Interview on Rating Speeches

Recently I had the pleasure of being interviewed by Zaydoon Jawadi on rating/evaluating speeches for RateSpeeches. The interview can be accessed with the above link. The press release can be found at:

http://www.24-7pressrelease.com/press-release-service/215750.

Communication Strategies: How Not to Talk Like a Heterosexist/Homophobe

Unlike sexist language, heterosexist or homophobic language is still very much with us and it should prove useful to identify some of the ways we can avoid talk that puts down gay men and lesbians. As with sexist language, much of this will be familiar and yet it may help to review some of the commonly offered suggestions.

Heterosexism exists on both an individual and an institutional level. Individual heterosexism consists of attitudes, behaviors, and language that disparage gay men and lesbians and includes the belief that all sexual behavior that is not heterosexual is unnatural and deserving of criticism and condemnation. These beliefs are at the heart of antigay violence and gay bashing. Individual heterosexism also includes such beliefs as the notions that homosexuals are more likely to commit crimes than are heterosexuals (there’s actually no difference) and to molest children than are heterosexuals (actually, child molesters are overwhelmingly heterosexual, married men). It also includes the belief that homosexuals cannot maintain stable relationships or effectively raise children, beliefs that contradict research evidence.

Institutional heterosexism is easy to identify. For example, the ban on gay marriage in most states and the fact that at this time only a handful of states allows gay marriage is a good example of institutional heterosexism. Other examples include the Catholic Church’s ban on homosexual priests,
and the many laws prohibiting adoption of children by gay people. In some cultures homosexual relations are illegal (for example, in India, Malaysia, Pakistan, and Singapore); penalties range from a “misdemeanor” charge in Liberia to life in jail in Singapore and death in Pakistan.

Heterosexist language includes derogatory terms used for lesbians and gay men. For example, in one survey in the military showed that 80 percent of those surveyed heard offensive speech about gay men and lesbians and that 85 percent believed that such derogatory speech was “tolerated”. You also see heterosexism in more subtle forms of language usage; for example, when you qualify a professional—as in “gay athlete” or “lesbian doctor”—and, in effect, say that athletes and doctors are not normally gay or lesbian.

Still another form of heterosexism is the presumption of heterosexuality. Usually, people assume the person they’re talking to or about is heterosexual. And usually they’re correct, because most people are heterosexual. At the same time, however, this presumption denies the lesbian or gay identity a certain legitimacy. The practice is very similar to the presumptions of whiteness and maleness that we have made significant inroads in eliminating.

Examine your own language for possible heterosexism and consider, for example, if you do any of the following:

<  use offensive nonverbal mannerisms that parody stereotypes when talking about gay men and lesbians. Do you respond to gay couples with the “startled eye blink”?

<  “compliment” gay men and lesbians by saying that they “don’t look it”. To gay men and lesbians, this is not a compliment. Similarly, expressing disappointment that a person is gay—often thought to be a compliment, as in comments such as “What a waste!”—is not really a compliment.

<  make the assumption that every gay or lesbian knows what every other gay or lesbian is thinking.  It’s similar to asking a Japanese person why Sony is investing heavily in the United States.

<  rely on stereotypes. Saying things like “Lesbians are so loyal” or “Gay men are so open with their feelings,” ignore the reality of wide differences within any group and are potentially
insulting to all groups.

<  overattribute. This is the tendency to attribute just about everything a person does, says, and believes to the fact that the person is gay or lesbian? This tendency helps to activate and
perpetuate stereotypes.

<  forget that relationship milestones are important to all people? Ignoring anniversaries or birthdays of, say, a relative’s partner is resented by everyone.

As you think about heterosexism, recognize not only that heterosexist language will create barriers to communication but also that its absence will foster more meaningful communication: greater comfort, an increased willingness to disclose personal information, and a greater willingness to engage in future interactions.

