The Curious Case of Communication

The Curious Case of Communication

"Biology gives you a brain. Life turns it into a mind."
- Jeffrey Eugenides, Middlesex

Most of us would read the mentioned quote in good heart. Unfortunately, unlike the most of us, I suffer from the unconscious habit of discerning unspoken ironies that surround us in our everyday lives. Man has been gifted with a brain that has let him create and conquer. We were brute back in the day, but modern times have taught us to use a far more intelligent weapon which despises bloodshed and gore, the weapon of communication. All of us would agree that the art of communication, is today, seen as the most important tool of an individual. The better one's expression, the greater are his or her chances in convincing the world, what the individual wants to divulge. But alas! Man always seems to bring out the worst from even his finest talents and just as the ancient Adam gulped down the forbidden fruit, we have made the rosy road of communication, absolutely dreadful with its zillion lingual forms. Yes, you've heard it right; languages, in my opinion, are the worst thing that has happened to mankind when we are to assume that man is gradually making himself more and more dependent on communication.

At this juncture, you may as well discount me for a madcap while dismissing my preposterous claims, but let me try to 'linguistically communicate' and convince you into accepting my observations.

Let us firstly understand the concept of communication. Communication is an umbrella term to define all forms of expression be it a body gesture, rough scribble, even a grunt or a moan. This implies that communication is a whole which should include both body and phonetic expression. Funnily, science has verified that, 'speech' or 'talkative expression' only makes up for six to seven percent of our entire expression which turns nonverbal communication, a unanimous victor in this field. Unfortunately, most of us instead of concentrating on the nonverbal cues, we constantly ignore them as we are all ears for what the person has to say. If the person's linguistic abilities aren't formidable, we tend to denounce the subject in one way or another. Language is the convict here.

Let's narrow things down to speech related issues for more apt evidences of crimes that 'language' is unjustly pardoned off. We are culture centric people living lives defending our 'own' from what's not our 'own'. Language seems to play an inseparable role in this perspective as the lay man would understand 'culture' as the sole combination of his mother tongue and ethnic ethics imparted to him by his forefathers. One offensive comment against his mother tongue could be enough to stir up a rage fit to murder a fellow man from another community. Most communal violence has an undertone of lingual rivalry which turns people into the barbaric hooligans. The same hooligans they evolved from, ages ago with the help of 'communication'. All this, for a language or two which aren't even letting them communicate their thoughts in appropriateness.

Switching from the ethnic stance to the economic stance, the irony of language and communication are startlingly parallel. Look at India for instance, a nation which boosts of tons of linguistic diversity. But what good is it, when a man has to dodge situations just because he may not be proficient in English. Let us confess that we are all judging every man who passes that proficiency test and mentally grouping them according as the 'educated' and the 'uncouth'. Such presumptions because a man may not express well in a certain language, while he may be excellent communicator in ten others. In our nation, social status and the knowledge of a 'language' is a match made in heaven.

Communication has been repeatedly punished by languages and a profound justification of this point can be seen in the form of the failure of verbal translations to capture the 'beauty' of the original work. Isn't it a shame for the world, that masterpieces can never be as enticing and fruitful when being read in their translated form? So hasn't the language barrier devalued pieces which are considered so well versed, so well communicated?

Imagine how less complicated things would be if everyone were to speak just one language. A language did not have to be translated and did not have to be claimed as some community's 'own'. A language whose proficiency would be achievable for all of us and its inefficiency was next to impossible. A language that could be rightly called a synonym of communication and the medium of expression every man understood in the same way.

Pardon me, for undervaluing the concept of language and the progressive edge it gives to our society. I am aware that we as developing creatures have come too far to change who are and my standpoint is a futile one in every sense. I only view things in this manner because I am aware that every time I write, I would be able to only reach out to a portion of the world and not the world in its entirety and every time I or for that matter you speak, we would only be understood by the few who share a linguistic commonality. And that is the saddening irony which man has brought about on him-self. For one day, man will be killed by this monster that he has created.

"Rabbit's clever," said Pooh thoughtfully.
"Yes," said Piglet, "Rabbit's clever."
"And he has Brain."
"Yes," said Piglet, "Rabbit has Brain."
There was a long silence.
"I suppose," said Pooh, "that that's why he never understands anything."
- A.A. Milne, Winnie-the-Pooh