2009/05/06

There's a difference between "suggestive" and "suggestion".

Here's another post that I've been saving for a rainy day. Don't you wish the rain would stop?

This issue came up in class a few weeks ago. There was a story, and the readers should have learned something from the story. Someone said something like:
  • × This story is suggestive.
What he meant to say was:
  • ○ This story has a moral. <- This story suggests that we behave in a particular way.
I feel that "suggestive" is usually used with meanings three and four from dictionary.com:
3. evocative; presented partially rather than in detail.
4. evocative; that suggests or implies something improper or indecent; risqué: suggestive remarks.
Definition from Edict:
挑発的 (ちょうはつてき) (adj-na) provocative; suggestive; lascivious; (P);
That means that if you say a story is suggestive, it sounds like it's about something sexual.
  • The novel was really suggestive, so I was a little hesitant to recommend it to my 12-year-old niece.
If we want to talk about the lesson we should learn from a story, use this:
  • The moral of the story is...(imperative sentence/present simple sentence). その話の教訓 (definition from 英辞郎 on the web)
  • Everyone knows the fable about the lion and the mouse. The moral of the story is what goes around comes around. (present simple)
  • Kusanagi must be suffering now from his antics in the park. The moral of the story is if you're going to get drunk and naked, do it in the privacy of your own home. (imperative)
So the moral of this story is don't use "suggestive" when you mean a story gives us a suggestion.

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