In addition to avoid heterosexist language, consider these suggestions. Gay is the preferred term to refer to a man who has an affectional orientation toward other men, and lesbian is the preferred term for a woman who has an affectional orientation toward other women. [“Lesbian” means “homosexual woman,” so the term lesbian woman is redundant.] Homosexual refers to both gay men and lesbians, and describes a same-sex sexual orientation. The definitions of gay and lesbian go beyond sexual rientation and refer to a self identification as a gay man or lesbian. Gay as a noun, although widely used, may be offensive in some contexts, as in “We have two gays on the team.” Because most scientific thinking holds that sexuality is not a matter of choice, the terms sexual orientation and affectional orientation are preferred to sexual preference or sexual status (which is also vague). In the case of same-sex marriages—there are two husbands or two wives. In a male-male marriage, each person is referred to as husband and in the case of female-female marriage, each person is referred to as wife. Some same-sex couples—especially those who are not married—prefer the term “partner” or “lover”. Whether married or not, your uncle’s gay partner is also your uncle in the same way that your heterosexual aunt’s husband is your uncle. Your sister’s lover is your sister-in-law (though in many cases, the “in-law” is not technically accurate, it is the more culturally sensitive form to use) in the same way that your heterosexual brother’s wife is your sister-in-law.

Communication Strategies: How to avoid sexist talk

Although non-sexist language is becoming the norm, it may help to review some of the major issues and guidelines involved in avoiding sexist talk. These may be especially helpful to those for whom English is a second language.

Individual sexism consists of prejudicial attitudes and beliefs about men or women based on rigid beliefs about gender roles. These might include such beliefs as the idea that women should be caretakers, should be sensitive at all times, and should acquiesce to a man’s decisions concerning political or financial matters. Or, as in a recent television sitcom, men should purchase the electronics. Sexist attitudes would also include the beliefs that men are insensitive, interested only in sex, and incapable of communicating feelings.

Institutional sexism, on the other hand, results from customs and practices that discriminate against people because of their gender. Clear examples in business and industry are the widespread practice of paying women less than men for the same job and the discrimination against women in the upper levels of management. Another clear example of institutionalized sexism is the courts’ practice of automatically or near-automatically granting child custody to the mother rather than the father.

Of particular interest here is sexist language: language that puts down someone because of his or her gender (a term usually used to refer to language derogatory toward women). The National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE) has proposed guidelines for nonsexist (gender-free, gender-neutral, or sex-fair) language. These guidelines concern the use of the generic word man, the use of generic he and his, and sex-role stereotyping. Consider your own communication behavior. Examine your own language for such examples of sexism as these:

<  use of man generically. Using the term to refer to humanity in general emphasizes maleness at the expense of femaleness. Gender-neutral terms can easily be substituted. Instead of “mankind,” say “humanity,” “people,” or “human beings.” Similarly, the use of terms such as policeman or fireman that presume maleness as the norm—and femaleness as a deviation from this norm—are clear and common examples of sexist language.

<  use of he and his as generic. Instead, you can alternate pronouns or restructure your sentences to eliminate any reference to gender. For example, the NCTE Guidelines suggest that instead of saying, “The average student is worried about his grades,” you say, “The average student is worried about grades.”

<  use of sex-role stereotyping. When you make the hypothetical elementary school teacher female and the college professor male or refer to doctors as male and nurses as female, you’re sex-role stereotyping, as you are when you include the sex of a professional with terms such as “woman doctor” or “male nurse.”

Generally, the term girl should be used only to refer to very young females and is equivalent to boy. Girl is never used to refer to a grown woman, nor is boy used to refer to people in blue-collar positions, as it once was. Lady is negatively evaluated by many because it connotes the stereotype of the prim and proper woman. Woman or young woman is preferred. The term ma’am, originally an honorific used to show respect, is probably best avoided since today it’s often used as a verbal tag to comment (indirectly) on the woman’s age or marital status.

Transgendered people (people who identify themselves as members of the sex opposite to the one they were assigned at birth and who may be gay or straight, male or female) are addressed according to their self-identified sex. Thus, if the person identifies herself as a woman, then the feminine name and pronouns are used—regardless of the person’s biological sex. If the person identifies himself as a man, then the masculine name and pronouns are used.

