Language is a fascinating topic to me.
I love learning languages, and love playing with them. As an aside, that’s perhaps why I love so much the Instagram account ‘The Language Nerds‘ (oh and I just found out through a friend about the podcast ‘lingthusiasm‘).
Whether referring to spoken languages (eg. English, Mooré, Thai, Spanish, Criollo) or to the jargon used in any given community or group, language does bear that wicked question:
😈❓How is it that #Language can be such a 🚧 barrier (with its in-crowds, secret language, simple and impractical inability to establish contact) and SIMULTANEOUSLY it can be a 🌉 bridge that brings people together? ❓😈
(your humble servant on his Friday LinkedIn ramblings)
Language can be a barrier
Just a few ideas for how that might be:
- It’s a no-brainer that if you don’t speak a language, you’re automatically ‘out’ of the community that does speak it;
- Idioms (the official type) can even be used as coded/secret language. I sometimes use Dutch in France with my kids when I want a message to get to them and to them only;
- Jargon, acronyms, specific language can also bring meaning to people inside a group that shares that language, but it can (and often does) make people who don’t master that language feel outside, and unseen or disrespected. Or even inferior: upper-class, political, technical, academic language can tend to make people feel excluded and not as worthy of speaking in public…
- Even if you have some notions about that language, you may still feel a bit clunky in its use and may feel deterred to speak up. I find navigating LGBT+ or racial language slightly awkward myself and thus not always keen to talk of these matters even though at heart I’m totally supporting the LGBT+ cause…
- Assuming that everyone shares the same language can reinforce that feeling of being unseen, unrespected or unworthy for those who do not master that language being used…
Language can also be a bridge…
Again just a few ideas…
- Duh! If you learn someone else’s language you can then communicate with that person in that language. Particularly handy if you don’t share any other common language;
- Even if you share another language with someone else, using their native tongue means (to me anyway) that you are meeting the real soul of the person, you are meeting them in their comfort zone, with the first language version of themselves (if they’ve learned other languages, they may have shaped slightly different layers of their identity and being through those other languages too). So it builds an extra connection. I think about Dutch people, who know so many languages and it’s so easy to speak English with them. But then you speak Dutch with them and a whole other world unravels in front of your eyes (and they have an endearing notch of affection for the fact that you bother learning their language which so many people find ugly and useless – I don’t btw).
- But even in the workplace, when you share the same jargon, you can speak more quickly about things. So it’s a practical way to build bridges towards efficiency;
- More importantly, using that jargon, including acronyms, private jokes and the likes creates a -conscious or not- sense of community for the people that share the language. That sense of community is a wonderful thing (provided it doesn’t make other people feel excluded);
- If a language is developed with a specific functional end in mind, it is also a bridge towards a different reality that people can see together. This is what happens with the language of e.g. Liberating Structures: it becomes a passport to the promised new lands (of thriving relationships, interactions, conversations, collaborations)…
So there is also some sense in that little language silo, so long as it’s not making itself consciously too important vis-à-vis other groups of people.
How to turn the barrier into a bridge?
The point here is that language is a learned property. It only takes time, dedication, and hopefully guidance, to master the language. We can use languages as beautiful bridges, but the bridges will be towering over other groups of people like barriers, if we don’t open these bridges.
So how about:
- We remain conscious of the language we use at all times. And if we see people who are not in a given language group, we can explain what that language means, translating on the spot the terms – or full sentence;
- We design our interactions with a keen eye on the language we use to avoid silos and senses of ‘out crowds’ and ‘in crowds’;
- We have conversations about what the language we use makes possible, reveals, emphasises. It helps us all see the beauty of sharp language and perhaps even helps us empathise with other people and other ways of apprehending the world…
- We make active efforts to bring people who don’t master a given language to get more and more proficient at it;
- We also take our responsibilities to call out abuse of the language, so we don’t let people feel rejected anymore, and rather invited to learn the language…
Demystifying the language of Liberating Structures
This whole post was inspired by a conversation I had with my dear friend Nadia von Holzen, when we reflected on the effect that the vernacular language of Liberating Structures tends to have on people who are exposed to it at first. It’s not easy. It’s awkward at times, even off-putting.
Find out more in the video below…
What role does language play in your facilitated interactions?
agilefacil 
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