Communicating without speaking or writing is definitely a
challenge. I decided to try this experiment on my mom when I got home. When I
walked in the door, my 15 minute experiment started. She greeted me asking how
my day was and instead of replying verbally, I used my hand to make a thumbs up
and lightly smiled. She was a little confused because I usually respond a
little more animated. The last minutes consisted of her trying to get a vocal
reaction out of me, but I still only responded using body language and some
hand signs. This was a little difficult because I would much rather talk than
using my body to communicate, and me not responding verbally made my mom a
little frustrated. It altered the way we communicated because the verbal
communicating was only coming from her and she had to guess what I was
saying.
Throughout the conservation, she was very much in
control. I had no control, because I could not say anything. It turned into her
becoming frustrated and just leaving the conversation alone. If I was able to
speak, the conversation could have been easily continued for a longer period of
time. It seemed like I had a language "barrier" when there really
wasn't one. If she and I were representing two different cultures, she
being verbal and me not, she would be at an advantage in the communicating
complex. In this, she was speaking and speaking is easier to get across to
someone than just nodding or using body language. The speaking culture may feel
superior to the non speaking culture. In modern times, this can
happen with deaf people, and the speaking people.
For the second part of this experiment, I was able
to verbally communicate, but I was unable to use my body language, or facial
expressions. I had to talk in the same tone through the whole conversation. I
decided to try this out on my dad. My dad and I started to talk about football,
because I am committing to a school soon for football. He would ask questions,
and I would respond with a flat voice, with no enthusiasm or excitement whatsoever,
and that threw my dad off because he knows how truly exciting this is. My flat
voice and lack of using my body to communicate made my dad believe I wasn't
excited anymore, when that wasn't the case at all. It seemed like this would be
the easier part of the assignment, but it really isn't. I would much rather
have someone use facial expressions and hand signals to communicate than a flat
voice.
When humans use body language, other humans can read it and can tell how
the person they're talking to is feeling. Sadly, there are people who do have a
hard time reading body language. Being able to read body language is important
for survival situations. If someone is planning to attack, being able to read
body language is crucial for your survival, or knowing when someone is feeling
down when they are not saying it. There are times when reading body language
won't help you at all. If you are speaking to a pathological liar, who is
constantly putting on a fake persona, you will not read them correctly and it
will end up not benefiting you in any way.
Part 1: That was brave of you to run this experiment without first explaining it to your mom. Do you think she would have responded differently if you explained it to her first?
ReplyDeleteGood discussion on the issue of power and control in the conversation.
I agree that those with symbolic language (spoken/written) have the advantage communicating complex ideas, but can you offer an example to support and explain that opinion? Would you be able to explain Darwin's theory of natural selection or Einstein's theory of relativity without symbolic language? I don't think I could. If body language was better at communicating these complex ideas, we wouldn't need spoken symbolic language. Because symbolic language is pervasive in all cultures, that tells us that it is advantageous in communication, particularly with concepts that are just ideas and not things to demonstrate and show.
Yes, this power differential between two people or two groups can happen between the "hearing" and deaf cultures... but note that it isn't safe to assume that those who are deaf will always be at the disadvantage. What would happen if there was a room filled with people who are deaf having a party and a hearing person (who doesn't use ASL) walks in the door. Who's at the disadvantage in that scenario?
Part 2: Good opening description.
The second prompt was asking about the information we gain from body language. You touch on this with one sentence. Needed to be expanded. Additionally, you are only considering the situation where body language matches and supports the information you receive from spoken language. What does it tell you when the body language doesn't match the spoken language? Humans tend to use body language as a type of lie detector. If spoken words don't match with the body language, we are more inclined to believe the body language and doubt the words. Think about how being able to detect liars might help an individual's ability to survive and reproduce (which applies to the next section).
Okay on the benefits of body language, but what type of benefits do you get by being able to detect liars?
" Sadly, there are people who do have a hard time reading body language."
This doesn't answer the question which asks you to identify those who have difficulty reading body language. What about those in the autism spectrum? One of the defining characteristics of autism is the inability to read body cues, which is why they have so much difficult in social situations, particularly with sarcasm and jokes.
"If you are speaking to a pathological liar, who is constantly putting on a fake persona, you will not read them correctly and it will end up not benefiting you in any way. "
Actually, pathological liars lie with words. Even gifted liars have difficulty getting their body language to lie with them. There is a usually a "tell" that reveals the lie. If a person is lying, I wouldn't want to give up reading body language as that may be the only way to detect the lie.
But is there any situation you can think of where body language might actually mislead you, not because the person is lying but because you don't know how to read the body language? Do all cultures use the same system of body language? They all use different systems of spoken/written language, so why would we assume their body language isn't different? If you travel to another country, can you trust the information you get from their body language?