Language Blog Post
Last week a friend and I did a little experiment. We tried
to communicate for 15 minutes where I was not allowed to use any version of a
symbolic language, symbolic language meaning no speaking, writing, or other
forms of language such as ASL. In the beginning this was very difficult, but
after some time my friend began to get the hang of what I was trying to say. I
ended up using my hands a lot and some grunting noises to convey what I was
trying to say. My friend however communicated with mostly questions that
started to shape the conversation. A lot of the time she was just guessing what
I was trying to explain. Normally, this particular friend and I talk a lot
about different things all the time, but when you are forced to communicate
this way for 15 minutes, I had to carefully choose what to talk about. At first
she was confused and I could tell she was a bit frustrated. She had these
moments of just looking at me with an “uhhhhhhhhh?” kind of expression, which
frustrated me in return. After this frustration, she did change her
communication to mostly questions that required simple answers.
If we
were to represent two different cultures, I would imagine it a lot like the
first communication between American Indians and the Explorers of the new
world. In this scenario, I would have represented the American Indians and my
friend, the English speaking explorers. I think that the English speaking
explorers would be able to communicate more complex thoughts and plans as
compared to the Indians. This would be a great advantage to the Explorers and
would end up in the Explorers thinking less of the Indians because of their
inability to speak and communicate the same way.
Today,
in our culture people who have lost their hearing have a similar struggle. Of
course, there are many tools available to help, however there is still a
struggle with their communication. I actually went to school with someone who
was deaf and it was interesting to see the interaction between other students,
like myself, and him. Although he seemed like a really nice guy, I never really
approached him because I wasn't sure how. It wasn't that I thought he was any
less of a person, but I just was afraid of looking like a fool and not being
able to communicate with him. He of course had his friends, and they all used
American Sign Language to communicate with him, but I had no knowledge of how
to do that. It definitely hindered me in that situation and makes me realize
how important verbal communication actually is.
The
next day, we did another experiment in which we were to communicate with just
speaking and nothing else. This means no vocal annotation or any facial or body
movements of any kind. I am really an expressive person so it was extremely
hard for me to speak without facial expressions and especially without
variations in my voice. My first couple
of sentences, I had to start over because I smiled or raised my voice when
asking a question. After we were done with the conversation she said she felt
like I was a robot a little and that I had no emotions. This made me realize
that through our language we actually use a lot of non-verbal signs and body
language to convey our points. When we are talking about something funny, we
usually smile and in return that conveys an emotion. I didn't realize how much
emotion plays a role in our communication also.
When
thinking about someone who has difficulty reading body language, immediately Autism
came to mind. Autistic people have difficulty reading body language and picking
up on social ques. Although, I have not known anyone with Autism, I do imagine
that it would be a difficult thing to deal with. It seems like this would
result in a lot of mis-communications. I think we as humans rely a lot on body
language to send certain messages and those messages can be missed easily. However,
an environmental situation where it may be beneficial to not read body language
could be when meeting new cultures. Different cultures have different body
language and symbols that can mean different things. It would be beneficial in
this situation to not approach it with a predetermined set of meanings.
In
conclusion, this assignment has made me very grateful for our speech abilities
and the different ways we can communicate. I think human communication lets us
covey very complex thoughts and emotions and in a way is what defines us as
humans. Language enables us to grow and learn at a very rapid pace as opposed
to other species.
