The short 4:23 clip starts off with two guys, one black named Dale and the other white named Peter, meeting up at their mail box. As they converse with each other, Dale looks puzzled at something Peter said, but the conversation goes on and everything seems fine. I gather from the scene that they are friendly neighbors because they seem to exchange a pleasant conversation with smiles and pat on the shoulder. Later that day they meet up again at their trash can. From the expression on Peter’s face and mannerisms he looks confused about a DVD he has in his hand and Dale seem to question him on it and pointing to the DVD seem to make comments on it. Again they part with a friendly smile and acknowledgement. Even later that day they meet up on some social networking site. Peter messages to Dale ‘No Offense’. Now I am left puzzled here. Because I do not know what has been going on and why Peter send Dale that message. All I can observe is Dale seems a little taken aback. Next we see Dale at the front door of Peter with a knife in his hand and a plastic bag with furry something sticking out. Peter seems upset with the content in the bag. Though they exchange some serious bit of conversation, nothing seems to be amiss here because they laugh and part ways. Next we see them on the phone with each other. Though they seem to exchange words with stress, they are laughing loud and I therefore assume they are having a friendly conversation. However, in the last scene, peter is standing on top of a red car (which I assume is Dale’s) and is hammering it. Seeing this Dale looks shocked and goes to the backyard of (I guess) Peter’s house and pulls down his pant to ‘poo’ on the lawn which frustrates Peter. At the end of this clip with no sound, I am left confused why what started out to be friendly exchange between neighbors turned out to be hurtful at the end.
After turning the sound on I was totally surprised to find out I was totally deceived. Although I was able to interpret some of the non verbal communication correctly, I was in for a surprise for the most part of it. Though they were all smiles and their facial expressions and body language seemed to convince me that they are friendly with each other, they were in fact insulting each other all along and having a laugh at it. Since I had never watched a ‘No Offense’ clips before nor have heard of such practice, the turnout of events was totally a big surprise.
Hi Deepa,
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed your blog entry.
Thanks for including the clip. I watched it with the sound on, and I saw how the body language seemed to indicate that the two were friendly and pleasant with each other. I also saw how that tone was important in this clip. The two were communicating with laughter and smiles but were degrading each other. This made me think that I need to watch my tone when I communicate.
Kristi
Deepa,
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed reading your blog. I have never seen this clip either. Their nonverbal communication does deceive you. Your verbal words and tones need to be watched when communicating as it can be very hurtful.
Luci
Hi Deepa,
ReplyDeleteIt sounds like you witnessed a good example of channel discrepancy where the words and behaviors don't match (O'Hair, 2012). It makes me think how important it is to not assume we know what is going on when we don't have access to information giving us the context of the situation.
O'Hair, D., & Wiemann, M. (2012). Real communication: An introduction. Boston, MA: Bedford/St. Martin's.
Deepa,
ReplyDeleteThanks for including the clip. I would agree with you Deepa, how mislead I would of been if I had watched the clip without the sound. I would have just assumed it was two young men playing pranks on one another. Not until the end would I have realized how angry they were at each other. I can imagine your surprise when you watched the clip with the volume turned on,
I enjoyed reading your post!!
Millie
Deepa,
ReplyDeletethis just goes to show how we can adpat your physical cues to communicate soething completely different than we really feel. Communication is very confusing. We need to make sure that our insides and outsides are giving the same message.
Shannon