Transvestites (people who prefer—always, frequently, or just sometimes—to dress in the clothing of the sex other than the one they were assigned at birth and who may be gay or straight, male or female) are addressed on the basis of their clothing. If the person is dressed as a woman—regardless
of the birth-assigned sex—she is referred to and addressed with feminine pronouns and feminine name.  If the person is dressed as a man—regardless of the birth-assigned sex—he is referred to and addressed with masculine pronouns and masculine name.

LinkedIn Apologies

Just want to go on record tho' I realize this is not the right place to post this:
Apologies to all who I inadvertently asked to accept me on LinkedIn. I should have read the screen more carefully. In clicking “accept all”--or whatever it was--I thought I was simply accepting those who asked to link to me. Instead I was asking others (who LinkedIn said I knew but in many cases didn’t) to link to me. I apologize for this. Please just ignore my request and accept my apologies for this embarrassing error on my part. Next time I will read the screen more carefully.

Communication Strategies: Using Disclaimers

Disclaimers are statements that aim to ensure that your messages will be understood as you wish it to be and will not reflect negatively on you. Some of the more popular disclaimers are these:
• Hedging helps you to separate yourself from the message so that if your listeners reject your message, they need not reject you (for example, “I may be wrong here, but . . .”). Hedging also enables you to cushion your being proven wrong. If, on the other hand, you were to say, “I know I’m right” (definitely not a disclaimer) and are then proven wrong, you’re likely to feel some degree of discomfort or embarrassment.
• Credentialing helps you establish your credibility, your believability. It helps you establish your special qualifications for saying what you’re about to say (“Don’t get me wrong, I’m not homophobic” or “As someone who telecommutes, I . . .”).
• Sin licenses ask listeners for permission to deviate in some way from some normally accepted convention, to violate the norms of discussion (“I know this may not be the place to discuss business, but . . .”).
• Cognitive disclaimers help you make the case that you’re in full possession of your faculties (“I know you’ll think I’m drunk, but I’m perfectly sober” or “Don’t think I’m exaggerating, I’m just reporting what I heard”).
• Appeals for the suspension of judgment ask listeners to hear you out before making a judgment (“Don’t hang up on me until you hear my side of the story”). These appeals are often used with excuses or apologies as in “I know you’re angry but please hear my side of the story.”
Generally, disclaimers are effective when you think you might offend listeners in, say, telling a joke (“I don’t usually like these types of jokes, but . . .”). In one study, for example, 11-year-old children were read a story about someone whose actions created negative effects. Some children heard the story with a disclaimer, and others heard the same story without the disclaimer. When the children were asked to indicate how the person should be punished, those who heard the story with the disclaimer recommended significantly lower punishments.
Disclaimers, however, can also get you into trouble. For example, to preface remarks with “I’m no liar” may well lead listeners to think that perhaps you are lying. Also, if you use too many disclaimers, you may be perceived as someone who doesn’t have any strong convictions or as one who wants to avoid responsibility for just about everything. This seems especially true of hedges.
In responding to statements containing disclaimers, it’s often necessary to respond to both the disclaimer and to the statement. By doing so, you let the speaker know that you heard the disclaimer and that you aren’t going to view this communication negatively. Appropriate responses might be: “I know you’re not sexist, but I don’t agree that . . .” or “Well, perhaps we should discuss the money now even if it doesn’t seem right.”

