The document discusses the importance of nonverbal communication and argues that it is often more important than verbal communication. It provides examples of how nonverbal cues like body language, eye contact, and posture can significantly influence interactions and convey much information without words. The author reflects on their experience in the military having to rely heavily on nonverbal signals and how it taught them the power and usefulness of nonverbal communication in both professional and personal settings.
Navigating the Language Shift from Military to Civilian Life
1. 1
Roderick Hooks
EN 105: Major Writing Assignment 2
September 6, 2019
The purpose of this writing assignment is to explain to the
audience the difficulties of
switching from the language of my job in the United States
Army to the language I use now in
the civilian sector. There are many difficulties switching
lanaguages and being able to explain
those difficulities is an honor. The challegnes I face while
writing this essay is trying to
encompass all the difference and challenges within this
assignment. Possessing the ability to
adapt quickly from the two langauages is a absolute
requirement. I hope to recevieve feedback to
help improve my essay, writing ability, and for my instructor to
fully understand my description
of the two languages.
2. Lonelle Rathje
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Edit carefully. Try downloading Grammarly. Works well for
online typing and Word documents.
4
Roderick Hooks
EN 105: Major Writing Assignment 2
September 6, 2019
“Sorry, I don’t understand”
Sorry, I don’t understand is a common phrase I hear when trying
to explain situations in the
civilian sector, mainly because of the difficulties of switching
languages. Serving in the Army allowed me
to learn its unique language, which includes a plethora of
acronyms, and small phrases in which
everyone understands, for example the word “tracking” is used
by Soldiers to relay to anyone that we
understand whatever they’re talking about. Transitioning from
the Military to a Civilian was hard to
overcome, at times I would have to recite what I wanted to say
in my head, and then civilianize it as
much as I can, so I can be properly understood.
3. Veterans have a tough time switching languages going into the
civilian sector, from completely
reformatting our resumes and replacing any Military verbiage
with it’s civilian meaning, and then when
speaking in a conference or just a meeting, the way a veteran
explains a situation is more talored
towoards a mission, for example I was briefing or having a
meeting with my team, and I had to discuss
the overall projections of productiviity. This was the first time
a language barrier was present at my
current job, my meeting was well planned and organized but
usage of phrases such as “get with your
leadership so they can relay a plan of action” had to be
rephrased to “get with your supervisor if you
have any questions” . I have a few member of my team that are
also members of the veteran
community, that understand me when I speak or relay any
information, but just like over 80% of the
associates don’t understand me, they also don’t understand the
few in my community.
Lonelle Rathje
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You have run-on sentences here. RE: ...understands. For
example,
4. Lonelle Rathje
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Thesis Statement: What is the main message you want your
audience to walk away with after reading this essay. It should
be clear in this thesis statement sentence. The thesis statement
is typically a sentence of 25 words or less that is placed at the
end of your introduction paragraph. It always notes two items:
your topic and point of view. Do you feel your thesis statement
is clear and specific about the purpose of your writing? Does it
have both a specific topic and a specific point of view?
Lonelle Rathje
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Capitalize the start of quotations.
Lonelle Rathje
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MLA essay design: Design all assignment submissions
according to MLA guidelines. Your EasyWriter text and the
sample MLA essay in Announcements, in your classroom, show
you how the document should be designed. There is a specific
MLA design for the title page, body of the paper and the Works
Cited page.
Lonelle Rathje
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Lowercase = military, civilian
Lonelle Rathje
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Avoid "packing" so much into a sentence. Focus on one key
point per sentence. This is also a run-on sentence. Will not mark
throughout.
Lonelle Rathje
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5. "Sorry, I don't understand" is ...
Lonelle Rathje
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Run-on sentences. RE:
https://owl.purdue.edu/owl_exercises/sentence_structure/senten
ce_structure/run_ons_comma_splices_and_fused_sentences.html
Lonelle Rathje
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Concise = when explaining ...
