How you say it, and what that says.

 When I was a kid, we used to travel from our home in northern Ohio to family reunions in Kentucky. Once we got there, it never took very long for my Michigan-born mother to start speaking with a marked Southern drawl. “Why?”, I thought. Had I known then what I know, I would have answered, “Well, because of communication accommodation, of course!” Just like your charismatic bard can adopt the parlance of the nobles she’s performing for, or dumb it down with bawdy and ribald jokes when at the dive bar, so too can we change our communication to match others. This theory is all about how and why our speech changes, how that relates to our social groups, and what we think are the potential social consequences of sounding more (or less) like those around us. 

According to this theory’s founder (a bit of a scholarly bard himself), Howard Giles, when we adjust our speech for others, we are accommodating in an effort to reduce the perceived social distance between ourselves and others. The less like someone else we sound, the greater the apparent gulf between us. Want to get ahead with the tribe of barbarians? Speak like a barbarian! If you want to make sure that the common folk don’t see you as just another stuffed-shirt noble, best to not sound like one! We have the capacity to both accommodate and also to consciously maintain or even increase social distance through linguistic non-accommodation. You might imagine a scenario in which your brilliant, bookish wizard wants to appear aloof and detached from the other party members and so purposefully uses jargon the rest of them don’t know, references they are sure not to understand, and a tone or manner of speech that intends to exclude the others. 

In the real world, research into communication accommodation might focus on bilingual groups and interethnic communication or on intergenerational communication. The bottom line seems to be that, generally, we like others who sound and speak like us. So, if we want to get along with different folks, we would do well to adjust our communication to match them. Because we can choose our speaking style, and those of us with knowledge of communication accommodation theory (which is all of us now), we can think about convergent and divergent speaking styles as strategies we might purposefully employ when we think it will most benefit us. 

The bard’s use of formal upper-class language with the nobility is one way she might present herself as being more similar to them than she actually is. This could include changes in vocabulary, conversation topic, paralanguage or other nonverbal cues.

The wizard’s choice to diverge in his communication accentuates his differences from them (or at least attempts to). Social distance can be enhanced through a number of strategies, which mirror the accommodation strategies our bard used. Other strategies of non-accommodation include maintenance behaviors. If the wizard keeps on with the transmutation-techno babble even after he’s the only caster in the room, that persistence (while not explicit divergence) is a means of emphasizing social difference. It means the fighter, monk, and rogue at the table likely don’t feel that they have a lot to contribute to the conversation. If you’ve been in a similar situation, you know what the fighter, monk, and rogue are feeling: confusion, exclusion, distance, and isolation. 

We’ve already hinted at a few reasons why we might adopt different strategies of convergence or divergence. Mainly, Giles and other theorists contend, convergence is about approval. Being the social apes we are, approval of the group likely means safety. But, why then would we ever diverge in our communication? The answer comes from a theory of social-identity. Whenever we are aware of groups (and the differences between those groups) we consider which groups we are part of, and which we are not. Sometimes we speak less as individuals and more as representatives of the groups of which we are part, and whose membership is salient to us at the time. When I lecture in front of a class, I’m performing as a representative of my college, as a member of the faculty, and as a scholar of communication. If one of those groups is particularly salient to me, (and different from the people I’m speaking to) my communication can easily diverge from them. For proponents of social identity theory (such as Henri Tajfel and John Turner) personal identity is bound on one end of a continuum and group identity bounds the other extreme. When we want to be recognized as unique, solitary, and distinct, we diverge in our communication.

For dungeonmasters, this theory can play an interesting role in the social interactions and performance of your players. If the bard’s speech to the nobility comes out sounding straight out of the court of Louis XIV, perhaps they get to roll their Charisma check at advantage.  On the other hand, if they sound more Larry the Cable Guy, perhaps that earns them a roll at disadvantage. In general, when we converge in our communication with others, they are more likely to evaluate us as attractive, competent, and warm. Divergent speakers get regarded more unfavorably as hostile and impolite.

Competent, deft communicators know how to accommodate. It’s helpful in getting along with others (especially others you don’t know well) to accommodate if you’re hoping to be well-regarded.  However, I don’t believe that how others perceive you is the ultimate measure of communication’s success or failure. Instead, I think that there is a value in authentic self-expression and enacting communication behaviors you can be proud of and which do not perjure your sense of self-identity. You may create more interpersonal strife through non-accommodation and thereby disrupt the formation of intergroup relationships. However, the upside of divergence is that you reaffirm to yourself and to those around you your own individual identity. How different would my mother’s experiences at the family reunions have been if she had chosen non-accommodation? Would she have still been welcomed with open arms, invited to help make dinner, and hugged warmly even without the affected southern drawl?  I think so, but we’ll never know.