Communication Strategies: Listening Choices

Effective listening can be viewed as a process of making choices among a variety of different perspectives which can be visualized as a series of choices along a scale of polar opposites. The most important of these are empathic-objective listening, nonjudgmental and critical listening, surface and depth listening, polite and impolite listening, and active and inactive listening.
Empathic and Objective Listening
Listening involves receiving, understanding, remembering, evaluating, and responding to what a person means as well as what a person is feeling. To listening effectively, you need to listen with some degree of empathy, the feeling for another’s feelings. To empathize with others is to feel with them, to see the world as they see it, to feel (to some degree) what they feel. Only when you achieve this can you fully understand another person’s meaning.
Although for most communication situations empathic listening is the preferred mode of responding, there are times when you need to engage in objective listening—to go beyond empathy and measure meanings and feelings against some objective reality. It’s important to listen as Peter tells you how the entire world hates him and to understand how Peter feels and why he feels this way. But then you need to look a bit more objectively at Peter and perhaps see the paranoia or the self-hatred. Sometimes you have to put your empathic responses aside and listen with objectivity and detachment.
In making choices among empathic and objective listening, consider these few suggestions:
• Punctuate the message from the speaker’s point of view. See the sequence of communication events as the speaker sees them. If the speaker sees Event A causing Event B (but you see Event B causing Event A, try to role play a bit and see the events in the way the speaker does. And try to figure out how these different perspectives can account for differences in meaning.
• Engage in equal, two-way conversation. To encourage openness and empathy, try to eliminate any physical or psychological barriers to equality (for example, step from behind the large desk separating you from your employees). Avoid interrupting the speaker—which sends the signal that what you have to say is more important.
• Seek to understand both thoughts and feelings. Don’t consider your listening task finished until you’ve understood what the speaker is feeling as well as thinking.
• Avoid “offensive listening,” the tendency to listen to bits and pieces of information that will enable you to attack the speaker or find fault with something the speaker has said.
• Strive to be objective when listening to friends and foes alike. Your attitudes may lead you to distort messages—to block out positive messages about a foe and negative messages about a friend. Guard against “expectancy hearing,” when you fail to hear what the speaker is really saying and hear what you expect to hear instead.
Nonjudgmental and Critical Listening
Effective listening includes both nonjudgmental and critical responses. Effective listening entails nonjudgmental listening (that is, listening with an open mind, with a view toward simply understanding) as well as critical listening (that is, listening with a view toward making some kind of evaluation or judgment). Clearly, engage in nonjudgmental listening first; listen for understanding while suspending judgment. Only after you’ve fully understood the relevant messages should you evaluate or judge.
Listening non-judgmentally, with an open mind, will help you understand messages better; listening with a critical mind will help you analyze and evaluate the messages. In adjusting your nonjudgmental and critical listening, consider these suggestions:
• Keep an open mind and avoid prejudging. Delay your judgments until you fully understand the intention and the content the speaker is communicating. Avoid both positive and negative evaluation until you have a reasonably complete understanding.
• Avoid filtering out or oversimplifying complex messages. Similarly, avoid filtering out undesirable messages. Most of us don’t want to hear that something we believe in is untrue, that people we care for are unkind, or that ideals we hold are self-destructive. Yet it’s important that we reexamine these beliefs by listening to such messages.
• Recognize your own biases. These may interfere with accurate listening and cause you to distort message reception through the process of assimilation—the tendency to integrate and interpret what you hear (or think you hear) to fit your own biases, prejudices, and expectations. Ethnic, national, or religious biases often prevent you from appreciating a speaker’s point of view.
• Avoid sharpening. Recognize and combat the natural human tendency toward sharpening—a process in which one or two aspects of the message become highlighted, emphasized, and perhaps embellished. Often the concepts that are sharpened are incidental remarks that somehow stand out from the rest of the message. Be sure to listen critically to the entire message when you need to make evaluations and judgments.
• Recognize faulty reasoning. See through fallacious reasoning, or when facts are being distorted, or when someone is lying, or when a person is speaking purely out of self-interest.
Surface and Depth Listening
In Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar, Marc Antony, in giving the funeral oration for Caesar, says: “I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him. / The evil that men do lives after them; / The good is oft interred with their bones.” And later: “For Brutus is an honourable man; / So are they all, all honourable men.” If we listen beyond the surface of Marc Antony’s words, we can see that he does comes to praise Caesar, and to convince the crowd that Brutus was not honorable but decidedly dishonorable—despite the fact that at first glance his words seem to say quite the opposite.
