Jackie, the young, independent-minded woman who drives this character study, doesn't have a problem articulating herself.
The authority of woman in language – her ability both to articulate herself and to make herself intelligible – is worlds away from her dispossession in art, the radicalism of her gaze, her struggle with the complicity of her own image as painterly subject and muse.
"People were asking things of her that she wasn't able to articulate for herself," says Wasikowska. "Everybody wanted an explanation as to why she was doing this, and I like that she didn't feel she owed anybody one".
She was too peevish, too egocentric and lacking in self-awareness, qualities for which her dry wit and articulate presentation of herself didn't compensate.
But too often the author seems reluctant to articulate what she herself thinks of these records, or to assess how they've stood up.
And teaching her how to be articulate – and express herself in an appropriate way – will only help her be a successful, independent woman when she grows up.
When a black speaker gets the most comfortable, the most articulate, the most herself — that is exactly when she is likely to slide in an "ax" for "ask". Immediately she sounds ignorant to any nonblack person who hears her, not to mention to quite a few black ones.
In other words she can understand what is being said but cannot articulate words very well herself.
But Emily is so articulate and sure of herself that your initial impulse is to suspend doubt and applaud her nervy independence.
It's Sal's recognition of the power latent in words, together with her ability to mobilise the skills of people more articulate and influential than herself, that saves Will's skin; and it's her courageous decision to accompany him to Australia that ensures his relatively easy passage to freedom and a full pardon.
