"What Goes Unsaid Goes Over Our Heads"

Last class, we participated in an exercise where we attempted to tell emotional stories using no nonverbal communication. It was hard. For me, I could not convey the fear and distress I was in without using elaborate hand gestures and changing the inflection of my voice. While the exercise was slightly comical, it really highlighted the necessity of nonverbal communication.

When I say that nonverbal communication is necessary, I don’t mean that we need to consciously remember to use it. The storytelling exercise in class proves that it is impossible to correspond with anyone without using it! When I say that nonverbal communication is necessary, I mean that it is necessary to learn about and understand nonverbal communication and understand its role and function in everyday society. The textbook described a woman in a foreign culture giving a friendly wave to a man from a balcony, only to have him come up to her door! On the surface, this sounds like a humorous anecdote but a combination of misunderstandings like this can result in terrible atrocities.

Reading nonverbal communication is a valuable tool for any person in any situation. For example, in justice class, we discussed reading the nonverbal messages given by people under question in depositions. Since depositions are very expensive, some legal scholars have suggested doing them over Skype or webcam to reduce travel costs. The biggest problem with this idea is the inability to read people’s nonverbal cues through a screen. Effective businessmen, teachers, doctors, plumbers, filmmakers, and everyone else under the sun must be able to pick up on nonverbal communication in order to be successful at their respective occupations.

What goes unsaid goes over our heads. This is my philosophy regarding humans’ abilities to consciously recognize nonverbal communication in the big scheme of things. Sure, we know that good eye contact and posture are always a positive, but can we articulate why that is? We have a clear distinction on what constitutes as personal space, but are we aware of the differences in proxemics with other cultures, and the implications that has for ours? When I say that nonverbal communication is a necessity, I mean that understanding nonverbal communication is essential, in the context of politics, economics, religion, history, sociology, or simply the phenomenon called everyday life.

On a completely unrelated tangent: Is it possible to understand and discuss nonverbal communication with others, nonverbally?