3
My communtiy use a unique concept that most civilians arent
exposed to. Some of us are self
explanotory while others are very cyrtic, but each have a
specific and important meaning. The language
my communtiy uses is a biproduct of how we are trained and
how we effectiviely communicate to each
other. I feel the civilian sector doesn’t quite understand that we
as a community are trained 24/7 for
years upon years on how to communciate, so when we transition
it should be more of a open are
welcome rather than having us change the way that makes us
who we are. Some common
misudersatanding include not hiring one of us because of the
perceived disconnect between us,
6. normally thinking we are strict and walk around yelling our
military language. The sterotyping is very
real and needs to end, because the veteran communtiy are
willing to change the way we communicate,
because we are trained to adapt and communicate to achieve a
common goal, so by allowing us to be
us will improve the transition of the two languages.
My communtity values communciation a lot, without
communication we feel lost and betrayed,
because we must know whats going on at all times. When
communicating we like to use less words with
more meaning to limit the time of talking to increase the time of
action. Ludwig Wittgenstein quote “
the limits of my language mean the limits of my world” really
touched me deep because I felt the same
at one point. When he stated this he meant that outside of what
he could understand in regards to his
language, is the limit to his understanding, for example is what
he knows is what he knows, nothing else.
His statement really had myself exploring more outside of my
language to really prepare myself for the
civilian world, so I wouldn’t find myself in the limits of my
language.
Overall, the language barrier between the civilian sector and
7. military has been a challenge, but
they both have their similarities when it comes to basic
communication, but the key is to ensure your
way of relaying any information would be well received by the
other community, don’t every assume
that they understand what you’re referring to or you will be in
for a surprise.
Lonelle Rathje
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Contractions have apostrophes.
Lonelle Rathje
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Topic sentences: Continue working to ensure that the first
sentence of a body paragraph, between your introduction and
conclusion paragraphs, summarizes the one main point of the
paragraph. Be very specific in that sentence. Do not use a quote
for this or a question. It is also good practice to do the same in
the last sentence of the body paragraph, while also working to
transition to the next body paragraph topic. Revisit your
approach throughout.
Body paragraphs: Do you feel they stay true to one key point
each? Do each of those points illustrate and prove you’re the
overall message/purpose of your essay? Revisit your approach
throughout.
Lonelle Rathje
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Conclusion: Ensure you summarize the one key point of each of
8. your body paragraphs, restate your thesis statement in some
manner and end on a memorable note. In other words, what is it
that you ultimately want your audience to do or believe?
Lonelle Rathje
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Overall, good start to this, Roderick. I gave you one example of
each item to reconsider throughout this essay and moving
forward. I encourage you to work with the writing tutors before
you submit to me for a grade, as well as download Grammarly.
Please let me know if you have any questions. :)
Lonelle Rathje
22400000000040903
Do not end sentences with prepositions. Look up the list and
avoid them at the end. RE: ...concept in which most civilians
are not exposed.
Lonelle Rathje
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Edit carefully = community uses
4
% There is a hotel that has n roomsavailable. A group of k
people arrives,and each person needs to be assigned a room.
% Your program must come up with different assignments of
people to rooms.
% Assume that all rooms are singlerooms.
9. % Change the value of n below to test different scenarios
#const n = 4.
% Assume that rooms are numbered from 1 to n
room(1..n).
% For n = 4, this is the same as saying
% room(1).
% room(2).
% room(3).
% room(4).
% Change the value of k below to test different scenarios
#const k = 3.
% Assume that people are numbered from 1 to k
person(1..k).
10. % For k = 3, this is the same as saying
% person(1).
% person(2).
% person(3).
% TODO: write your code here.
% Make sure that each person is assigned exactly one room
Roderick Hooks
EN 105: Major Writing Assignment 3
September 16, 2019
The purpose of this writing assignment is to explain
to the audience my concept of communication and the benefits
of my high usage. There are difficulties when being verbal
dominates your everyday conversation, but my assignment will
explain why communicating more non verbally will make you a
better person socially and also in the workplace. The
challenges I faced while writing this assignment was little to
none. I hope to recevieve feedback to help improve my essay,
writing ability, and for my instructor and peers to fully
understand why I feel the best communication is non-verbal.
