no taboo word or expression to describe the taboo act of cannibalism. On the reverse side, sex is not an expressly taboo act, but a superfluity of words and phrases exist that have been elevated to taboo language status.

There are also purely linguistic taboos. For example, Thai speakers in an English environment do not use certain Thai words because they sound like taboo English words, such as the Thai words fâg (sheath), fág (to hatch), and phríg (chili pepper). Similarly, Thai speakers avoid English words, such as yet, that sound similar to Thai taboo words, such as jéd, a taboo Thai word for sexual intercourse. (Fairman, 2006, pg. 15)

Perhaps the most fascinating facet of taboo is the very definition of the original Polynesian word. One is anything that is “’sacred or consecrated’ and the other ‘impure, prohibited, dangerous, and disgusting,’” (Fairman, 2006, pg.15). We can see many examples of both of these characteristics of taboo throughout history. “Due to its sacred nature, the Hebrews would not say their word for God. For our Germanic ancestors, the names of fearsome animals were taboo. Their word for bear is unknown because it was never recorded,” (Fairman, 2006, pg. 15-16)

Taboo language may be as ancient as time itself and might be just as unavoidable. This type of communication has been found to be involved with “the more ancient emotional network, the limbic system,” (Spinney, 2007, pg. 4). The most intriguing part of this research shows that “when you stimulate the limbic system of a macaque monkey, it produces emotional vocalisations,” (Spinney, 2007, pg. 4). This has led some scientists to come to the conclusion “that these angry grunts and shrieks share neurological underpinnings with human profanity,” (Spinney, 2007, pg. 4). Because this type of communication is based in the emotional limbic system there is a large amount of force and intensity behind these vocalisations and “while monkeys appear to shriek, humans channel that energy through words,” (Spinney, 2007, pg. 4) This explanation behind swearing may also explicate the death of multi-syllabic words as the single syllabic F-word continued its rise to dominance over all English taboo words.

Another argument for the inevitability of taboo language might very well be the way our brain works.

The strongest evidence for this comes from instances of stroke patients whose brain damage has left them unable to speak but who retain the ability to swear…This has prompted neurologists to speculate that swear words are stored in the brain’s right hemisphere. In fact, they suspect that all formulaic expressions, including other taboo words, prayers and song lyrics, reside in the right, while propositional language – in which words are combined according to grammatical rules – is stored in the left,” (Spinney, 2007, pg. 4).

Regardless of why taboo exist, there will always be a social element of repression. When that social repression becomes a legal matter its known as institutionalized taboo. “Under federal law, whoever utters and ‘obscene, indecent or profane language.’ on a broadcast will be fined or imprisoned or both. But in 2001, the FCC clarified indecency standards, ruling that, to be indecent, the agency must find that the material describes depicts ’sexual or excretory organs or activities,” (Butler, 2008, pg. 2).

The problem with this kind of definition is the use of euphemisms. An example of a broadcast that uses euphemisms to get around the ruling is Battlestar Galactica. Any viewer of the show knows what frak means but because it is a newer, invented taboo it does not fall under the same ruling as the F-word. “’The idea of making up swear words is actually a clever one,’ says Robert Thompson, a television expert at Syracuse University. ‘First of all we have just plain worn out our swear words,’” (Menon, 2006, pg. 1). For reasons not quite explainable, “linguistic taboos erected over hundreds of years came crashing down in a single generation…yet ironically, fake profanities are sprouting as real profanities lose the power to scandalize,” (Menon, 2006, pg. 1-2). “When you get right down to it, you can’t make up swear words…it takes centuries of being afraid to say them and being afraid you’re going to get in trouble before they really mean anything,” (Menon, 2006, pg. 3)

Another interesting theory about the widespread use of taboo words in today’s society is the belief that the “use of expletives reflects another important function of swearing; to promote social bonding. Whether swearing is perceived as aggressive or as a social entrée depends on the context…’In the locker room, the guy who doesn’t swear is the wierdo,’” (Spinney, 2007, pg. 2).

Of course, not all research done on the F-word and its sister taboo words is done with the intention of understanding the use and original purpose of the language. Some research has come to the conclusion that the world would be better without this kind of language. Some research has concluded that “using profanity is a sign of laziness…lazy language is language you use when you can’t be bothered to clearly communicate how you feel. If you spew obscenities, you might convey a strong emotion – like anger – but the actual words you’re saying don’t mean much,” (Burling, 2007, pg. 2) Which could actually be another proof for the emotional animal sounds theory from earlier in the research.

