This characterizing of silence makes sense. Students will be less likely to assume automatically that any and all detail is needed for personal writing to succeed if instructors make clear that they value it as a positive rather than as a null set and if they provide students with a heuristic by which to evaluate silence types. Silence creates a dichotomy with disclosure; as a result, the two together force choices, which automatically increases intellectual engagement--just what we want our students to develop. Once students realize that silence can potentially have as much if not more power than disclosure, they can recognize the value of judicious use of both.
Reading about silence as a rhetorical tool brought to mind that I've been told it sometimes takes courage to speak. I'm thinking, for example, of those individuals willing to buck the trend of the "don't be a snitch." And, less dramatically, I'm thinking of those young college students accustomed to the cool of quiet in high school who, nevertheless, make the leap and participate in class exchanges in college. I'm also thinking about two moments when what I considered "stating the obvious" was called courageous.
In the first case I merely posted an email to the interim president of our college as an alternative to attending an open forum he has holding in the wake of the sudden exodus of our school's president of 25 years. He had asked for suggestions, and I had a couple. First, I had been disturbed by the silence of school leaders in the days and months following the departure of the president. The lack of any sort of communication was deafening and debilitating. My suggestion was that the interim president, as a leadership specialist, was in a unique position to address these deficits. Second, I pointed out what I knew he already knew--that the school was misusing the Baldridge competition, making it into a "coronation," I believe my word was, rather than a process that would invigorate the school. Instead of abandoning the competition, though, I argued that the process was exactly what we needed at this point. An administrator to whom he copied the mail wrote that I was on target but one of the very few who had the courage to put such thoughts in writing. I was shocked to think that I was working in an environment where reasoned suggestions for institutional growth would require courage. I found myself wondering how many reasoned suggestions have been silenced through intimidation.
The second time I heard the word "courageous" was from a colleague who read my "Condolences" post on this blog. The very fact that he felt the need to use that word says something about the reality of an environment that should be about promoting a free exchange of communication. (Of course, he was one of only two faculty who understood the message, so so much for free exchange.) But I'll admit in this case that I wanted to use the post to violate the social more of silence. After all, people aren't supposed to complain about what they don't receive, especially if it's an expression of sympathy, right? That custom of silence was what people were relying on, no doubt. Had this been about me, I probably would have remained silent. This wasn't for me, however, and since Mom no longer had a voice I had to be her voice.
Communication by definition involves entangling alliances. Some--one would hope--pleasant; others, not so much, though still necessary at times. Ultimately, it all seems to come down to judgment--judgment about your purpose and your audience.Teaching students how to negotiate those alliances using the power of both silence and disclosure is important, it seems to me.
Work Cited
Gere, Anne Ruggles. "Revealing Silence: Rethinking Personal Writing. " College Composition and Communication 53.2 (2001): 203-223.
