The great and powerful, as everyone calls it, the Russian language is rich in a variety of expressions. In our language, which contains about half a million words in its arsenal, the borrowing of foreign forms to describe any things is widespread. Perhaps that is why the Russian language is the most beautiful and complex. The vocabulary of one person does not reach 500 thousand. This is explained not only by an elementary ignorance of any words, but also by a lack of understanding of their meaning. You have probably heard a word more than once, but you could not understand what was at stake - this is exactly the situation.
For the most part, this applies to those expressions that are borrowed from another language or belong to special subject areas.
It seems that many have heard the word "consensus." Now let's answer the question of whether we understand its meaning. Probably not. An unusual expression that catches the ear, but the meaning remains unsolved for one single reason: the word is perceived in the context, which means we do not need to know it in order to understand the meaning of the statement. This approach is not very good because of its limitations, so it would be useful to understand what consensus is. This will be discussed in this article.
Borrowing words
The word “consensus” itself sounds unusual, not in Russian, which means that it suggests that it came from somewhere abroad. In general, why did such a tendency appear - to borrow words? The fact is that progress in Western countries is moving at a slightly higher speed than in Russia. The same applies to scientific thought. It is for this reason that new words “are created” there, and after that they are distributed throughout the world. Another basis of the borrowing theory is the fact that many things, for example, the names of dishes, belong to an exclusively specific area, and going beyond it was accompanied by the appearance of new words in the vocabulary of other nations.
If you have been abroad, you probably even heard expressions in tune with some Russian words even in European languages.
About the word "consensus"
For most Russian people, this expression will seem, at least, strange. For our perception, an unusually large number of hissing sounds, of which there are as many as three in consensus. Perhaps for some it will seem difficult to pronounce. Like many other words, whose homeland is ancient Greece, "consensus" is perceived as a kind of scientific expression that causes hostility. Nevertheless, there is nothing terrible in it - for people who are used to the scientific presentation of their thoughts, it will seem the most ordinary.
Value
What is consensus? Different dictionaries do not have a single wording describing the meaning of this word - everyone gives it in their own way, but in general, the definition may look as follows. Consensus - reaching a mutual agreement or making decisions that suit all parties to the conflict. In a real situation, so-called mutual agreement.
In other words, to find a way that would suit everyone means to come to a consensus. The word is really used quite rarely in everyday life, as it is of an official business nature.
When appropriate
As mentioned above, the word has a more formal coloring, therefore, it is most often used in various reports, reports on negotiations. Often you can hear this expression on TV in news releases. In everyday life, of course, the word “consensus” can also be used, but it’s much more convenient to say “Vasya and Masha have agreed” than “Petya and Sasha have come to a mutual consensus”. Also, because the expression is unusual and occurs infrequently, the interlocutor may simply not understand you, which may affect the result of the conversation.
Word semantics in phrases
By itself, “consensus” means nothing. The important thing is how this word is combined with others. There is such a phrase as “consensus building”. Its meaning lies in the fact that the parties were able to regulate their relations in such a way that they found a way out of the current situation. Such phrases occur, in most cases, in news releases, informational articles about any social or political events, and can also be heard in reports at various conferences.
Thus, decision-making in the form of the word “consensus” is rather an expression for the
business style of a language using in the above areas. For everyday communication, it is rarely inherent, rather this is an exception rather than a rule.
Synonyms
With what “consensus” is, we have decided. As it became clear, this expression is used for official communication, therefore, in everyday life we ​​need commonly used words. From the definition it follows that this is a kind of decision making that suits both parties. Therefore, for the word "consensus" a synonym is agreement. This expression sounds much clearer and is more often used in everyday life.
In synonyms, you can also write words such as “consent”, “agreement”. Knowing what “consensus” is, it is easy to check whether a word is suitable for the role of a substitute. For this, it is necessary to substitute it in the expression "The parties have reached consensus." Thus, when substituting, for example, “consent”, it turns out “Parties have come to an agreement”.
As you can understand, the meaning has not changed at all, which means that for the word "consensus" the synonym "consent" is legitimate. As an opposite example, we use the word “consilium”, since it is consonant and can be easily confused. The word "council" means assembly. When substituting in our phrase, we get something “The parties came to the meeting”, which completely distorts the meaning of the initial statement. Using the same principle, you can easily check absolutely any synonyms.
Consensus types
Like any word, “consensus” can only outline a certain range of meanings. Among them, for example, political consensus.
Such an
expression means agreement in any political matter, for example, when discussing a bill, different factions had the same views on the issues described in the document, but were able to come to an agreement.
Also, this expression may mean an agreement between the two organizations on any controversial issue. Thus, everything related to a settlement in the field of political actions either in the state or in managing a company and competing with competitors can be considered a political consensus. Its achievement is considered extremely important in situations when it is required to resolve any conflict.
There is another common form - social consensus. An expression can refer to any agreement between various social groups on issues affecting their interests. You can give an example: half of the residents of an apartment building have private cars, while the other does not. Vehicle owners insist on building parking spaces, but the rest oppose them, for example, because there is no room for walking in the yard. A consensus will be reached in this situation that when constructing parking spaces, vehicle owners will conduct a community work day to improve the area in order to create a zone for walking and recreation. It is easy to reach consensus - all you have to do is hold a meeting at which all parties will express their points of view.
Usage errors
Probably one of the most serious mistakes is that the meaning of the word “consensus is confused with the semantics of the expression“ compromise ”. If the first case marks an outcome in which everyone will get exactly what was originally laid down in their requirements, then a compromise is a way to resolve the conflict, in which the parties make small concessions in order to achieve one goal.
Also, as already mentioned above, confusion often occurs due to the consonance with the word "consilium".
Another common mistake is the use of the word in the opposite sense, namely the concept of it as disagreement and discrepancy. In order to prevent such errors, there should be a clear idea of ​​what consensus is. The meaning of this word is unique, and it must be remembered.
Conclusion
The Russian language is rightfully considered one of the most beautiful on the planet. It includes not only words and expressions, but also a huge number of different syntactic constructions, and the level of borrowing is quite high. Of course, there are many opponents of this way of organizing the language, but this process cannot be controlled.
Moreover, a considerable number of words are so densely rooted in our language that we consider them native. Why does it happen that some expressions quickly “turn dark”, while others take years, and sometimes centuries, to take their place? The answer is simple: for those words to which many synonyms have already been chosen, as for “consensus”, it is quite difficult to gain one's place. People are reluctant to use unfamiliar expressions. Nevertheless, they help to improve the language, and their use would be very desirable in everyday communication.