In most messages there’s an obvious meaning that you can derive from a literal reading of the words and sentences, the surface message. But there’s often another level of meaning. Sometimes, as in Julius Caesar, it’s the opposite of the literal surface meaning; at other times it seems totally unrelated. Consider some frequently heard types of messages. For example, Claire asks you how you like her new haircut. On one level the meaning is clear: Do you like the haircut? But if you listen more deeply, the message can reveal another, perhaps more important, meaning: Claire is asking you to say something positive about her appearance. In the same way, the parent who complains about working hard at the office or in the home may, on a deeper level, be asking for an expression of appreciation. The child who talks about the unfairness of the other children in the playground may be asking for comfort and love.
To appreciate these other meanings, listen in depth. If you listen only to the surface-level communication (the literal meaning), you’ll miss the underlying message and will surely miss the opportunity to make meaningful contact with the other person’s feelings and needs. If you say to your parent, “You’re always complaining. I bet you really love working so hard,” you fail to respond to the call for understanding and appreciation.
In regulating your surface and depth listening, consider these simple suggestions:
• Focus on both verbal and nonverbal messages. Recognize both consistent and inconsistent “packages” of messages, and use these as guides for drawing inferences about the speaker’s meaning. Ask questions when in doubt. Listen also to what is omitted. Remember that speakers communicate by what they leave out as well as by what they include.
• Listen for both content and relational messages. The student who constantly challenges the teacher is, on one level, communicating disagreement over content. However, on another level—the relationship level—the student may be voicing objections to the instructor’s authority or authoritarianism. The instructor needs to listen and respond to both types of messages.
• Make special note of self-reflexive statements, statements that refer back to the speaker. People inevitably talk about themselves. Whatever a person says is, in part, a function of who that person is. Attending carefully to those personal, self-reference messages will give you greater insight into the person and the person’s messages and meanings.
• Don’t disregard the literal meaning. You need to listening to both surface and deep meanings if you want to truly understand that a person means. Balance your listening between the surface and the underlying meaning. Respond to the different levels of meaning in the messages of others as you would like others to respond to yours—be sensitive but not obsessive, attentive but not overly eager to uncover hidden messages.
Polite and Impolite Listening
Politeness is often thought of as the exclusive function of the speaker, as solely an encoding or sending function. But, politeness (or impoliteness) may also be signaled through listening. Of course, there are times when you would not want to listen politely (for example, if someone is being verbally abusive or condescending or using racist or sexist language). In these cases you might want to show your disapproval by showing that you’re not even listening. But most often you’ll want to listen politely and you’ll want to express this politeness through your listening behavior. Here are a few suggestions for demonstrating that you are in fact listening politely. As you read these you’ll notice that these are strategies designed to be supportive of the speaker’s positive and negative face needs.
• Avoid interrupting the speaker. Avoid trying to take over the speaker’s turn. Avoid changing the topic. If you must say something in response to something the speaker said and can’t wait until he or she finishes, then say it as briefly as possible and pass the speaker’s turn back to the speaker.
• Give supportive listening cues. These might include nodding your head, giving minimal verbal responses such as “I see” or “yes, it’s true”, or moving closer to the speaker. Listen in a way that demonstrates that what the speaker is saying is important. In some cultures, polite listening cues must be cues of agreement (Japanese culture is often used as an example); in other cultures, polite listening cues are attentiveness and support rather that cues of agreement (much of United States culture is an example).
• Show empathy with the speaker. Demonstrate that you understand and feel the speaker’s thoughts and feelings by giving responses that show this level of understanding—smiling or frowning or otherwise echoing the feelings of the speaker. If you echo the speaker’s nonverbal expressions, your behavior is likely to be seen as empathic.
• Maintain eye contact. In much of the United States this is perhaps the single most important rule. If you don’t maintain eye contact when someone is talking to you, then you’ll appear to be not listening and definitely not listening politely. This rule, however, does not hold in all cultures. In some Latin and Asian cultures, polite listening would consist of looking down and avoiding direct eye contact when, for example, listening to a superior or much older person.
