Sep 11, 2012

Language a great barrier to communication

This title sounds a dramatized fallacy but a little reflection on our part would prove it a great truth. Disagree? Then listen to this.

We communicate in terms of language and our language proficiency is the sum total of our knowledge of vocabulary, grammar and all the tools that language offers like Idioms, phrasal verbs, metaphors , oxi morons etc.
                When our vocabulary is restricted or when we are ill at ease with metaphorical expressions, our ability to express stays curtailed.
Upon reflecting on my own writings and communications, I have found that my ability to express things gets limited due to the limitations that have rooted in my communication.
We try to speak or write in terms of the language that is within our cognizance. We narrate event, express ideas or write down depictions purely in terms of our linguistic capacities.
This greatly impairs our communication- both oral and written.
So, our expression should not be dependent on our linguistic abilities. Imagination should be free from it. It should be a play presented on the stage of mind. We should become cognizant of imaginations, ideas and views, and then try to present them transgressing the barriers posed by our language.
Example : If you don’t know the word “wallow”, pigs in your imagination just stand , sit or run around . They never wallow in the dirt around them. How realistic would be a pig that never wallows. In contrast, when you know the word wallow. Not only the pigs do wallow but lot more happens in the metaphorical realm. Your friends wallow in their past love affairs. Your old aunt wallows in the nostalgia of her glorious past and society wallows in the dirt of self-imposed inhibitions. 
Hence, we shall keep our cognizance free of imagination and then discover a language to express them and it shouldn’t happen otherwise.
Language should be innovative, fresh and adventurous. Perhaps then only we would be able to do justice to our intellect, that has immense capabilities.

1 comment:

  1. I read another article a few days ago on the same topic. A writer needs to know variety of verbs. Only then he can communicate effectively.

    Joy, your articles are quite informative. Thank you.

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