But you said...!

No one would talk much in society if they knew how often they misunderstood others.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

                Communication. Conveying ideas verbally. Speaking. Sitting down to talk. Letting someone know how you feel. Chatting. Writing a note. Sending an email. Writing a letter. Penning an article. So many wonderful chances to be misunderstood!

                Verbal communication is exceptionally important to human beings. It’s how we coordinate our efforts towards goals both individual and social. It’s how we attempt to convey concepts, relay information (vital or not). It’s how we try to express the myriad of ideas bouncing around in our heads, like playing billiards with only one pocket and we have one specific ball to get into that pocket, but the other balls are in the way, and the angle sucks.

                There’s a tendency for people to make assumptions about verbal communication. We believe that everyone around us uses language the same way. I suffered through English class in high school with my neighbor, after we played with G.I. Joes together in grade school, so we MUST be using the same definitions and applications for words, right? No. As the title quote today tries to relate: we’re a linguistic mess. We each, every one of us, has slightly different experiences in life, slightly different neurological programming through which we sift those experiences, and these produce (often) mild variations in how we use words.

                So what? They’re just words! He/She knows what I mean! That’s stupid, we’re both speaking English!

                The “So what?” is that the assumption results in dramatic miscommunication that spans the gamut from “I thought you wanted to stay in tonight” to “Why would you think THAT was ok to say, you moron!” to the fate of nations resting on professional examinations of diplomatic exchanges, trying to ensure that precise meanings are understood. Yes, I know the image I used before this paragraph is used quite a bit, and I dislike it because ONE of them is right. A third party put a 6 or a 9 on the ground, and intended it to be interpreted in the way THEY saw it. But how do we KNOW their intent? We don't!

                Children, perceiving themselves as the center of The Universe, often make up their own languages and are frustrated when the adults around them don’t understand. This is part of the process of learning that one is simply a single mote in a vast dust storm known as The Universe, and the other motes don't revolve around us, but rather we ricochet off each other quite chaotically. Adults don’t have that luxury very often. Someone who is expected to behave and communicate in an adult manner must THINK about what they are saying. Caution must be exercised in their word choice, with a consideration for the audience.

                Today’s blathering idiocy was inspired by my scrolling through The Week’s website and seeing an article about Elif Batuman's book The Idiot. Ms. Batuman addresses the linguistic challenges we face by pitting a potential romantic couple against each other with conflicting communication methods. She brings up the idea of the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, that language determines the way you view and organize experiences in your mind. I mention this only as a small part of the overall subject. The language we use in our own minds (normally our first, “native” language) has a strong influence on how we feel about the ideas we're trying to contemplate, and the language we use when speaking or writing places specific limits on how we are able to convey concepts. In The Idiot, the author writes

It was a curse, condemning you to the awareness that everything you said was potentially encroaching on someone else's experience, that your own subjectivity was booby trapped and set you up to have conflicting stories with others. It compromised and transformed everything you said. It actually changed what verb tense you used. And you couldn't escape. There was no way to go through life, in Turkish or any other language, only making factual statements about direct observations.

                Anyone who has learned multiple languages can relate. Some languages lend themselves to mathematics or engineering because of their precise approaches to material existence or manner of expressing numbers producing an ease of mathematical comprehension. Other languages provide a poetic approach that is both emotive and descriptive, while unable to capture specific empirical ideas. Moving from the macro-scale (German vs French) to the micro-scale, does my neighbor mean the same thing as I when describing an event? Does my companion convey immediacy or importance the same way as I? Often the answer is no, but we don’t recognize it unless circumstances unfold such that we’re hit upside the head with the realization.

                Much of the research into this that is provided for public consumption focuses on romantic relationships. The general theme is along the lines of “Men are from Mars, Women are from (insert really distant planet here)”. Generalizations are made, sometimes legitimately, often not. “But he/she said X!!”. Certainly, but YOUR interpretation of ‘X’ is not the same as his or hers. And thus the crux in that environment. But I believe this…challenge (?) extends further than can appropriately be labeled Men vs Women. In my experience, each individual has slightly different language usage, and 99.9% of the population either doesn’t see it, or doesn’t think it’s important. One sibling, who may have a high-reactive neurological make-up and thus is introverted to some extent, has a different idea of what the word “exciting” means than their sibling who is a low-reactive extrovert. They grew up in the same house, with the same parents, same teachers, same city all their lives, but the word “friend” means something different to each of them. Now expand out to the neighbor, who has different parents, is a year older or younger than you, and had a cat rather than a dog. Maybe one of their parents is an immigrant, and that parent’s native language has only one word for “snow” because their ancestors didn’t experience snow much, whereas you may have had an Inuit grandparent, and so learned 30 words for “snow”, each being used dependently on the texture, density, weight, and other characteristics of frozen water drops. How would a conversation about skiing proceed? It would seem to be the same, but tiny differences would lead to minor misunderstandings. Minor misunderstandings lead to different actions and reactions, which lead to major anger.