• Give positive feedback. Throughout the listening encounter and perhaps especially after the speaker’s turn (when you continue the conversation as you respond to what the speaker has said), positive feedback will be seen as polite and negative feedback as impolite. If you must give negative feedback, then do so in a way that does not attack the person’s negative face, for example, first mention areas of agreement or what you liked about what the person said and stress your good intentions. And, most important, do it in private. Public criticism is especially threatening and will surely be seen as a personal attack.
Active and Inactive Listening
One of the most important communication skills you can learn is that of active listening. Consider the following interaction. You’re disappointed that you have to redo your entire report, and you say: “I can’t believe I have to rewrite this entire budget report. I really worked hard on this project and now I have to do it all over again.” To this, you get three different responses:
DANNY: That’s not so bad; most people find they have to redo their first reports. That’s the norm here.
KELLY: You should be pleased that all you have to do is a simple rewrite. Nathan and Joann Nathan both had to completely redo their entire projects.
SUZANNE: You have to rewrite that report you’ve worked on for the last three weeks? You sound really angry and frustrated.
All three listeners are probably trying to make you feel better. But they go about it in very different ways and, you can be sure, with very different results. Danny tries to lessen the significance of the rewrite. This well-intended response is extremely common but does little to promote meaningful communication and understanding. Kelly tries to give the situation a positive spin. Again, this is not much help. Note that with these responses the listeners are also suggesting that you should not be feeling the way you do. They’re implying that your feelings are not legitimate and should be replaced with more logical feelings.
Suzanne’s response, however, is different from the others. Suzanne uses active listening. Active listening owes its development to Thomas Gordon in his Parent Effectiveness Training. Active listening is a process of sending back to the speaker what you as a listener think the speaker meant—both in content and in feelings. Active listening, then, is not merely repeating the speaker’s exact words, but rather putting together your understanding of the speaker’s total message into a meaningful whole.
Active listening helps you as a listener to check your understanding of what the speaker said and, more important, of what he or she meant. Reflecting back perceived meanings to the speaker gives the speaker an opportunity to offer clarification and correct any misunderstandings. Active listening also lets the speaker know that you acknowledge and accept his or her feelings. In the sample responses given, the first two listeners challenged the speaker’s feelings. Suzanne, the active listener, accepted what you were feeling. In addition, she also explicitly identified your feelings: “You sound angry and frustrated,” allowing you an opportunity to correct her interpretation if necessary. At the same time, active listening stimulates the speaker to explore feelings and thoughts. Suzanne’s response encourages you to elaborate on your feelings, and helps you deal with them by talking them through.
A word of caution: In communicating your understanding back to the person, be especially careful to avoid sending “solution messages”—messages that tell the person how he or she should feel or what he or she should do. Four types of messages send solutions, and you’ll want to avoid them in your active listening:
< Ordering messages: “Do this . . . .” “Don’t touch that . . . .”
< Warning and threatening messages: “If you don’t do this, you’ll . . . .” “If you do that, you’ll . . . .”
< Preaching and moralizing messages: “People should all . . . .” “We all have responsibilities . . . .”
< Advising messages: “Why don’t you . . . .” “I think you should . . . .”
Three simple techniques will prove useful as you learn to practice active listening: Paraphrase the speaker’s meaning, express understanding, and ask questions.
• Paraphrase the speaker’s meaning. Stating in your own words what you think the speaker means and feels helps ensure understanding and also shows interest in the speaker. Paraphrasing gives the speaker a chance to extend what was originally said. Thus, when Suzanne echoes your thoughts, you’re given the opportunity to elaborate on why rewriting the budget report means so much to you. In paraphrasing, be objective; be especially careful not to lead the speaker in the direction you think he or she should go. Also, be careful that you don’t overdo paraphrase; only a very small percentage of statements need paraphrasing. Paraphrase when you feel there’s a chance for misunderstanding or when you want to express support for the other person and keep the conversation going.
• Express understanding of the speaker’s feelings. Echo the feelings the speaker expressed or implied (“You must have felt horrible”). This expression of empathy will help you further check your perception of the speaker’s feelings. This will also allow the speaker to see his or her feelings more objectively (especially helpful when these are feelings of anger, hurt, or depression) and to elaborate on them.
• Ask questions. Asking questions ensures your own understanding of the speaker’s thoughts and feelings and secures additional information (“How did you feel when you read your job appraisal report?”). Ask questions to provide just enough stimulation and support for the speaker to feel he or she can elaborate on these thoughts and feelings. These questions will further confirm your interest and concern for the speaker but not pry into unrelated areas or challenge the speaker in any way.