Here’s a short post from Clark Quinn about making communication work even when we don’t really share the same language:
Pidgin Learning
Very nicely put. I’ve been mired the writing of two chapters of my book that talk about definitions, and I think Clark has hit it bang on. In academia, much has to do with territory and attribution. Giving credit is important, but that too often becomes about territory – credit is given to those in one’s own field, but not to ‘outsiders’.
So I guess the question is, how do we motivate people to commit to the process?
In Quaker practice, for example, there is no voting on anything – all decisions proceed by consensus, which in this case means ‘permission to proceed’ as agreement is not required. The process assumes everyone is committed to the process, and here that’s usually true. It can be a slow process though as it requires that all participants have a chance to speak and to be heard.
The actually hearing what someone is saying is something many academics have a great deal of trouble doing.
