Limitations of Vocabulary

A large vocabulary can make you look smart. It can also confuse people. Or it can make you seem improperly educated.

Yes, I said improperly educated. How? Simple. There are those out there with smaller vocabularies. What difference does that make? Well, those people may not have the full knowledge of a word that you do, and they can think you are using a word in the wrong context.

For example, I said that my literature teacher appraised my paper as college level. My mom thought I was using the word incorrectly -- You don't "appraise" papers. You appraise diamonds. But she looked it up and found that it means to "assess, determine the value." Now the term is growing on her. But how many others would read such a sentence and consider it wrong, or at least awkward?

It's one thing to have to explain stuff to those who do not understand, but it can get annoying when you must defend your works from incorrect, accusatory judgements.