“The unspoken truth is that there is no scientific evidence that a word harms a person…words do not harm women and children, which is the underlying grossly false assumption motivating censorship. This is part of the conservative mood in North America where belief is valued over science,” (Menon, 2006, pg. 3). This unspoken truth relies on the symbols of the taboo words or phrases being just symbols. However, when one observes taboo language through the Symbolic Interactionism communication theory, it is possible to see how this type of language is given power through community interaction.

Symbolic Interactionism is a communication theory that spawns communication theories. It is not so much a theory as it is a world view or perspective with which to view life. The most telling way that this theory can be viewed as more than just a simple theory, is that the man who invented it, George Herbert Mead, never set it down in stone. It was his students, his disciples, chief among them being Herbert Blumer, who wrote down and solidified his teachings into a cognitive and defined theory.

Symbolic Interactionism’s most powerful claim is that communication is, in essence what defines us a human. Our ability to use symbols and give them a higher, more abstract meaning, is what has placed us above the level of a mere mammal. We then use this ability to communicate more than just a simple animal desire for food, safety, and shelter with our peers. There are three core principles, meaning, language, and thought, that help shape the perspective with which a Symbolic Interaction disciple views the most important subjects in human development; the formation of the self and socialization into a community of peers.

Meaning, as stated in the theory, is the construction of social reality, with the premise being “that humans act toward people or things on the basis of the meaning they assign to those people or things,” (Griffin, 2006, pg. 56). If a person is new to a social situation, they might be perceived differently from various cliques within the social community. If the person buys an interesting item, such as a pink flamingo or something of that nature; one clique may view the person as eccentric, one may view the purchase as annoying, and another may view it as a personable incident. Which of these views is correct? Symbolic Interactionism finds that it does not make a difference if the views are correct or not because the viewpoints have become real in terms of their consequences. For instance, the clique that views the purchase as annoying will treat the person as annoying. The clique that views it as personable or amusing is more likely to communicate directly with the person, therefore more likely to find the person personable. Finally the clique that views the person as eccentric will forever view all incidents with the person looking for eccentricities, thereby making the person appear eccentric to them. Griffin uses examples like this to prove the Symbolic Interactionism’s viewpoint.

Accepting this premise on meaning, the theory then states that language is the source of meaning. “Meaning arises out of the social interactions that people have with each other…” and “is negotiated through the use of language,” (Griffin, 2006, pg. 57). The thing that makes people human is our ability to name things, inanimate, abstract, or otherwise. “Usually the names we use have no logical connection with the object at hand,” (Griffin, 2006, pg. 57). Symbols and words are arbitrary signs applied to things by a society. There is nothing inherently dangerous, ferocious, or intimidating in the word tiger. [emphasis author's] We can only attach these adjectives to the symbol tiger by communicating with other people, or symbolic interaction.

This use of language/symbols between social groups can be both a prison that the user can be confined in and a skill to expand the user’s horizon. The most dangerous aspect of language is its ability to confine its users. This seems to be more evident in an age where entire people groups can be labeled as terrorists, or liberals, or even conservatives. [author's emphasis] A single person may be labeled as conservative because they identify with certain aspects of the conservative viewpoint but do not agree with everything that a conservative has been slated to believe. However, once someone has been labeled as any of these things, its consequences have become real. Whether or not the label fits the labelee, the labeler views everything the labelee does in terms of the label.

As an example of the dichotomy of this use of language/symbols between social groups, is the ability to break down the walls that confine and open an entire world to individual and social interpretation. The most impressive example of this ability is the use of Socratic Questioning to more thoroughly define abstract terms.

Socratic questioning is disciplined questioning that can be used to pursue thought in many directions and for many purposes: to explore complex ideas, to get to the truth of things, to open up issues and problems, to uncover assumptions, to analyze concepts, to distinguish what is known from what is not known, and to follow out logical implications of thought. (Paul, Elder, 2007, pg 1).

For instance, what is justice? This extremely abstract idea cannot be defined to any sort of finality for any social group, past or present, but through symbolic interaction they have the ability to come to a fluid consensus, in order to better understand this idea.

