3,244 Quotes About Communication

We . . . go out into the Waste Land of Experts, each knowing so much about so little that he can neither be contradicted nor is worth contradicting.

When we talk about a person being a problem, rather than directly to the person, we add to the underground anxiety and make it harder for the talked-about person to behave with confidence and competence.

Nothing changes until people decide to do the things they must, in order to bring about peace.

For no medium is excessively dangerous if its users understand what its dangers are. It is not important that those who ask the questions arrive at my answers or Marshall McLuhan's (quite different answers, by the way). This is an instance in which the asking of the questions is sufficient. To ask is to break the spell.

Character displays "the weighty impatience of having to explain something that should already be understood.

Frankie, I'm fully awake and more curious than George. If we hang up I'll lie here formulating a million reasons for your call, none of them your truth, and that would drive me crazy. You wouldn't do that to the guy who has your grandmother's old phone number, would you? Trust me, you can tell me anything.—Emerson

There is one way to understand another culture. Living it. Move into it, ask to be tolerated as a guest, learn the language. At some point understanding may come. It will always be wordless. The moment you grasp what is foreign, you will lose the urge to explain it. To explain a phenomenon is to distance yourself from it.

The clearest way to see through a culture is to attend to its tools for conversation.

Many times in life I've regretted the things I've said without thinking. But I've never regretted the things I said nearly as much as the words I left unspoken.