communication.
I had a nice day with my mom today doing a bit of shopping (yay Linens n’ Things!) and having an awesome dinner (yay Dad!). Anyway, I had to get a bunch of work done after dinner and now I’m dead tired and ready to pass out.
Earlier tonight I was looking at my bookshelf in my childhood bedroom and I saw a book that I had read in college and began flipping through it. It’s called “That’s Not What I Meant! How Conversational Style Makes or Breaks Relationships,” by Deborah Tannen. I read it for Intro. to Interpersonal Communications Sophomore year and I remembered really liking it because it made so much sense and was so relevant (though it was written in the 80s).
I’m really big on communication and understanding how and why things go wrong when it comes to communicating. Like seriously, I think about communication issues a lot. I probably should have been a sociolinguist. But maybe not, because I think I already spend too much time analyzing conversations as it is. Anyway, this book does an awesome job at explaining the differences between men and women and their communication styles. It basically makes you feel a little bit less crazy and like your man’s not such a mess.
But in reading through the second chapter, I read an excerpt that I though really made a lot of sense:
“We need to get close to each other to have a sense of community,to feel we’re not alone in the world. But we need to keep our distance from each other to preserve our independence, so others don’t impose on or engulf us. This duality refelects the human condition. We are individual and social creatures. We need other people to survive, but we want to survive as individuals.”
“Another way to look at this duality is that we are all the same–and all different. There is comfort in being understood and pain in the impossibility of being understood completely. But there is also comfort in being different–special and unique–and pain in being the same as everyone else, just another cog on the wheel.”
We are constantly trying to balance these two goals that completely violate each other. And thus, it is impossible for communication to ever be perfect. I’m not really sure if that’s comforting to me or not.
But I think it’s a good reason for why we blog. We all want to be understood. And to know there are others like us. But just the same, we all like being individuals. Keeping our distance and not being smothered. It’s kind of a good balance here, I think.
January 18th, 2008 at 2:29 pm
I completely agree. Very nice way of putting it!
January 18th, 2008 at 2:44 pm
it makes me so happy to know that i’m not the only one who has held onto college textbooks that have meaning to them.
very well put…and happy weekend!
xo, bb
January 18th, 2008 at 3:13 pm
I think sometimes the balancing act can be frustrating.
Also like with blogging.
January 18th, 2008 at 3:50 pm
I might have to look into this book… I think you touched on a big struggle, that between doing it on your own and feeling connected to other people. Sometimes I have trouble knowing where the boundaries are.
January 18th, 2008 at 4:10 pm
Deborah Tannen was on The Colbert Report this week. AND I just had my first day of Interpersonal Comm. Cool!
January 18th, 2008 at 4:19 pm
I love this post. So true!
January 18th, 2008 at 4:33 pm
I’m a huge fan of Deborah Tannen. I read “Talking from from 9-5. Men and Women in the Workplace: Language, Sex and Power” freshman year and I really liked it. I love analyzing the language we use when communicating with each other.
January 18th, 2008 at 6:03 pm
I was a Comm major in college and I definitely read stuff like this and it just makes so much sense.
January 18th, 2008 at 6:46 pm
I loved Deborah Tannens book about mother-daughter communication (I think it’s called “You’re Wearing THAT?”). It really helped me talk to my mom more effectively!
January 18th, 2008 at 7:10 pm
coulda woulda shoulda been a sociolinguist?! me! that’s me too! i love language and sociology and language as a vehicle for members of one society. one of the best classes i took in college was Society & Language (very creative title, i know).
i analyze even while i fight with my boyfriend. i know that i’m falling into the traps … but i have yet to apply what i have learned.
obviously. =)
have a wonderful weekend, honeypie! thanks for getting me all excited about not being the only sociolinguist wannabe
January 19th, 2008 at 8:14 pm
That is a very interesting idea, the whole balancing act. Yet I completely agree! Which is why I love blogging so much, yet try not to put too much of my real “self” out there. Maybe someday I’ll delve into the deeper issues that I never mention on my blog, haha.
Have a great weekend!