Understanding Communication: Process, Language, and Text Strategies
Communication: Process and Elements
Communication is a process by which information is transmitted between a sender and a receiver. It’s considered a process because it is in constant motion between the sender and receiver.
Elements of Communication:
- Sender: The person who creates and sends a message.
- Receiver: The person receiving the message.
- Message: The information sent from the sender to the receiver.
- Channel: The physical environment through which the message is transmitted. This can be:
- Artificial: For example, writing, billboards, letters.
- Natural: For example, air.
- Code: There are two types of code:
- Verbal: Oral and written.
- Nonverbal: Signs, images, sounds, text, icons, traffic lights, gestures, etc.
Functions of Language
- Referential: Transmits objective information. Example: The French flag has three colors: red, blue, and white.
- Phatic: Checks the contact between the sender and the receiver. Example: Do you like Allen’s party?
- Poetic: Embellishes the information to be transmitted with aesthetically pleasing phrases, rhymes, etc. The focus is on the message. Example: Well dressed, well received.
- Metalinguistic: Seeks to explain aspects of the language itself. Example: “Burro” is written with a “B”.
- Appellative: Consists of giving an order or asking for something. The focus is on the receiver. Example: Pass the paint.
- Expressive: The sender expresses their mood, emotions, and opinions; subjectivity prevails. Example: What a wonderful landscape!
Language and Types
- Language: The ability of human beings to communicate with peers using signs, which they have invented.
- Speech: Ordered set of signs, used as a system by a particular group of humans.
Types of Language: Oral and Written
- Oral: Perceived by the ear and transmitted through the air; it is interactive.
- Written: Captured on paper and perceived through sight; it is more permanent.
Paragraph: The most common subunit in texts.
Characteristics of Spoken Language:
- Concrete, using sequences of sounds.
- Interactive, with a constant exchange between sender and receiver.
- Highly dependent on the situation.
- Ephemeral by nature; short-lived.
- Allows the use of crutches (filler words), incomplete sentences, etc.
Characteristics of Written Language:
- Specified in writing, via letter sequences.
- The sender is absent.
- Remains intact after its attachment to the paper.
- Does not allow redundancy or incomplete sentences.
Strategies for Text Comprehension
- Anticipation: Predicting the content of a reading from images and linguistic elements.
- Emphasis: Highlighting key ideas of the text, as well as any items that draw attention.
- Note-Taking: Collecting the most important ideas or data from the text.
- Summarizing: Like underlining and note-taking, summarizing is a strategy that allows us to organize information.
- Paraphrasing: Explaining, orally or in writing, with one’s own words, the ideas contained in a text, without changing the meaning of the original message or adding new ideas.
- Using the Dictionary: Discovering the meaning of unknown words that hinder understanding of the text.
- Inferring: Discovering the messages conveyed implicitly in the text or “between the lines.”