Non-Comm: February 2011

A Cultural Barrier!

When interacting with other cultures we expect there to be communication barriers due to differing language, but people are less likely to anticipate nonverbal differences, often times resorting to use of hand signals or gestures that may infact represent somethign totally different in other cultures.

We talk a lot in class about how the middle finger in America is a negative thing, whereas in other cultures the middle finger is used as simply a pointer finger or something else that is less confrontational.

I havent had much personal experience with this but simply as a barrier I think nonverbal communication is the most tricky thing, because language's meaning can be found in definitions, but nonverbal communication has much to do about social cues and simply being in a culture. They are much harder to pick up on and understand as they as so integrated in a given culture and aren't taught in conventional ways, like a language can be taught.

Paralanguage

Paralanguage are the nonverbal elements of the voice. they could include laughing, crying, how intense a person speaks (such as yelling or whispering), pitch, and the ability to speak fluently (saying uh's and um's)

Though it has much to do with speaking paralanguage is actually nonverbal and could give away a lot. If I want to go hang out with my friends and my girlfriend tells me "Fine, go ahead" her actual meaning of that sentence could change drastically depending on the tone she uses and that is where paralanguage comes in. My girlfriend could say, "fine go ahead" with a happy tone to indicate that it is okay for me to hang out with my friends, or could give a sarcastic tone to indicate she would rather I not.

Or if I were to go up and present infront of class, if I stuttered my speech, using a lot of um's and uh's it could indicate to my professor that I may not know what Im talking about, or that I have practiced enough, or that I am nervous.

Below in this link, is a video to a scene from the TV show Scrubs the perfectly shows an example of paralanguage in aciton.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=okpxGGd2sVQ&feature=related

Clothes and Appearence

On page 121 Jandt has an excerpt about how clothes and physical appears can communicate to a person and really I think this can be the biggest part of non verbal communication. When any person first meets another person the first message that is communicated is the way the person looks and people are able to extract a lot of information from that alone.

Appearance can determine a lot. If I met a guy who had a shirt of the Philadelphia Eagles or LA Lakers on, I could instantly have something to relate with him on. It communicates a commonality instantly to me. Or if I am attracted to the way a girl looks I may try to impress the girl or act like a fool around her all because of my attraction. Appearance is essentially the first impression a person will get from another.

Going into a job interview or on a date I would be sure to wear good clothes, but if I'm spending the weekend at a friends house I would be totally comfortable with walking around in basketball shorts and a tee shirt. I think appearence can account for a large, large percent of nonverbal communication.

Time, Time, Time!

Chronemic's is a form of nonverbal communication that involves our use of time. Chronemic's in human history can cover all aspects of how cultures document and use time, whether it be through the use of calendars, clocks, or even simple understand of time. For example, Jandt states that most American Indian people undestand time to be cyclical whereas Western Cultures understand it as more linear.

But simply speaking about chronemic's in a practical sense, it could simply be how we use time to relate to people. For example, I am very punctual and on time when I have a meeting with, say, a professor or an employer. But if I am going to see some friends I may be a little late or consider my time as more loose with them.

Being late to a job interview could communicate to an employer a very bad image of yourself. So time usage is actually a very important nonverbal aspect of communication!

Below is a little video of Comedian Dane Cook talking about being late to work. Just to note: I do not like Dane Cook (at all), but this bit seemed appropriate. Also there is explicit language.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wCpwIaptQ04&feature=related

The Personal Bubble (Proxemics)

In the movie Bubble Boy, it's main character is forced to maintain a physical personal space block between himself and all other characters in his world. He literally has a physical bubble that determines his own personal space; this works much like the invisible 'bubble' that people have. On page 113 of Jandt's book she talks about this bubble as our personal space.

Essentially its the comfortable distance between you and another person. It can indicate where a person is from, how close a person is with another person, and generally communicate things that would otherwise go unsaid. For example, in America it may be normal to stand at a 2-4 foot range with someone while in simple conversation, where-as in Eastern cultures, like in Japan or China, it may be comfortable for them to stand within a foot or less of personal space. Or when talking about relationships, couples or close friends generally lower that two to four foot range and can be very close in public.

Personally I find myself very comfortable at any distance when talking with a person. I can stand close or far and not feel that urge to move away, or just simply feeling uncomfortable. Unless someone is 3 to 4 inches away from my face odds are I won't have a problem with standing near them. I also like to mess around and stand in the middle of elevators just to see how people stand around me. I read in my Comm studies that people have a natural inclination to stand at the edges of an elevator, so I like standing in the middle just to see if it throws off anyone. Typically they just stand at the walls anyways! Sadly, that is the extent of my communication social experiments.

Oh! Olfactics...

