Deborah Tannen, author
of “You just don’t understand, Women and Men in Conversation” (1991) about mis-communication
between men and women, also wrote “Talking from 9 to 5. How women’s and men’s
conversational styles affect who gets heard, who gets credit, and what gets
done at work” (1994). The book describes the different communication styles of
men versus women, in working environments. Although her data were mostly
collected in offices in the USA, some of her observations may have a wider
validity and may explain some of the problems that lipreaders and people with
hearing problems in general, experience in work situations.
Tannen’s main message
is that conversation is a ritual, with unwritten
rules and subconscious expectations. When someone does not play according to
these unwritten rules, we experience cognitive dissonance. My word, not Tannen’s. What happens is not
what you expect to happen. So you have to do some thinking. Were your
expectations wrong, is the other person
wrong, or is there something else that can explain what just happened? Very
often, our response is emotional: “This
is not fair!” Or, in Tannen’s terms who describes conversations at work mostly
in game-like terms: it’s a one-down. Usually, feelings are hurt. The
result: consciously or subconsciously the person affected will try to get even, and/or will try
to avoid further conversations with the person who caused the cognitive
dissonance.
This happens between
men and women at work. Different rules, different expectations, resulting in
different subgroups. Different subgroups, each with their own conversational
rituals.
This happens in
meetings and in employee-employer talks. But as Tannen writes “On the job, the
meat of the work that has to be done is held together, made pleasant and
possible, by the ketchup, relish, and bun of conversational rituals.” (page 43)
“Talk at work is not
confined to talk about work. Many moments are spent in casual chat that
establishes the friendly working environment that is the necessary backdrop to
getting work done. (..) Both women and men know that their small talk is just
that – “small” compared to the “big” talk about work – but differences in small-talk
habits can become very big when they get in the way of the easy day-to-day
working relationships that make us feel comfortable at work and keep the lines
of communication open for the big topics when they arise.” (page 64)
And that’s exactly
where lipreaders, and people with hearing problems in general, will get in
trouble. They may manage in 1-1 "big-talk", factual communication about work, when context,
speaker, and conversational rituals are familiar and fairly predictable. They
get the hamburger, but not the ketchup,
relish or bun. Colleagues meet in groups, near the coffee machine, smoking
outside, in the cafeteria. The lipreader who tries to blend in there notices too late
who is speaking, doesn’t know the context, misses the clue of the joke and
laughs too late. Or: asks someone to repeat what was said. Or: responds with a
remark that doesn’t fit the ritual. Or: tries to monopolize the
conversation, because when you talk, you don’t have to listen. In all cases:
rituals broken, cognitive dissonance, hurt feelings.
The lipreader may
blame the others: they forget that I’m hard-of-hearing, they never take my
needs into account, why can’t they speak one at a time, take their cigarettes
out of their mouths, turn down the background music. Or: depending on the
lipreader’s personality and/or frame of mind at the time, the lipreaders blames
him-/herself: Stupid me! Next time, I will stay at my desk. Or at home.
One of the problems is
that these rituals are automatic, subconscious. The other person may remember
that the lipreader has ‘special needs’ for a week, or a day, or 2 minutes, but
– especially in conversational speech – will quickly go back on automatic pilot,
and forget to speak clearly.
Lipreaders shouldn’t
be surprised. It’s what they do themselves. You’d expect lipreaders to be very
good lipspeakers. Because they know first-hand how important it is to speak
clearly, one at a time, in well
organized messages. Yes, dear lipreader, you may think that that is what you do. But please ask another lipreader for more objective feedback
And yes, people with
hearing problems are partly to blame, themselves. They hide their hearing aids,
they get upset when someone speaks very – slowly – or – VERY LOUDLY especially
for them, because they so desperately want to be seen as ‘normal’. Whatever that is.
Men AND women, hearing
AND not hearing: don’t let your emotions take over when someone breaks a
ritual! Cognitive dissonance is good! It makes
you – and the other person – switch off the automatic pilot, it makes
you a more aware participant. Real-life differences feed your brain!
PS: Small-talk solutions?
- Befriend your colleagues on Facebook and regularly check their pages;
- Become the editor of a weekly or monthly company newsletter or company bulletin board and ask everyone to mail you their small and big news;
- Find a buddy who will keep you updated;
- Decide - and explain to your colleagues – that, because of your hearing problems and/or personality, you don’t do small talk. Several deaf people who were finally able to hear "small-talk" after receiving a Cochlear Implant report their disappointment: "Is that all hearing people talk about?" Yes, it is. Small-talk is mostly a feel-good ritual. It's not hamburger, it's ketchup.
