WORDS AND COMMUNICATION

Communication is a thorny topic. The most eloquent, intelligent, rational and verbose amongst us may have trouble with it even when trying to converse with someone who is sitting across the table from us. How much more difficult does it become when we are limited by time constraints, distance, the medium of the electronic message and of course any underlying language limitations! It may become even more complicated if one is trying to be tactful, diplomatic or discreet. Frequently, we must rely on the written message alone, and this may become less clear and more convoluted through loss of intonation, facial expression, gesture, other body language… The opportunity for misunderstandings increases a thousand-fold.
 
St Exupéry said: “Words are the source of misunderstandings”, and yet words are also our only weapon against misunderstandings. How do we resolve situations where our words have been misconstrued? By using more words! Resolution of communication breakdown needs simple words, honesty and a genuine sense of wanting to clear up confusion or perceived ill-will. However, the situation becomes more complex when words simply fail us. One may talk plainly, communicating lucidly what is in one’s mind, but the recipient of that information may pass the words through a personal filter that is tinged with any colour of the perceptional or emotional rainbow, and thus construe a meaning completely different to that of the originator of the message.
 
A frame of reference is important when we are communicating and the social and psychological environment of the communicating persons need be kept in mind as well. The simple word “love” can be uttered in such a bewildering variety of contexts that it can become bogged in a quagmire of communication breakdown. We love our spouse, love our parents, love our children. We love pizza, love our country, love our friends, love going on holidays. We love playing games, we can score love in tennis, we can meet the love of our life, we make love, fall in love, fall out of love. We can call our partner “Love”, but the woman at the corner shop can ironically call us “Love” also. Context matters!
 
Communication can be purposefully made difficult. We may choose to be deceptive in what we say or write. “No man means all he says, and yet very few say all they mean, for words are slippery and thought is viscous.” Said Henry B. Adams. Words can be a fortress we hide in, words can be the fog that obscures our actions, words can be our defence or our offence. Words can be daggers that are thrust to wound and hurt maliciously. Words can be uttered in a facile way so that they flatter and fawn. Compliments and cajolery, blarney or sweet-talk, propaganda, can all get in the way of true communication. Rumi advises us: “Know that a word suddenly shot from the tongue is like an arrow shot from the bow. Son, that arrow won't turn back on its way; you must dam the torrent at its source.”
 
In work environments the failures of communication are manifold. We write our emails, publish our communiqués, draw our labelled diagrams and we are the originators of much published material that the world can see. Just like any other form of communication, our work-related written material can create misunderstandings and can have consequences that range from the amusing to the dire. What we write about and how we choose to do it, can have an immense effect on other people that may be quite dramatic. What we choose to write about can heal or hurt, amuse or anger, attract or repel, inflame or influence, excite empathy or indifference. Our words can be balsam or poison. Or at the very least soporific!
 
I speak plainly, and communicate what I think and feel. If I choose to write about something, I do it because I want to and because I need to. My tact is genuine, for I do not wish to hurt anyone’s feelings. If I am misconstrued, it is has not been my intention to be so. If what I say seems obscure, words are there to be used, so please ask for an explanation. If I can resolve misunderstandings, I will almost certainly do so.

TEACHING & LEARNING AT UNIVERSITY

I was lucky to have been brought up by a family that values education. Beginning with my grandparents, then my parents, my uncles and aunts, even our family friends, they all extolled the virtues of a good education. I grew up in a household where to be educated was the rule. It was never questioned that I should do anything else but progress through school, enter University and then possibly continue on by studying further. My love affair with education, which was aided and abetted by my family, was supported by my own love of learning and the end result was that I became a dyed in the wool academic, never far from education and the pursuit of learning.
 
In the society I grew up in, education was not only respected, but put on a pedestal as the solution to that society’s many ills. A university education assured one of a certain social status, a good job, and a tacit understanding that one’s efforts would not be in vain but that they would contribute to the social good and resolve the problems that beset the country. Times have changed… Now the unemployment queues are full of university graduates, many of them with several postgraduate degrees!
 
