Importance of context

By Marion Wyse

WHEN conversation gets confusing, North Americans say, "I know you think you understand what you thought you heard me say, but I'm not sure if what you heard was what I really meant."

We can learn how to find out what is going on around us in our everyday lives.

But put into a new environment, we don't know what clues to look for. This can be disastrous or funny — but it is always embarrassing.

Nobody wants to feel "left out" or "clueless."

As I adapt to China, I learn why teaching culture is harder than teaching language. Language has rules. Context doesn't.

Every word needs a context to give it meaning. If you don't know the context, the word is nonsense. You have no "clue" what it means. The "clue" is the thread that leads you safely through danger.

In the Greek myth, a princess gave the hero, Theseus, a ball of thread. He tied it to a pillar before descending into the depths.

As he went down he unwound the "clue." At the bottom he killed the monster then followed the "clue" back to the light where the princess awaited him.

A word's context is its "clue."

A big English dictionary gives a sentence for each meaning a word has.

A thesaurus gives similar words for different "shades"

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