The Language Teacher
05 - 2003

Nonverbal Communication and Pragmatics

Donna Fujimoto

Kobe University of Commerce




Nonverbal communication does not get enough attention in language teaching and language learning research. It is often erroneously assumed that if the communication involves a nonverbal code, then it will be understood by those present. Gestures, for example, are often thought to be universal, yet even a cursory investigation shows that they differ considerably from person to person and from culture to culture. Perhaps nonverbal communication has not received much attention because so much of our nonverbal behavior is unconscious, and it is assumed that nonverbal behaviors will be picked up naturally by learners as they become more fluent. Nonverbal communication is not widely researched or taught, no doubt because language researchers/teachers focus upon the spoken and written word--"language" after all is the subject of study--and it is certainly much easier to capture than the elusive nonverbal behaviors.

However, studying only the verbal elements without taking into account the nonverbal elements is as misguided as the blind man making conclusions about the elephant on the basis of touching only its trunk. Awareness of the importance of nonverbal behavior is crucial for teachers, students, researchers and pragmatists alike. Unfortunately, for most, nonverbal communication is invisible. This article argues that it is precisely because it is so invisible that it should be examined more closely.

Nonverbal behavior and verbal behavior work together and are totally intertwined when people communicate. Watzlawick, Beavin, and Jackson (1967) point out that no matter what we say or don't say, our behavior communicates. They argue that "behavior has no opposite--in other words there is no such thing as nonbehavior or, to put it even more simply, one cannot not behave" (p. 48, emphasis in original). In this same vein, when people interact, they simply cannot avoid communicating nonverbally. According to Bateson (1955), communication research shows that "as much as 90 percent of the social content of a message is transmitted paralinguistically or nonverbally." Those in pragmatics and language learning should pay heed.

Poyatos (2002), both a researcher and educator in nonverbal communication for many decades, says that "it is impossible to isolate the verbal language, the 'speech act'" (p. xvi) from the rest of communication. He is skeptical of Searle's (1969) definition of the speech act: "as if it were a reality relatively easy to isolate and interpret." Poyatos argues:

One cannot but wonder how a transcription of only verbal speech could ever reflect anybody's discourse, when speakers utilize at least, verbal language, paralanguage and kinesics.... It would lack those paralinguistic voice features that can modify the meaning of words (emphasizing, contradicting or masking them) and those eloquent independent paralinguistic elements that alternate semantically and grammatically with words (e.g. a throat-clearing) and it would likewise miss the kinesic behaviors that can also modify the meaning of words and signify by themselves with perfectly lexical functions as nouns, verbs, adjectives, conjunctions, etc. When we are shown an exclusively verbal transcription, no matter how faithfully those words have been registered, we know it is but a mutilated rendering.... (p. 133-34)

Thus if we follow Poyatos and others, our perspective shifts. Far from claiming that nonverbal behaviors should be allotted a separate part of the study of pragmatics and language learning, it is already part and parcel of any communication behavior, and we as language professionals need to open our eyes to their existence and effect upon pragmatics and language learning.

However, language professionals might argue that there is a limit to what can be covered in the classroom, and, after all, priorities must be made. Underlying this view is the assumption that nonverbal communication is simple. Far from being simple, it is very complex and encompasses a wide area. As we investigate further we find that it includes: 1) kinesics, behavior which includes facial expression, body movements, gestures, postures and conversational regulators; 2) proxemics, the communication of interpersonal space and distance; 3) chronemics, the study of the meanings, usage and communication of time; 4) haptics, patterns of tactile communication, i.e., touching; 5) oculesics, the study of communication through the eyes, including eye gaze, eye contact, eye movements, blinks, pupil dilation, etc.; 6) vocalics (also referred to as paralanguage), includes the nonverbal elements of the voice or sounds made by the mouth and nose; 7) olfactics, the study of interpersonal communication through smell; and 8) objectics, where the face, body, clothing and accessories also communicate. Poyatos' (1983) definition of nonverbal communication illustrates the depth and breadth of this area of study. Nonverbal communication includes:

the emissions of signs by all the nonlexical, artifactual and environmental sensible sign systems contained in the realm of a culture, whether individually or in mutual co-structuration, and whether or not those emissions constitute behavior or generate personal interaction. (p. xvii)

A briefer explanation given by Samovar and Porter (1982) is: "Nonverbal behaviors...constitute messages to which people attach meaning.... Nonverbal messages tell us how other messages are to be interpreted. They indicate whether verbal messages are true, joking, serious, threatening, and so on" (p. 284-285). It is important for us as language professionals to reexamine a commonly held belief that nonverbal communication is "communication minus language." Sebeok (1975), a well-known semiotician, strongly argues that this is "clumsily negative, simplistic and obscurantist" (p. 10). He claims that "the concept of nonverbal communication is one of the most ill-defined in all of semiotics" (Sebeok, 1977, p. 1065-67). Nevertheless, despite considerable research in many disciplines, no other term has supplanted it, and nonverbal communication continues to be used by researchers and the layperson alike.