I guess I am showing my age and my nationality to a certain extent, as views on education (particularly university education) have changed, especially now that I am in a country where the ability to make as much money in as short a period of time as possible is seen as the real measure of success – education be damned. To be called an academic in Australia carries with it a stigma, I sometimes think...
 
Being educated in Australia and finishing my degrees here, but also after working for many years in academia, has disabused me of some of my romantic notions about education as being the panacea for all the ills of the world. Nevertheless my experiences in tertiary education have convinced me that tertiary education can be a transformative, life-changing experience. The ways in which one’s mind can be opened and the breadth of one’s existence can be expanded are astounding.
 
Major Australian universities in the “Group of Eight” (our Australian version of the Ivy League) are committed to several important activities: Tertiary education in the undergraduate and graduate arenas, cutting edge creativity and thought leadership in the arts and sciences, professional education and world-class research. All of these activities are essential assets and the best of our universities are up there with the best universities in the rest of the world. But all is not well in Camelot. Universities also have problems, even if they are in the top tier, or perhaps because they are in the top tier.
 
Why does is does it cost so much to attend a university and spend such a great deal of money in order to be educated nowadays? Why do universities always demand more and more money from the government (and increasingly from their students also)? Why do universities try and attract more and more international students, who pay higher tuition fees? Are universities financially responsible and do they operate on a good business model? Are universities as scrupulous and accountable as they ought to be? Do our august universities concentrate too much on research and postgraduate education to the detriment of the undergraduate courses? Are universities truly independent and are their staff able to operate in the spirit of true academic freedom, that is, freedom of speech and enquiry? It is such questions that have been debated for decades and have created tensions between academia and our broader society.
 
In the last year or two, it seems that tertiary education has been thrust willy-nilly into a rack and forced into a situation of great stress. This is perhaps the most disruptive time in the entire history of tertiary education. The internet and its widespread, highly scalable use globally as well as the growing popularity of online education as a viable alternative to on-campus education has been a catalyst for this. The appearance of the Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) into the tertiary education landscape with the consequent opportunity for students to have access to free tertiary level online study was the slap in the face that awakened universities from their complacency and forced them to ask some soul-searching questions.
 
A student these days has many options regarding study – whether they choose to go to a physical university or not. In this rapidly changing environment becoming well educated need not be equated necessarily with being admitted to a “Group of Eight” university and paying inordinate amounts of cash to study. Flexible and global education solutions at different levels geared towards any individual are now readily available at a fraction of the cost (or free). Ultimately this empowers the learner who can make an informed decision and take responsibility for their own learning.
 
The question that arises out of this concerns the credibility, validity and validation of the education programs on offer. What is their quality, what is the ability for the learning achieved to be authenticated in a secure way, and primarily perhaps, whether or not the overall online experience is engaging, interesting and motivating enough for the learner accessing learning through the internet – i.e. the “onlinearity” of the offering.
 
Onlinearity being: The appropriateness and judicious choice of technology, good learning design and pedagogy, suitability of course material and learning objects, reliable delivery platform and media - in order to run an engaging, effective, quality online course.
 
As more and more reputable tertiary educational institutions worldwide get online, not only the public and employers are seeing these means of becoming educated at an appropriate level as a viable option. Government and some of our more conservative universities are beginning to entertain the notion that a student should expect a quality educational experience in blended and fully online modes. The costs of doing online education well are not insignificant, but one has to balance that with the cost of having students on campus and providing them with suitable facilities for quality face-to-face learning.
 
The bottom line is that quality educational experiences, whatever their mode of student engagement, require adequate investment and considerable resources. Whether face-to-face, fully online or blended, in order to teach well you require passionate, interested and engaged teachers who have the facilities, professional development opportunities and access to technology to develop innovative programs that facilitate student learning. The real question is whether universities are willing to allow this to happen by devoting adequate resources to develop good learning and teaching, but also reward good teachers in the same manner that good researchers are rewarded in terms of career advancement, promotion and status.

