Identity & Language

Either this is weird, or I am weird, or you are:

------------

When someone calls your name, you turn around, right? Right.
(note that, calling your name does not equate to talking directly to you, it could mean hearing people saying your name in their conversation, et cetera)

Let's say, someone calls out, not by your given name, by whatever you are associated with, for example, "red shirt guy", "mugger", etc. You turn around too, right? Right.

That means you have accepted that as one of your identities - whether willingly or not.

I have always thought that it is safe to talk about someone, who is physically near you, without the person noticing. I thought it would be fine as long as you don't refer to them explicitly. That is, to avoid explicit language - just vaguely use "the auntie", "the girl", "that guy". I had always thought - but I guess I'm wrong.

I say this because there was once, significantly etched in my memory, when I was walking, with my friend, to the bus stop. We were talking (negatively) about an auntie we encountered earlier, who had like no manners... but that is not the point now, I shall not digress. We were talking quite loud, probably, and when we reached the bus stop, my friend started a remark (in a rather irritated tone), which was something like "eh, that auntie damn-" and walaa! 3 women suddenly turn around to look at us. *a moment of silence + eyeballing*. then they turned back.

Weird, because I thought people don't usually react that way. But it's pretty cool, we went other places to experiment. Tried out other 'trigger' words... and watch that amazement! It is rather amusing.

..and so now you know, there is not need to be so rude probe into people's phone. If you think test subject X loves test subject Y, conduct this experiment and anticipate the positive result for "X's boy/girlfriend"!
[Disclaimer: ~ just joking. ]

------

Well the earlier half on top is about how people listen and react ... this half is about how vague we had been...

At the NUS Co-op, a book on linguistics caught my attention. I saw the chapter on the use of explicit language and er.. something... it's the opposite lah. Basically the difference is that the earlier can be clearly understood without knowing the context, whereas the meaning in the latter is highly dependent on the context. To illustrate:

Three boys were playing football in their school's soccer field and one of the three boys kicked the ball...

contrasted with,

They were playing football over there, and one of them kicked it..

and you will realise the ambiguity and instability of the references.

I thought this point as mentioned in the book is highly relevant to what happened - the meaning of "auntie" shifted, slightly.

------------

Well, just my thoughts. I don't suppose all of you really care about such details.. but such stuff grates me every now and then.
Comments are always welcomed -