(Link) View more Raptors Sound Clips and Smelling Sound Clips

This is my favorite type of communicating and one of the most understudied. It's based on using your sense of smell to give a message. Turns out smell can trigger emotions like fear, hunger, and those related to sex, according to pg 123 in the book. More commonly smell can be used to speak for someones social status, or living conditions. I know I may see someone who's dressed like Donald Trump of something, but as soon as I smell them they have B.O. covered by a heavy scent of Armani Black cologne. Automatically, I know either this person is living out of their car, or perpetrating to get some panties. To me if you don't have good hygiene, you don't like to take care or yourself much. Smell is one of my strongest physical strengths, so people often communicate to me without even knowing it just by walking past me. A person with a strong Irish spring scent or Japanese cherry blossom makes me turn my head every time, and this often makes me initiate a complement and conversation with them. The most common research done on olfactics is still on animals though, generally on snakes, dogs, elephants, bees, and other creatures with dominant smell receptors. We as humans like to use smell to test the value of things too, such as wines, cheese, milk, and food in general, perfumes, situations like fires, and even people. To me, we use smell as a universal tool of judgement and the determining factor of whether something, or one, is good or not. Smell is still a subject among communication that needs to be explored more closely on humans before really determining it's most important influence on our communicating skills. It's important to me though!

What's Haptics...

Haptics is just touching. Touch is a sense most often not really thought of as a form of communication. Probably because we do it so naturally that half the time we don't really notice if we're conveying a message. If I think about, I often touch someone's shoulder or shake someone's hand when i'm at work and think nothing of it. But to them, i'm comforting and reassuring of my position with the company. My shoulder touch makes them comfortable around me, while my firm handshake reassures them that I am their superior and need to be respected. Still, there's those few clients who need to remember there are boundaries between employee and client. Occassionally, a male client may get too close or touch my chin to try and get intimate feelings across. In this case, haptics is used in a negative way and I call security or may have to file a sexual harassment case. In a general sense haptics is most commonly used among couples or people with intimate feelings for eachother. Friends usually display friendships by walking up and giving hugs, and couples walk hand in hand with eachother to show they are in a relationship. More commonly among couples is haptics acknowlegded since both partners are communication completely through the form of touching, especially in physically intimate settings. This video shows exactly what i'm talking about.

Silence, more than just Golden

I saw this film a while back and it still creeps me out a little bit. It wasn't because of the quiet, but the dolls oh God! Anyways, the concept behind this movie was you scream or make a sound and you die with your tongue cut out. In communications case, I don't know if silence will save your life, but it can share a various amount of meanings depending on how you're silent. Silence is almost like an unwritten rule. One of those things you know is there, but isnt really noticed until someone else mentions it. You could be having an arguement with someone, and as soon as they come back at you with something witty, you go quiet. This could be interpreted as you're thinking of something else to say, you're embarassed, you agree, or you may not want to admit defeat. Therefore your silence says it for you. I personally enjoy silence as a communication technique, because i'm a more interpersonal person myself. I'd rather show things through my actions than my words, like many other cultures among the world. Once again, different cultures may have different meanings behind their use of silence. In Asia, silence is considered a sign of respect, especially in business settings. But, among Americans silence is considered rude or being in-attentive to the person addressing you. In contrast, silence is similar between diversitites in terms of making a change. Gandhi used silence as a nonviolent protest technique to gain India's indepence, as stated on pg 119. While, in America silence is used to protest against discrimination among the LGBT community. Silence is definitly a subject I have a bit of a passion for.

Kinesics, a language all to itself...

Cues and Blues

On page 106 of Jandt's book, cues are discussed and mentioned as behaviors that are recognized world-wide in similar or the same ways. Most people think a cue is a signal of some sort that directs a person to perform an action. In terms of communication, cues are facial expressions that show a persons outward feelings about something, or how others should feel about a situation. Take for example this cat...

The facial expression on this cat is laughter, cueing to anybody else that something was funny. In the second paragraph on page 106, it states "Most people worldwide correctly identify the facial expressions of anger, disgust, happiness, fear, sadness, and surprise." So universally, cues seem to benefit the population as a whole.

Non verbal communication, is it really communicating?

I used to question and look at people funny when they would throw up hand signals or move around in strange ways while another person was talking to them. It took a while for me to realize that this person was deaf and was commnicating through sign language instead of saying words verbally. Chapter 5 in Jandts book goes into so much more detail about different forms of nonverbal communication that didn't even involve sign language. Some of the main ideas I caught onto were cues, kinesics, silence, haptics, and mainly olfactics.

While learning sign launguage this quarter, it never really occured to me that there are so many various ways people communicate daily without even saying a word.