You don’t realize how important it is to be able to communicate until you can’t communicate anymore.
I know this firsthand after being stranded in the middle of a foreign city with a train to catch in five minutes. Having no way to communicate really made me wish that I’d picked up some of the local language before I left. On the bright side, charades has never been more exciting.
Missing that train (and the next two) got me thinking about how miscommunication happens across languages, yes, but also within languages. Just because two people are talking to each other in the same language doesn’t mean that they’re having the same conversation. Intent doesn’t always come across the way we want it to.
Tone, body language, word choice, context–these are just a few of the signals sent back and forth in a conversation. They’re also just a few examples of how communication can turn into misinterpretation.
As a high school student who does competitive speech and debate, I can say with some degree of confidence that the clearest communication is almost telegraphed. Every word over-enunciated, every sentence structured to be understandable, and every complicated idea broken down into neat bullet points.
Of course, no one speaks that way in casual conversation. If we did, conversations would be scripted and stilted.
So what’s left for us? Are we humans doomed to eternal misunderstandings? Never able to truly know the hearts and souls and thoughts of others?
No! Miscommunication happens and miscommunication will always happen. And that’s OK. You don’t need to flawlessly articulate every thought and intent in a casual conversation.
What’s important is we’re all trying. Nobody is perfect, but as long as we strive to be understanding and limit our snap judgments, the words we speak will not fall on deaf ears.