The final principle of Symbolic Interactionism is thought, with the premise being that thought is the process of taking the role of others where “an individual’s interpretation of symbols is modified by his or her own thought processes,” (Griffin, 2006, pg. 58). The two most important subjects that shape thought are the formation of the self and socialization into a community, with thought being the conversation between two personae within the self; the I and the me. The formation of the self is provided by the two separate personae. The character traits that a person is born with, the things that seemingly come out of nothing (e.g. creativity) are defined as I, while the construct of me is a compilation of how other people define the person.

The I is associated with the right brain. It is the indefinable “goo” that every human being is born with. Every painting ever made, every dance ever conceived of, every song ever sung, has come forth from the I. “Trying to examine the ‘I’ part of the self is like viewing a snowflake through a lighted microscope. The very act causes it to vanish,” (Griffin, 2006, pg. 61).

Socializing into a community, or the social structuring of the me has its own separate facets; the ability to take on the role of another, and the effect of other’s expectations. As humans we have the astounding ability to take on the role of others and see ourselves from another perspective, this is part of the me construct. A terrific example of this is found in the Calvin and Hobbes comic strip book There’s Treasure Everywhere written by Bill Watterson (1996). In one strip Calvin poses the statement, “I wonder why people are never content with what they have.” To which Hobbes, Calvin’s stuffed tiger/imaginary friend replies, “Are you kidding? Your fingernails are a joke, you’ve got no fangs, you can’t see at night, your pink hides are ridiculous, your reflexes are nil, and you don’t even have tails! Of course people aren’t content!” Because this tiger is in fact a figment of Calvin’s imagination, it is actually Calvin taking on the perspective/role of Hobbes the tiger. Through this ability to take on the role of another person/being, Calvin looks at the human species from the perspective of a tiger. He has therefore allowed the tiger world view to affect and influence how he sees his own species, and consequently himself. He even shows the audience a little bit of tiger envy in Hobbes’ later statement, “Now if tigers weren’t content, that would be something to wonder about.” (pg. 157)

This ability to take on another’s perspective to view ourselves can also be known as the “looking-glass self.” The term was adapted from a poem written by Ralph Waldo Emerson, in which “Emerson wrote that each close companion… Is to his friend a looking-glass, reflects his figure that doth pass,” (Griffin, 2006, pg. 59).

This term however, encompasses more than just viewing ourselves from another perspective, it also includes the facet of the effects of others expectations, or what our social community states about us. This hearkens back to the idea of meaning and how a society can create meaning through language. This is the equivalent of a father’s famous words, “You are who you hang around,” (Robert Bartels, Personal Communication).

“In Jane Wagner’s one-woman play The Search for Signs of Intelligent Life in the Universe, Trudy the bad lady views…underscore the interactionist position that meaning making is a community project:

…How does a person know if they’re crazy or not? Well, sometimes you don’t know. Sometimes you don’t know. Sometimes you can go through life suspecting you are but never really knowing for sure. Sometimes you know for sure ’cause you got so many people tellin’ you you’re crazy that it’s your word against everyone else’s… After all, what is reality anyway? Nothin’ but a collective hunch,” (Griffin, 2006, pg. 57).

The idea of thought being the conversation between I and me is the crux of the final principle. It is the conversation between you and the image of you, thereby ensuring that the community has a hand in creating the self and the influencing thought. Because the me is in essence the community within the individual, the power of epithets, slurs, labels, and name-calling from the community is astonishing. For this reason, calling an overweight child the label of fat, becomes a sort of self-fulfilling prophecy. Whether or not the child remains fat when they are older they will always view themselves through the warped “fun-house” mirror of fat.

Because this “theory” tends to engender more questions than answers, it should be observed as more than just a simple communication theory, because it is more than a simple communication theory. Since it was actually started by a sociologist, it has deep roots in that arena and its validity is still being debated hotly in the sociological world. The biggest argument seems to be the sociological idea of social structure in terms of “’macro’ sociological phenomena,” (Dennis, Martin, 2005, pg. 302). This argument is based on conventional structuralist sociology’s idea that “where norms do appear they do so not as individuals’ personal, professional, and collective values but as the products of social systems,” (Dennis, Martin, 2005, pg. 301). The main rebuttal of this argument is that “symbolic interactionism is a coherent alternative to structural approaches, and as a consequence the concept of structure…cannot simply be imported into, or imposed upon, the interactionist perspective.” So, while it appears that Symbolic Interactionism ignores the idea of social structure, it simply has placed a surprising twist on the idea and “has bee, from the start, concerned with the ways in which social order emerges out of the dynamics of human interaction,” (Dennis, Martin, 2005, pg. 302).

