Using Language to Communicate
One of our authors shares this personal example, illustrating how easy it is to misunderstand someone else, even when we share the same language:
In college, the car I drove was still registered to my parents, so when I got parking tickets they were mailed to my parent’s house. At some point in my first year my parents threatened to stop paying for the registration because of the parking tickets. Stunned, I pleaded my case arguing I had only gotten a few tickets. In the course of nine months I had gotten seven parking tickets—and that was definitely not “a few tickets” in my parents eyes. Where they live, street sweeping comes once a month and they had a driveway to park in. So getting seven tickets was a lot. Where I was living at college, they came twice a week and I could only park on the street. In my mind the fact that I could get eight tickets a month, and I was only getting one meant those seven were just a few.
As you learned in Chapter 1, when we use language to communicate, we are engaged in verbal communication. When we think of verbal communication we often focus on speaking, but both verbal and nonverbal communication can be spoken and written.
Table \(\PageIndex{1}\): Verbal and Nonverbal Communication
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Means
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Verbal Communication
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Nonverbal Communication
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Oral
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Spoken language
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Tone, inflection, laughing, crying, etc.
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Non-Oral
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Written language/sign language
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Gestures, body language, etc.
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Verbal communication refers to our use of words while nonverbal communication refers to communication that occurs through means other than words, such as body language, gestures, and silence. Verbal communication is an agreed-upon and rule-governed system of symbols used to share meaning. This chapter will explore verbal communication in greater depth focusing on the nature of language, the impact of language on our lives, language barriers, and finally how to improve our verbal communication.