Language

Part 1: No Symbolic Language
I found this experiment pretty difficult because I am a very talkative person and I constantly have something to say. So when my partner was showing me a picture of her new puppies I literally had to bite my tongue to keep from telling her how cute they were. I also had a hard time trying to figure out how to find ways to let her know what I was thinking in a way she would understand but she was actually was able to figure out what I was saying pretty easily. That night I had spilled a customer’s water and decided I would try to tell my co worker what happened while doing this experiment. I started by making a sad face and she asked my why and my response was to knock over an empty cup. At first she thought I was sad that my drink was empty but when I shook my head no she quickly figured out that I was trying to tell her I had spilled a drink. While I was talking to my partner I noticed that she seem pretty uncomfortable at first and she had a hard time figuring out what to talk to me about but after a few minutes she started to talk more easily. The major difference in the way she communicated with me was paying more attention to me while we had our conversation; rather than doing something while we were talking she had to watch me more closely so that she knew what I was saying.
If we were two different cultures meeting for the first time I would say that the culture with spoken language would have the advantage to communicating complex ideas because they have probably developed more ways to convey different ideas and thoughts. However I think that the culture that uses body language to speak would have developed ways to communicate most of the things that they want to say to each other. I believe that the speaking culture would look down at the non speaking culture to them it would probably seem that the non speaking culture has not advanced as much as they have. It would be like one of us meeting someone from 90 years ago; we would feel smug because we have the advantage of all the advances that have been made since then. A major group of individuals in our culture that do not communicate with spoken language are deaf people; since they cannot hear enough to learn how to properly say words or to control the sound of their voice they use they hands to speak as well as using other body language to help get across what they want to say. It is very difficult for most people to communicate with the deaf community because not very many people learn sign language unless they need to and this causes a barrier between the two groups. A few years ago at work a group of deaf people can in to eat and while most of them were willing to write down their order for me one man refused. I spent the next ten minutes trying to figure out what he was trying to order and at the time this really frustrated me because we were very busy and I felt he was being inconsiderate. As I think about the situation now I realize he probably is frustrated that so little people take the time to learn how to communicate with him.

Part 2: No Physical Embellishment
This part of the experiment was very hard and it took me a few tries but I eventually was able to go the full 15 minutes without using any physical embellishments. This was difficult for me because when I really get into a conversation I have a tendency to be very animated and I am always making faces at what people say to me. I was easily able to keep my arms from moving by keeping them in my pockets but the facial movements and vocal fluctuations were harder to control. My partners way of communicating did not seem to change but she did say that I seem very emotionless and made or conversation boring. She also told me that if she had not known about the assignment she would have thought I did not care about the things she was saying to me. I think that this part of the experiment shows how important the “signs” we use on a daily basis are. I think that the “signs” we use give our conversations more emotion and give the person we are talking to an idea of how we are feeling about what is being said. When my partner told me something offensive that someone had said to her it took so my will power not to react they way I wanted to.
There are many people that have a hard time reading body language and a major group is people that have autism. This makes it hard for them to figure out when a person is upset or being sarcastic. I think that being able to read body language give people a huge benefit because you are able to figure out what people are feeling and if you are really good at it you can tell if someone is lying to you are not. A time it would be a benefit for someone to not be able to read body language is if you were trying to lie to get away with something; if someone couldn’t read body language you be able to get away with whatever you were lying about.