Language professionals may argue now from the other side. Nonverbal communication is too complex and too pervasive to include in the curriculum. However, the issue here is not to push for adding "nonverbal communication" as another subject, but to raise awareness that it is already there. We should demonstrate to our students that effective communication does not rely on spoken words alone. One of the disadvantages of the classroom is that it is a rather sterile environment compared to the real life interactions that take place outside of class. If we wish to prepare our students to be able to function well in those situations, we need to expose them to the variety and complexity of the nonverbal behaviors that accompany speech.

Raising awareness does not have to take more time or extra lessons. If we want students to be aware of appropriate sociopragmatic behavior, we as teachers need to become aware ourselves of how nonverbal behavior affects us. Whether a student stands 15 cm, 50 cm or 150 cm from the teacher when asking a question about homework can make a difference in the teacher's reaction. The teacher may feel the student is being aggressive, too personal, too aloof or very proper. When a student who is called upon in class looks down at the floor, at another student or directly at the teacher, the teacher's evaluation of the student is certainly affected: the student may be seen as inattentive, interested, impolite, a good student, a poor student, etc. When a student is speaking in English, but uses a Japanese gesture, which is not recognized by a non-Japanese, miscommunication can occur.

It is incumbent upon teachers who are working with students from cultures different from their own to make an effort to understand the nonverbal differences that may be at play in the classroom. Scollon (1999, p. 13-27) gives a good example from her own classroom, describing how she did not stop at the conclusion that her students in Hong Kong were rude, but delved deeper to find out why her students talked while she was lecturing or answering a student question. As the teacher, she expected polite silence. There is much teachers can learn from their students.

Looking at the typical classroom in Japan, it is useful for both the Japanese and non-Japanese instructors to examine their concept of silence and then to compare this to that of their students. As Ishii and Bruneau (1972) point out, "the quantity of silence versus the quantity of speech is interpreted and valued differently across cultures" (p. 317). We can also read this to mean that it is valued differently inside our classroom versus outside. Perhaps it would be useful to deliberately point this out to students. Ishii and Bruneau also argue that "[h]umans become communicatively competent by acquiring not only the structure and use of language but also a set of values and patterns of silent interaction" (p. 316). It is certainly within the realm of pragmatics to help students become aware of when to speak and when to remain silent.

Hall (1983), an anthropologist whose lifework has focused upon nonverbal communication, showed how some ethnic groups are much more attuned to nonverbal behaviors than cultures that depend more on the written and spoken word. Japanese culture has often been cited as being highly nonverbal. This fact alone is a strong reason why language professionals in Japan should increase the knowledge and awareness of nonverbal communication in their research and their teaching.

With interest in pragmatics in our field growing, it will surely become more and more obvious that communication does not depend on words alone. Nonverbal communication must also become a natural part of our work.

References

Bateson, G. (1955). A theory of play and fantasy. Psychiatric Research, 2, 39-51.
Hall, E. (1983). The dance of life. New York: Anchor Books.
Ishii, S., & Bruneau, T. (1972). Silence and silences in cross-cultural perspective: Japan and the United States. In L. Samovar & R. Porter (Eds.), Intercultural communication: A reader. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth.
Poyatos, F. (1983). New perspectives in nonverbal communiation studies: Cultural anthropology, social psychology, linguistics, literature and semiotics. Oxford: Pergamon Press.
Poyatos, F. (2002). Nonverbal communication across disciplines. Vol. 1. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Samovar, L., & Porter, R. (1982). Intercultural communication: A reader. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth.
Scollon, S. (1999). Confucian and Socratic discourse in the tertiary classroom. In E. Hinkel (Ed.), Culture in second language teaching and learning. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Searle, J. (1969). Speech acts: An essay on the philosophy of language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Sebeok, T. (1975). The semiotic web: A chronicle of prejudices. Bulletin of literary semiotics, 2, 1-63.
Sebeok, T. (1977). Zoosemiotic components of human communication. In T. Sebeok (Ed.), How animals communicate (pp. 1056-1077). Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press.
Watzlawick, P., Beavin, J., & Jackson, D. (1967). The pragmatics of human communication. New York: Norton.

Donna Fujimoto teaches English at Kobe University of Commerce. She is involved with experiential intercultural training and at the same time is attempting to connect this work with a more research-based study approach.



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