                What if your audience is from a culture that doesn’t value precision in their actions and products? "Early is on-time. On-time is late" makes perfect sense to me, but may never occur to someone from the culture I currently live in. What if, despite growing up in the same town as you, your neighbor's parents’ or grandparents’ native language leads them to devalue a gender? I tried studying one language that has blatant sexism built-in. It’s no wonder members of that culture, men and women both, are misogynist; they’re saturated with the idea that women are low-value members of society at an existential level, and from before birth. Because they THINK in that language, there’s little opportunity to conceive of another potential reality. How do you communicate certain concepts with someone who’s fundamental perceptions of The Universe are so dramatically different from yours that they are incapable of understanding many of the ideas you hold as universal constants? Additionally, how can you trust your own ability to understand THEM well? How can you reasonably expect to engage in ANY effective communication?

                When speaking on a subject which I care deeply about, I have a tendency to default to a rather precise articulation of American English. A few years ago I realized that my subconscious intent was to convey my thoughts as precisely as possible in order to avoid miscommunication. Guess what; it’s self-defeating. Few people speak that way. I end up confusing most of my audiences. Conversely, most people speak with slang, in a somewhat-vague manner, expecting their audience to “just know” their meaning. To someone like me that’s infuriating. It’s confusing. It’s frustrating. The only difference is that I recognize the difference. Other than that, we’re both facing the same problem.

                I’m not especially fond of the Huffington Post, but I ran across this article recently, and thought this paragraph quite appropriate:

What then is to be done if we are all speaking different languages despite using the same words? Shall we stop trying to communicate altogether? This is not a viable solution, as we still want to reach each other and be known, still want to dialogue and exchange ideas. Because the system is limited does not mean we limit our use of it. Rather, what is important is that we recognize and honor the limitations of language in the face of our desire to know each other, and keep all of this in the front of our consciousness. We must continually remind ourselves that what we mean with our words is probably not what another is hearing. When we receive feedback, in whatever form, that we not immediately react to another based on the assumption that what we said is what the other heard or more importantly, understood. Sometimes the response we are receiving is indeed about what we meant, but so often it is not. We can interrupt a large majority of the conflict that arises in our relationships just by recognizing and staying mindful of the infinite variations in meaning that exist within the very same words.

                Taking a moment to recognize that what I thought they said might not be what THEY thought they said would make an immense difference. Unfortunately we live in a world that teaches us to make assumptions and to react from emotion. Lovely words from various poets say “feeling is everything”, and western society has taken this so far as to burden us with social expectations of instant, emotional, reactions to everything, and to have quick verbalizations of our emotions. The lyrics “Say what you wanna say / And let the words fall out / Honestly I wanna see you be brave” have always irritated the heck out of me. It’s a lovely-sounding song, but it encourages knee-jerk reactions to thoughts and emotions that are dangerous. There's nothing "brave" about being uncaring of someone else's position on any given issue. There's noting "brave" about giving-in to impulses and not caring if your audience understands your or not, is offended or not. The song pressures the listener to never consider their words and tailor them to their audience, but rather blurt-out whatever they are thinking in a way THEY understand, and damn the misunderstanding, full-speed ahead!

                One of my favorite authors, Robert Heinlein (Starship Troopers, Stranger In A Strange Land) wrote

“Moving parts in rubbing contact require lubrication to avoid excessive wear. Honorifics and formal politeness provide lubrication where people rub together. Often the very young, the untraveled, the naive, the unsophisticated deplore these formalities as ‘empty,’ ‘meaningless,’ or ‘dishonest,’ and scorn to use them. No matter how pure their motives, they thereby throw sand into machinery that does not work too well at best. ”

                While he was specifically referring to formal behavior between individuals (calling someone “sir” or “ma’am”, showing respect, etc), the idea can be applied here also. Keeping in mind that interaction between people, even those ostensibly similar, is far from efficient and effective, we should show some respect to our audience and make allowances for different communication methods. Perhaps I communicate urgency in a way that you interpret as a lack thereof, and vice-versa. Thus if I were to attempt to communicate that I wished to engage in a specific activity or task immediately, you may believe that I see it as non-emergent and get angry when I begin that task right away while you felt something else was more important and perceived me as feeling similarly. Does this make sense? Semantic difference make an actual difference. The results of a miscommunication may be minor, or they could cause a long-term mess!

               

               I wish I had an answer. I wish I knew of some technique that would influence the entire species such that we'd all interpret every word and concept the same way. I don't. All I can do is take these challenges into account in everything I do. I can try to recognize when related problems exist, and give benefit-of-the-doubt. I can ASK that others do the same, but I can't reasonably demand it. 

               Just know that if I'm using precise words and technical terms, I probably care about the subject quite a bit and am trying MY damnedest to get a specific message across. I'll try to not do that, and take my audience into account instead. Now could the rest of the world please do the same?