Mr. Brandt presented our class with a challenge. The challenge was to go an entire school day without talking. We were armed with a dry-erase board for illustrations and our amateur acting skills. The result was a very amusing but frustrating day. At the beginning of the day, simple events such as walking with a friend to class became awkward. It was too difficult to draw or act in addition to walking and carrying next hour’s books. At lunch, instead of the typical chatter going on, several picture conversations were started. We were trying to discuss our plans for the weekend. However, our conversations did not last long since it was very hard to interpret each other’s pictures. Most of us just ended up laughing at our drawings even though we never really understood the meaning behind them. If we could not communicate clearly our plans for the weekend, then it is obvious that we would be unable to carry on any sort of deep discussion. This goes along with what Postman says about not being able to teach philosophy with smoke signals. Our medium of charades and pictures limited us way too much. As a result, most of our “conversations” were meaningless but entertaining. We settled for simple amusement instead of trying to convey any form of real discussion.
I like your point toward the end when you wrote "most of our 'conversations' were meaningless but entertaining." This reminded me of Postman's belief of how our forms of communication in society today, while entertaining, are inadequate when comes to accurate and thought-provoking information.
ReplyDelete"If we could not communicate clearly our plans for the weekend, then it is obvious that we would be unable to carry on any sort of deep discussion." I like how you linked this with Postman's you can't do philosophy with smoke signals. It was difficult to carry on a conversation that lasted a few minutes on the surface level, and would be then impossible to go into a deeper level.
ReplyDeleteI agree with you that the medium of charades and pictures limited us. I also settled for drawing simple pictures so people could understand what I wanted to tell them. It is also true that simply walking down the hallway was a completely different experience when talking and words, as a form of communication, are taken away.
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