Some exciting studies have arisen out of the Symbolic Interactionism theory. In 2006 Internal Self-Esteem: God as Symbolic Interactionism’s “Significant Other”? was published. It was a study done by April Chatham-Carpenter that explored the implications of “church-going” women and what it meant to have God and the church in the sphere of influence known as “Significant Other.” The astounding potential for this idea resonates through centuries. What would it mean for a person’s self-esteem if God is in that persons “community” and has a significant part to play in that person’s construction of the self?

The study’s results showed that

The women who spoke of the positive link they found between self-esteem and their religious faith noted five reasons for this link: (a) receiving self-esteem as God-given and -derived (vs. from other sources), (b) experiencing a personal, loving relationship with God, ( c) knowing “who I am in God,” (d) having a purpose for living, and (e) being supported in a church “extended family,” (Chatham-Carpenter, 2006, pg. 107).

This study was by no means exhaustive as it was “a study of 59 adult women’s stories about self-esteem,” (Chatham-Carpenter, 2006, pg. 103), but its inference is powerful.

What does this all mean for our American “Christian-based” world today? Why should Christianity care about the language it uses and allows? What is the responsibility of Christianity in a Symbolic Interactionism world view? These questions all have extreme validity and should be considered thoroughly by all those who exercise the ability to “speak” for God.

First we must view this researches artifact through this researches theory. When one views the F-word through Symbolic Interactionism it is easy to see the power that the word has been given. Since words have no intrinsic power, where did this particular word receive its power? The answer should in no way surprise anyone when there has been an overtly obvious “attempt to cleanse the language of this word.” (Fairman, 2006, pg. For almost two complete centuries, from 1795-1965, there is no mention of the F-word in any dictionary. The motivation behind this omission seems to have been “to inspire modesty, delicacy, and chastity of language,” (Fairman, 2006, pg. 9). So the dominant society for two centuries discussed among themselves and determined that this word/symbol was not modest, delicate, or chaste.

This determination, however, made the word appropriate for any situation that was immodest, harsh, or immoral. Those who lived in a harsher environment, such as sailors , hence the common colloquial “swears like a sailor,” found this word perfect for their uses. This in turn pushes the language onto any immoral situation a sailor might find himself in, an example may be a foray into the red light district. Now, in this scenario, the prostitutes and sailors have a common language that they alone have influence over, since the dominant society has chosen to have nothing to do with it.

These new rulers of this type of language now have free reign to find new uses for these words and phrases. So when a prostitute finds herself in an immodest situation, possibly stripping in public, both her and her audience, possibly sailors and dockworkers, have a word that just so happens to fit the situation. Thereby spreading the use of this word to the dockworkers and spreading its meanings in general.

This pattern continues on into the World Wars. According to the F—k documentary produced in 2005 by Bad Apple Productions, the two World Wars, the second one in particular, had a huge influence on the many uses of the present word, (Bad Apple Productions, 24:20). It is easy to imagine one seeing thousands of fellow Americans dying within feet of each other, with the blood and screaming and pain, and resorting to the emotional/animalistic part of the brain, to produce words/symbols that are pure emotion, “Holy F—king God!” If “Holy God” has a reverential attitude behind it from someone raised in a church, it would have been stuck in the right part of the brain, along with the F-word. Viewed from this perspective one can see how combining them strikes a picture of a small town boy standing in awe of the utter destruction he is seeing splayed out before him on Normandy Beach.

If one were to follow this image, one could see this young man going back home to his family and high school sweetheart, perhaps he even marries her. However, he is still haunted by the images that have been seared into his brain. He does not ever want to “f—king talk about it,” and he possibly even has dreams in which he is cursing the “f—king krauts.” His wife and children hear these words and do not have the associated images. The only thing they know is that he uses these words when he is angry, and so the children maybe start to use it when they are angry, and so on and so on.

Subsequently, through this picture one can see how taboo language, once made taboo by the dominant society, has a complete, underlying existence of its own. This theme of a community giving words their power makes one wonder why a community of Christians would want a word like this to continue its reign in the immodest, harsh, and immoral underbelly of society? Yet one sees this throughout our “Christian” society.

