Sunday, January 3, 2010
Communication Stories
The videotaped class sessions from COMM 321 Winter 2008 include Professor Walker telling too many stories. Walker tells these stories to exemplify how communication theories and concepts can be applied to understand communication activity. What are your communication stories or personal experiences? Share them here and comment on the stories and experiences of others. What communication theories and concepts do these stories and examples illustrate?
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12 comments:
So here's a communication story. My boss, a fiery attorney in Portland, loves to violate the proxemic expectancies of his employees. For something simple, like replacing a light bulb or making a pot of coffee, he will often scream and shout from a totally different room to get any of us workers within earshot to get what he wants. My coworkers are always upset when he just screams at them for the other room, and I realize that it's probably because they expect someone to approach them, and get within a certain distance and talk to their face, when asking them for a favor. The fact that the lawyer just hollers at people from all over the office is off-putting. It might also violate a few other things like courtesy, but in light of what we're studying here, I think proxemics is a big part of why my coworkers hate the fact that he does this. When we're talking to each other, we always go to the other person's office, knock politely on the door jamb, get their attention, and then ask our question. With the lawyer, not so.
Lawers are a strange breed. Everthing about them screams theatrics. I used to work as a paralegal in my dads office and every conversation I witnessed there was highly dramatized. You have to be used to putting on a show if you are an attorney becuase its really an art form. Watching them in the courtroom is like watching an actor put on a preformance. And too a lawyer, coffee is like fresh air so its no wonder why he freaked out. My number one job was making sure it was stocked at all times during the day or there would of been serious consequences.
I enjoyed the instructor's story of the t.v. dinner and the replacement with old spaghetti. Obviously the message was not strong enough to be understood.
Thank you, Dennis, for your lawyer story. I have friends who are lawyers and I work with them periodically as part of environmental conflict resolution projects. Some are more open-minded and easier to work with than others. Some could improve their communication competence. And I almost went to law school instead of grad school...I am glad I chose the PhD over the JD.
Professor,
I was one LSAT away from going to law school myself! So far, from what I've seen of new lawyers, I'm not impressed ... So I chose OSU instead. I've seen a lot of new lawyers come into law offices fresh from law school thinking they've got a lot of stuff figured out, only to get their butts handed to them by lowly legal assistants! I've seen it happen over and over in my various offices. I see a lot of expectancy violations when this happens. There's a hypothesis to test in there somewhere!
In one of my on-line classes last quarter I had a very strange thing happen in regards to communication. My professor had a gender neutral name and in the picture that was posted, it was hard to tell if they were male or female. I never asked because I thought that would be rude (it really was a bad picture!) Instead I directed all my comments using gender neutral headings. I thought I was the only one who had a problem with discerning their gender, but on the final, one of the questions stated that she was female and that many students had assumed she was male. She then asked if knowing this changed how they felt about the class. After finally knowing this information, I felt that there were clues in the on-line communication that seemed more understanding and thoughtful of peoples feelings, which felt a little odd, but I could not put my finger on what it was that I was feeling about it. I think there is a difference in how people communicate in regards to their gender. I think I was feeling this, but didn't know what it was.
I think that it is interesting to not know through Computer Mediated Communication what gender someone is, and how that information can affect a relationship. It was a strange experience, and I still don't know if she tried to keep the information unclear or if it just played out that way and she chose not to correct people and then find out how they felt about it after.
Chris, good comments! It sounds like there's a little bit of the uncertainty reduction theory at work. When two people meet online, there is a definite uncertainty about their gender. What's interesting is the idea that the uncertainty can really only be reduced by a personal, face-to-face meeting.
Interesting.
Dennis
Another communication story: I was volunteering to help my wife at a big charity dinner this weekend. I was charged with setting up the name placards on the 90-odd tables in the dining room. I had just been working for about 20 minutes setting all the placards at an angle on the tables when, nearing the end, my wife's boss came over and said, "Let's do the placards like this," indicating a totally different angle. My response was quick, "I just spent 20 minutes setting up all the name cards this way, so I'll go undo what I just did." My wife thought I was being rude to her boss. On the other hand, I didn't think my comments were rude -- my work, with gruff, quick-tempered attorneys, had conditioned me to communicate on equal terms with my bosses. At my wife's work there is a communication hierarchy (which I violated).
I apologized later and explained that my bosses would have expected my response as opposed to being upset by it.
I like this discussion section the best. I enjoy reading how others are thinking about communication in their everyday lives. And Dennis, I don't know if you really did anything to apologize for, it seems that your wife's boss might have been a little insensitive to the work you had put forth, but I can see how the hierarchy thing does play a role in communication at work.
I am currently in Comm412, Communicating in Health. We use different communication theories when looking at different aspects of health communication. I have noticed that when going to the doctor they use physician-centered communication. A majority of it is one sided and patients do not understand the words that doctors are using. If physicians used communication accommodation theory the communication would be more reciprocal and patients would understand what the doctors are telling them.
Constance- I think you have a very good point. My mother has worked on the cancer floor at a hospital for many years and she has noticed how miscommunication or use of words that patients dont understand can leave them much more distraught when they finally do understand what the doctor means. If they could be more accommodating to the lack of understanding of medical terms I think it could be easier on families and patients to hear bad news. Its hard to hear some complicated name for your illness that you dont understand, and then have the doctor tell you you have 3 months left. Bad practice if you ask me
Constance, Matt, I think you're both right. I try to interpret things the attorneys say for our clients sometimes because they seem to be speaking another language. Summary judgments? Depositions? If I can summarize the interpretation quickly and help the client understand (they're trying to kick you out of court, they're going to ask you questions) they can begin to relax more. It is definitely something I notice, especially with some of our more worried clientele.
Dennis
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