Context and Communication

In the above section, we talk about how communication is an on-going meaning-making process and how culture is the outcome of our communication. In this section, we will discuss the role that "context" plays in communication as a meaning-making process.

We begin this discussion by looking at how a communication process can be analyzed on a number of levels, such as the technical level, the semantic level, and the pragmatic level.

To understand a unit of communication on the technical level is to ascertain the extent to which information, data, or message is clearly transmitted ("Did you hear me clearly?"). To understand a unit of communication on the semantic level is to clarify the extent to which the intended meaning of the information, data, or message being transmitted is understood by the receiver ("Did you see what I meant by that?). To understand a unit of communication on the pragmatic level is to gauge the kind and extent of the actual impact, effect, or outcome as a result of the communication process ("How do you feel after hearing that?").

But while analyzing these three levels of communication is helpful in our understanding communication in general, something very essential is missing in our analysis above. What is it? Let us first consider this scenario:

"You returned home in Taipei on a typical August evening after a long day of work. You ran into your neighbor as you were about to open the front door to your ground-floor apartment. He was wearing a long mink coat and, in a very crisp and articulated voice, asked you this question: 'Can you pass me the soy sauce?'"

Well, as you might have already sensed, there is something terribly wrong with the above story. On the technical level, you clearly heard what your neighbor said. On the semantic level, you also knew the meaning of what your neighbor said--at least according to our standard dictionary. On the pragmatic level, however, I am quite sure you were either puzzled, confused, or, worst, frightened by the "anomaly" of his behavior or action.

But this is exactly the point: Why is your neighbor's behavior seemed unusual or, in general, why is this communication scenario abnormal? Something is very wrong in the above scenario that throws the communication totally off balance. The answer, and I suspect you know it very well by now, is the "context." More specifically, the typical August evening in Taipei is not the proper context for anyone to wear any mink coat. The timing, place, and occasion of the encounter is not the proper context for such a request, which is more suitable at the dining table.

Context is among the most essential aspects in human communication because it is context that gives meaning to what goes on in any communication process. As Gregory Bateson put it in his 1978 article, "The Pattern Which Connects," "Nothing has meaning except it be contextualized." Wendy Leeds-Hurwitz echoed this observation in her 1994 book, Communication in Everyday Life, that "It is the context of the behavior that determines how it will be interpreted, not the behavior itself." Which is another way to say that, in and of itself, there really is nothing wrong with your neighbor wearing a long mink coat or asking you to pass him the soy sauce; it was the context that made what he did absurd.

Context has been adopted by intercultural communication researchers as a concept for understanding the various "frames of reference" within which people construct and interpret "reality" and communicate or interact with others. In other words, these frames of reference define people's behavior. For our initial understanding of this subject, we will briefly discuss five types of frames of reference. They are:

1) Psychological frame of reference,
2) Cultural frame of reference,
3) Social frame of reference,
4) Spatial frame of reference,
5) Temporal frame of reference, and
6) Historical frame of reference.