In the documentary entitled F—k the claim is made that “in the year 2000 there were 111 indecency complaints received by the FCC,” (Bad Apple Productions, 2005, 40:08) and that “by the year 2004 [there were] 1,068,802 indecency complaints received by the FCC,” (Bad Apple Productions, 2005, 40:26). The documentary finally states that “99.9% of the complaints were generated by Parents Television Council,” (Bad Apple Productions, 2005, 40:33).

It is clear that the PTC is a powerful organization that has made it its mission to protect “children against entertainment sex, violence and profanity,” (www.parentstv.org, 2008). However while it has stated through the words of its founder, L. Brent Bozell III, that “it is a non-political, non-ideological organization,” (Bad Apple Productions, 2005, 40:34) and that it is “not a conservative organization,” (Bad Apple Productions, 2005, 40:55), its website says that Bozell “is one of the most outspoken and effective national leaders in the conservative movement today,” (www.parentstv.org, 2008).

There are seemingly “basic ‘canons’ or principles of conservatism: [with the first being] A divine intent…rules society,” (Edwards, 2003). Through this example one can see that “divine intent” is behind the “conservative movement.” So once again, there is a movement to “inspire modesty, delicacy, and chastity of language,” (Fairman, 2006, pg. 9) with “divine intent” being the motivation. If one is trying to rid the world of such an evil and perverse word, what is the benefit of giving it more power through social interaction and attempted social repression?

A common Bible passage used in an attempt to sway people away from “unwholesome” language states that we are not [to] “let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen,” (Ephesians 4:29, New International Version) The problem with this argument is that it is a narrow interpretation of what others “needs” are, as well as the definition of “benefit.” For instance, what if a person has lived in a community that has interacted and decided that use of the F-word is appropriate at all times and they “need” someone to communicate to them using their language? How does a Christian communicate with that person to their “benefit” if “the guy who doesn’t swear is the wierdo,” (Spinney, 2007,, pg. 2)?

Someone who has existed in that kind of community may find it unappealing for someone to not use the F-word, approaching it with the mindset of, “Do they think they are better than me? Do they think they’re somehow above me because they’re not using a word, a common word, that my class of people uses?” (Bad Apple Productions, 2005, 20:07). They may even go so far as to think that the Christian has “got something to hide, and..think ‘oh what kinda phoney am I in front of,’” (Bad Apple Productions, 2005, 20:07).

This is especially dangerous to the credibility of Christianity when the “conservative movement” produces research results that conclude that “using profanity is a sign of laziness,” (Burling, 2007, pg.2). To completely discount a certain subcultures communication as “laziness” puts one in the superior position of having a better way of communicating. This type of rhetoric reverses the universalism of Christianity and puts it squarely in the grasp of the elite, those in the conservative movement. The problem with taboo language as it relates to Christianity is that, if the language is no longer taboo in the community the Christian exists in, Christianity should not be the last scion of “decency” holding onto the power of the taboo language.

Perhaps the most compelling facet of the argument for the fluidity that Christian communication should possess is the idea that Christians communicate on behalf of God. From the Chatham-Carpenter study of self-esteem and how God relates to their construction of the self, there is a powerful statement made that showcases the awesome power held by those who “talk for God.”

…Women often talked about how their image of God changed from a “punishing” image to a “loving” image. For example, [one woman interviewed for this study] told about a pastor who influenced her view of God: “He made God feel safe to me. Before, I had always seen God as a punishing God… (Chatham-Carpenter, 2006, pg. 108)

This shows that Christians, when interacting with their community about the abstract idea that is God, can have a profound influence on how God is viewed by the community. So Christians need to interact and pose the question of whether or not God cares what language is used to convey the idea that He loves the world? God has communicated, through the millenia, via a myriad of different languages and dialects. Why is this new dialect any different?

In conclusion, this research finds that words do have power and taboo language has extreme power but this power comes from the interaction of a community and not because of any inherent ability of the words. This research also finds that through social repression and attempted regulation the power of taboo language is multiplied, not decreased. This research comes to the determination that if Christianity and the “conservative movement” truly wish to end the power of taboo language, the F-word in particular, their interaction with the community needs to be one of dismissal of the power of the F-word, instead of attempts at social repression and regulation. This research also determines that, if the society/community in which a Christian finds itself deems it appropriate to use the F-word, then it should be completely acceptable for a Christian to use taboo language like the F-word. Finally this research postulates that the message of God has the ability to speak through any language and any dialect and that it should not be hindered by the false assumption that language can be repressed and regulated.

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