EDUC-6165-Communication Skills: Language, Nonverbal, Listening

EDUC 6165-Week 2-Communication Skills: Language, Nonverbal, Listening

For the purpose of the assignment I watched “The Office.”  I have not watched this show at all and was curious about the show given the reference to it in our text.   Watching the show without any sound was an interesting exercise.  The show starts off looking similar to a music video with everyone singing and dancing.   It would appear that as a group who work together that there are many relationships within the office between the characters.  For example, it would appear that two are romantically involved (the kiss upon seeing each other).  There is a young lad who appears to be the one to have to get the coffee, mail letters, etc.  The group are displeased with this young lad given the hand gestures, finger pointing, and facial expressions.   One of the other characters appears to be the brunt of many jokes as one character takes the large key ring and tries to add more keys to the ring.  Two of the characters end up on the elevator together.  With the sound off, it is hard to determine why the one character had another do something to the elevator panel.    At their staff meeting the sign on the white board reads “don’t bother Luke.”  What is not clear is why.  With the sound off it was great to see eye contact, head nodding, eye brow raising, finger pointing, smiling, arms crossed, head shaking which helped to figure out the emotional message.

Of course with the sound on, the show made more sense.  The couple were romantically involved and had started dating over the summer.  The young lad turned out to be one of the characters’ nephews.  As a group, they were very displeased with the young lad and his lack of motivation, and follow through with requests.    At the staff meeting, this particular character asks everyone to give Luke a break.    It made more sense with the sound on why the two characters ended up on the elevator. Turns out one of the characters was playing a practical joke on the other in hopes of redeeming herself with one of the other characters for laughing when he tried to add keys to the key ring.    Some of my assumptions about how the characters were feeling were accurate.    It is amazing how much we use hand gestures in coordination with our speech to help illustrate what we are saying. 

I think the relationships between the characters would have made more sense if I watched the show on a regular basis.  There were many characters and knowing the relationship between the characters would helpful.   However, I do think I was more objective not knowing the characters.