看 看
LOOK LOOK !
In Mandarin, the phrase “Kan Kan” means, “Look Look!” It’s a common phrase like the American English, Check This Out!
The phrase Kan Kan typifies the form of idiom, gesture, ritual, drawing, song, advert, poem and so on that conveys an elemental experience and begs universal, intuitive understanding.
We operate under a great and fallacious notion that communication occurs in a demystified zone where there is strong and lasting agreement upon common sets of terms. In essence, we assume far too much about what can safely be assumed.
Well, we know better, don’t we? But, still we walk the tight-rope above the abyss of confusion. The fact is, there aren’t many other clear ways across. Why do we want across? Why Not.
Vocabularies and grammers don’t align, histories and songs fail,
the meaning mutates, the memes fray, binary breaks down; yet by some miracle no less mysterious than the big bang itself, communication happens. A message gets through.
What if the message is wrong? Well, this raises a whole list of questions. What I’m primarily concerned with here is this: is it in our power to refine the communicaton process and should we even try?
It may be time to learn a whole new language.