11. The best communication is non-verbal?
Nonverbal communication plays a significant role in our
lives, as it can improve a person's ability to relate, engage, and
establish meaningful interactions in everyday life. A better
understanding of this type of communication may lead people to
develop stronger relationships with others. This type of
communication relayed can dictate the understanding of a
conversation, guidance or direction. Nonverbal communication
is when an individual uses gestures, such as facial, tone of
voice, eye contact, body language, and posture. Some people
can use nothing but non-verbal communication to communicate
without using language, and a lot can be said by an individual’s
posture and facial gestures that relates to confidence,
uncertainty, or even bad intentions. Normally when someone is
interviewing for a job or at a meeting, the nonverbal skills they
present is more important than the verbal ones, for instance you
are constantly being evaluated when the conversation is directed
towards or away from you, having your arms crossed usually
mean you’re on the defensive, avoiding eye contact means you
lack confidence, and poor posture is thought as unprofessional.
The nonverbal communication you present can either support
the tone of your conversation or completely destroy by simply
12. displaying disinterest, texting on the phone, interrupting the
talker, and especially not giving eye contact. There are some
skills I use to display proper non-verbal communication such as
sitting with my back against the chair showing good posture and
attentiveness, gauging the conversation so I won’t display the
incorrect message, such as laughter when the conversation is
serious, proper hand etiquette, no electronics, and proper eye
contact. There are times when your body language can give an
individual the perception that you’re not trustworthy, there are
also times where nonverbal communication is needed to
complete a joke, or to tell a story, can you honestly tell a story
without communicating nonverbally.
While at work communication is extremely vital, and your
employees feed off of your non-verbal communication, for
example during a meeting I had to relay to all of my associates
the workload of the holiday season, but while relaying this
information I must maintain great eye contact, good posture, so
when the information is given, they in return feel comfortable,
and confident that the workload can be completed, because of
my confidence displayed during the briefing, maintaining
control of my eye contact and hand gestures. There are times at
work where my mood is being presented without saying a word,
it can be a deep sigh or an angry look, or my favorite the look
of disappointment.
There was a book published by Albert Mehrabian called
Silent messages which covered his research on nonverbal
communication. The study seeks to prove that on 7 percent of
communication is verbal and 93 percent is nonverbal. Although
many disapprove that logic, I believe it’s true to a point, maybe
not 7 to 93 percent but around the 40 to 60 percent range, I
mean there’s a reason a facial expression requires so many
muscles to make a smile or frown or display to show any type of
emotions. Albert Mehrabian believe the when delivering a
speech or just addressing a crowd, the verbal portion must
13. dominate by a wide margin, and I ultimately disagree.
The moment what really swayed my opinion on the importance
of nonverbal communication was during my time on Active duty
in the United States Army. During my time in the Army we
were commanded to complete certain mission throughout the
country of Afghanistan that required ultimate secrecy and at
times total silence. The day would start with a briefing
reviewing the route we would take when traveling to the
mission location, and going over the proper hand etiquette when
moving by squads. We basically went over the importance of
communicating with speaking and letting our nonverbal
communication dominate while completing this mission, unless
we encounter gunfire. So there we were for days on end
communicating with one another without saying one word, only
using hand gestures, body gestures, and facial gestures, and I
can honestly say it really taught us a valuable lesson when it
comes to communicating non verbally, the first lesson was that
it doesn’t matter what you say verbally, but if your nonverbal
gestures display anything other than what you were speaking of,
that entire conversation become null, secondly your nonverbal
skills is dependent on by the receiver to properly gauge your
emotions before responding, and lastly communicating non
verbally is an international language that could be understood
by any language if displayed accordingly.
Ultimately the concept of communicating nonverbally
developed me into the strong leader and boss I am today, it
really taught me how to control my emotions without displaying
the incorrect emotion, it formed my personality, and it taught
me how to manage people and acquire talent at my place of
employment. I’m able to adapt to different personalities on a
daily basis because I understand what’s not being said, by that I
mean if one of my employees is displaying a discouraging look,
14. just by smiling and carrying myself with confidence would
change my employees outlook.
This concept is used by everyone but what determines how
well a person speaks to a crowd or presents themselves is based
on the ratio of usage, you have some people who are very
monotone, and just extremely boring to listen or be around, and
then you have those eccentric people who tell the best stories
and displays a lot of detail, really putting you in the story and
keeping your attention.
Works Cited:
https://www.goodtherapy.org/blog/psychpedia/nonverbal-
communication
https://ubiquity.acm.org/article.cfm?id=2043156