Understanding is certainly contextual. After a month in USA I frequently keep misunderstanding; Sometimes, of course, because of unfamiliar words, but mostly because I don’t know what people expect me to do. The first time I was buying a coffee I stood like a frozen when the shop-girl asked me: “How many creams?” I was so confused by the question’s grammatical inaccuracy of singularity/plurality of “cream”.
Sometimes I misunderstand because I read different “parts” (modalities) of communication in different, or even opposite ways. For example, I misunderstood a party invitation because in my mind I could not match the lay out of the invitation card with its contents. Knowing that there are many things I do not know does not really help much when others do not understand that I don’t understand. Then, I can tell you, it is not easy to buy a sandwich, take a buss or even cross a street. Fortunately, I have now learned how to cross a street! And even more: I have learned that crossing a street is a local phenomenon which I can not expect to be applicable other places in USA.
On my son’s way to Urbana Middle School, there are several crossroads with four “stop”- signs. Every driver stops his/hers car and waits. But how would they know who should drive when? From a perspective of a pedestrian on rollerblades, crossing a road is usually a risky business because possibility for braking is limited. That is why I decided to follow my son to and from the school. I soon found out how dependent the “four-stop-sign” driving is on multimodal communication; Drivers look at each other. They look at us pedestrians to establish eye contact. They smile, nod or wave to let us cross. I am sure they also do their interpretations of what they see: People with unsteady movements and they wait and wait for us to move over. And sometimes I and my son cross in front of them even if we intended to go another way – We do not want to disappoint the drivers who have showed such kindness and patience!
Things are for sure done differently in different parts of the world. Meeting people through University of Illinois, makes it possible for me to get in touch with people from different places in the world and learn a bit about Korea, South Africa, Bolivia… Each meeting seems to help me achieve a little bit more understanding about how one can view the world, and how limited my own understanding always will be. Cultures have for ages been formed by interactions between people, but also by climate, geography, flora and fauna, migrations, power difference… We all carry them with us multiple layers of oil paint: new layers every day… may be each time we share word with someone?
… May be oil paint is not a good metaphor – At least I feel that the lubrications are much more moister than oil pain, and get more easily absorbed into my body and become a part of my thinking… Drawing a line between my personal experience, and my striving to be a “good researcher”, I want to quote Robert Stake who wrote so wisely:
“It is an ethical responsibility for us as case researchers to identify affiliations and ideological commitments that might influence our interpretations – not only for the contracting parties but for the readers of reports, and, of course, for ourselves. But there is no way for us as evaluators to identify all relevant predispositions, or even know them” (Stake, 2006: 87).
Stake, R. E. (2006). Multiple case study analysis. New York: The Guilford Press.
All images show the same sculpture from The Millenium Park in Chicago.
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