In Communication Struggles, Words Often Fail Us

Sometimes words just fail us.

It’s happened to all of us. Whether staring at the blank first page of an unwritten term paper, or trying to make that particularly cogent point in section, or trying to explain to a roommate why you don’t want to live with her next year, we have all had the experience of trying to put what we want to say into words but being unable to express exactly what we mean.

Logically, things shouldn’t work that way. Human language is the most advanced form of communication. It is arguably one of the things that distinguish us from all other animals. We have a grammar that can specify any temporal relation you choose, and suggest degrees of force, intention, and probability: am, was, will, can, could, would, should, might, may. We have an immense vocabulary—the Oxford English Dictionary defines over half a million words and runs to 20 volumes in the print edition. You would think that, in this welter of words, it would always be possible to find one that expresses your meaning—that describes perfectly what you are thinking.

Yet this isn’t so. Language has such limitations that even the way we use it constantly refers to what it cannot do. “A picture is worth a thousand words,” and “actions speak louder than words,” are phrases everyone is familiar with. A crime so terrible that the witness cannot fully express their response is called an “unspeakable act.” Who hasn’t had the experience of trying to tell a story about something that happened to them and having to end in awkward failure with the tired phrase, “...Well, you had to be there”?

Maybe the problem is that there are too many words. In a language of multiple synonyms where “think,” “reflect,” “concentrate,” “ponder,” “dwell on,” and “mull over” can all refer to the same basic action, the difficulty could be in choosing among an embarrassment of riches.

Even more problematic is the fact that many of these seemingly duplicate words in fact carry differentiating shades of meaning. Think of “liking,” “attraction,” “desire,” “yen,” “yearning,” “lust”—and of the weight that a shift between any one of them can carry when used in a sentence. Often, different people assign slightly different meanings to words based on their personal perceptions, and the fear that those who are reading or listening to your chosen words will misunderstand can paralyze any effort to form a sentence.

Often, what we feel most strongly about we have the hardest time articulating. As varied and rich as words are, they can never fully accomplish what, ultimately, all communication strives to do—bring your audience in and completely persuade them with your argument, to make the person you are talking to truly see your perspective.

Although language allows us to argue, persuade, compel, demonstrate, and reason with, it cannot ever truly make visible and tangible what we feel. In the end, words are simply the messages in bottles that we float across the distance between our minds.
Sometimes it is impossible to pick the words best able to bridge that gap. Sometimes they cannot bridge it, even with our best efforts. The task of fully illuminating your perspective to another is in fact an impossible one, and words, although they fail sometimes, are the best means we have.

chloe.smith@columbiaspectator.com