SCRIPTA MANENT

Nearly all of us still use email on a daily basis and it has become an indispensable tool in our communication armamentarium. Email is not only used in business, but also as a means of communication in education, and also for personal and social purposes. Despite the social media revolution, email still gets used, a lot!
 
Although email is useful and can achieve much, it can also become a two-edged sword, especially if it is used indiscriminately and unwisely. The ancient Romans used to remark: “Verba volant, scripta manent”. Translated literally, it means “spoken words fly away, written words remain”. It is originally derived from a speech of Caius Titus in the Roman Senate, who said it wishing to drive home the point that spoken words might easily be forgotten, but written documents can always be produced and be the conclusive evidence in public matters. This is a pointed reference to the reliability of written records, on which agreements should be based, rather than a conversation, which can never be agreed upon as an accurate record of what was actually said, if the two sides involved have a different recollection or interpretation of it.
 
However, the written word also carries a sting in its tail, as something hastily written in the heat of the moment, under stress, or in frustration and anger, and sent to someone via email can cause much harm. The ease with which we communicate nowadays via email, SMS, Twitter, Facebook or even through blogging has made us a little unwary. What we write remains behind as a record and we can be held accountable to it. A quick note written down hurriedly can give a completely different message to the one intended. Especially as the written word is deficient in terms of facial expression, vocal tone, gesture, and further clarification if your interlocutor expresses their inability to fathom what you are saying or what exactly what you mean.
 
How many celebrities (with the world’s eye on them) have had serious problems with something they published on Twitter or Facebook? How many stories do we hear of very public apologies and retractions of the thoughtless comments that were written unwisely or in haste? There are numerous occasions where something written has created huge issues not only for the writers, but also for the people referred to in the communication… Written words are powerful weapons, and in untrained hands or in the hands of the unwary, can injure as severely as sharp swords. More so than verbal invective, a written attack is there to hurt the recipient continuously and can come back to haunt the writer, who may have repented writing the offensive missive at a later stage.
 
I have often felt a need to reply immediately to an email I have received which incenses me or insults me or assumes that I am an idiot. How often have I sat down and responded in like tone or language! However, I always do so in “draft” mode. I never send the reply immediately. I sit on it for a variable period of time, read it, re-read it, change it, reshape it, and more often than not, delete the draft without ever sending it. The draft has served its purpose. I have vented my anger, rid myself of the poison and then, when I am suitably composed and having considered the matter from all angles, I rewrite the reply in a more sedate tone and in a more logical frame of mind. The heat has dissipated and in the coolness of good sense I reply in a fair and logical manner, without repeating the offence of offending the offender.
 
In other cases I write something on paper, seal it in an envelope addressed to myself (this is important!) put it in a drawer and come back to it later, the next day being preferable. When I see the envelope with my name on it, I open it pretending its contents were not written by me, but by someone else – a close colleague, a family member or my partner. I try and read the letter through new eyes, trying to imagine the feelings of these people might experience if they read this letter. I invariably feel embarrassed. On some occasions where I have not torn the letter up immediately, I have felt the need to burn it as tearing it up I did not deem to be destruction enough for it!
 
We have to be even more careful when communicating to a large number of people (how careful are we when we click on the dreaded ‘reply all’ button?), or to people outside of our immediate sphere of acquaintance. Professionalism, courtesy, leadership and good sense should prevail in all of our communications, but especially so in our written communications, which persist, can be produced at a later stage and generally haunt us…
 
Catharsis is a powerful feeling. We all need it, we all feel better after it has worked its magic on us. Writing a hasty response to a vituperative email or letter can prove to produce an even more virulent and damaging effect than the original communication did. However, writing such a response can be cathartic. Just don’t send the blooming thing!