Importance of context1.doc

importanceofcontext when conversation gets confusing, north americans say, i know you think you understand what you thought you heard me say, but im not sure if what you heard was what i really meant. we can learn how to find out what is going on around us in our everyday lives. but put into a new environment, we dont know what clues to look for. this can be disastrous or funny but it is always embarrassing. nobody wants to feel left out or clueless. as i adapt to china, i learn why teaching culture is harder than teaching language. language has rules. context doesnt. every word needs a context to give it meaning. if you dont know the context, the word is nonsense. you have no clue what it means. the clue is the thread that leads you safely through danger. in the greek myth, a princess gave the hero, theseus, a ball of thread. he tied it to a pillar before descending into the depths. as he went down he unwound the clue. at the bottom he killed the monster then followed the clue back to the light where the princess awaited him. a words context is its clue. a big english dictionary gives a sentence for each meaning a word has. a thesaurus gives similar words for different shades of meaning. however, thats usually not enough. two of my student friends were arguing in my home before our friday evening movie. the countryside is not the city, so isnt a town or village either. how can you say youre from the country when ive visited your village? one student asked the other. if its not city its country, the other insisted. finally they asked me: what does country mean? my favourite way to answer starts: well, it depends. to a city person, its true that anything not in the city is rural, country. to me, country means wild, natural, uncultivated, since i grew up near that. to a 19th century writer like hardy, countryside meant small village farming life. country also means a nation geographically. so both were partially right. it depends on what you mean. context decides. the best way to learn context is from people in the languages culture. sure, like the hero youll still trip in the dark. but with foreigners in almost every chinese university and commercial community, youll make friends who can give you clues about context. youll soon slay the monster of ignorance and win the prize. another way to get a clue when people are using words you dont understand, is to ask someone to draw a picture. especially in a technical meeting, this is vital. we foreigners often forget that most chinese colleagues need us to speak slowly and clearly, with explanations. in many meetings ive seen two people arguing. but then a quick drawing brings the comment: oh now i see, i agree with you! its okay anytime to say, that word is unclear. what do you mean by it? by saying that, instead of what does it mean? you ask for a personal view not a dictionary definition. ask your conversation partner to write the word. trust me, seeing it helps. i often cant tell the difference between two chinese sounds, so when it is written in pinyin then i hear it much better. if the meaning is still vague, say a word you think is close. if your partner says, youve got it! get on with the conversation. if not, repeat the process until its clear. take the tim