The secret of how we talk
How "um", "mm-hmm" and "huh?" lie at the core of four languages
WHILE CHATTING with a friend, if it ever felt like you knew exactly what was going to be said next, that was probably because you really did. Not just that, chances are that you played an active role in leading the conversation to that very point. And this was done in large part not just by the things you said, but also through signals such as “um” (to express a delay), “mm-hmm” (to express understanding or offer acknowledgement), and “huh?” (to express confusion or lack of comprehension).
Analysing the behind-the-scenes workings that guide our conversations, N J Enfield, in his book, How
We Talk, seems to give an altogether new meaning to phrases like “finishing each other’s sentences”. After all, on average, it takes a person just 200 milliseconds to answer a question. That is less than the time it takes for our brains to identify a colour or retrieve a word from memory and pronounce it. We manage this by constantly predicting what the other person is going to say and when they are likely to finish that sentence, while
simultaneously formulating our own response. All this happens with split-second precision every time we have a casual conversation. Astonishingly, this remains constant across cultures, regions and languages.
Researchers from varied disciplines have long studied the functioning of language and the properties of the human brain that have made it possible. The focus, however, has primarily been on the rules of grammar, the formal structure of sentences and the neurological mappings of the brain as it processes language. Enfield’s work inverts these concerns and seeks to understand language as we experience it—via the “messy back-and-forth of conversation”. Through this lens, this book delves into the “universal core of language” characterised by a system of turn-taking while talking, heightened sensitivity to the passage of time (which is most noticeable when a pause stretches even a fraction of a second longer than usual) and a complete dependence on small utterances such as “huh?”.
Once every 84 seconds
As it turns out, “huh?” comes closest to being a universal word, appearing in 31 languages spread across 16 distinct language families. It also appears once every 84 seconds in a conversation. Similarly, one of every 60 words we say is “um” or “uh” wherein a delay in speaking marked by “um” is invariably greater than a delay marked by “uh”. One needs to bear in mind that the delays in question here are 670 and 250 milliseconds respectively. For those uninitiated in the study of linguistics, it can be hard to register the significance of a 200-millisecond-long pause in a conversation.
However, if one looks beyond all the experiments and the trivia, what really stays with the reader is the sense of deep compassion with which Enfield approaches and discusses the inner workings of conversations and the underlying reasons for the evolution of language. The chapter on “repair” and “confirmation” (seeking clarifications through repetition) does not simply enumerate efficient techniques of exchanging information, but rather conveys a shared willingness to cooperate and resolve problems as they arise in the course of a conversation. It is this empathy that leads Enfield to envision the simple norms of conversations (like the expectation of a response) as following a “moral architecture” that guides our behaviour: “We infer others’ intentions beyond the explicit meanings of their words, we monitor others’ personal and moral commitment to interaction and if necessary hold them to account for that commitment, and we cooperate with others by opting for the most efficient, and usually most helpful, kinds of responses. We help each other, where necessary and possible, to stay on track in conversation.”