6.1 THE FIRST IMPRESSIONS
6.1.4 ELEMENTS OF CONFUSION
This section specifically illustrates the different elements of confusion that appeared to have impeded the learners’ understanding of the message, with the suggestions that something simple and clear is needed to attract the attention of people. A sub-theme of learners mixing up the messages also forms part of this section.
Incongruities due to calligraphy as well as punctuation issues seemed to have caused some confusion as to what certain symbols represented or meant. For instance, a lack of clarity regarding the Sesotho word ‘ee’, which can be translated as yes or as a question ‘ee?’ is represented by two ‘ees’ not a single ‘e’:
F4: As for the written message, it says: na u kena baneng? (do you like nice time) and this thing here which confuses me “E” (question) or “E”(yes)
F1&F6: “E?” / “E”
F4: I don’t know whether it’s “E” for a question or “E” for a positive answer F2: …but doesn’t the “E” for yes stand alone?
F6: Yes, it supposed to
F2: So this can’t be for yes then, it indicates surprise from the person who is asking the question. He must be surprised at how much you like nice time
F3: I think it’s just an expression, see these exclamations? I think if it was a question they would have put question marks instead
F2: Had it been on an audio, maybe this person could have whistled instead, to show his surprise
R: What should I say…? What should I say when reading it?
F4: The problem is every one of us seems to read it with a different understanding or interpretation rather (NUL: 1518-1536)
The discussion continued for a while and finished with a claim that the message is not clear:
165 F5: We can take it to be a continuation of this question
F1: In that case it should have had a comma somewhere, to read: na u kena baneng comma (,) “E” and then a question mark if it were one sentence
F4: What can we say it represents? Looking at this other message, bona hee HIV e kenella le uena, I would really say this is a question
F2: Ahh! It really is not clear (NUL: 1552-1559)
Responses to the question that asked whether the content matched with the title or not, also pointed to a communication gap that illustrated how images can be misinterpreted or interpreted differently when there is not enough anchorage in the message. This gap meant learners failed to understand the meaning of the image. This further indicated how an insufficiently supportive relationship between text and image can confuse people:
F4: Yahh! Because it does not point out exactly what is happening especially if it refers to every one of them. For instance it says: (u kena baneng?) Meaning she likes or is going out for nice time? As we’ve just agreed that this person for instance looks like she’s a student, it may be that she is on her way to the library meaning she’s not going there for socialization and may even not be having time for such things. She does not represent what this title is referring to. The same applies to these two whom we said look like they are at work; in the offices, people don’t go to work for
socialization. They go to the bars and stuff like that (NUL: 1791-1802)
The confusion was again evident in the ideas or opinions that learners had of the symbols that made a ‘web’ that appeared to connect people in the picture to each other. These symbols to some represented “arrows”, to others “lines”, while to others still, they represented “sticks”. In Thaba-Tseka (LCE) the dilemma was resolved after a symbol that represented an arrow was drawn on the chalkboard and the consensus was that the symbols in the poster did not represent arrows, but instead they were lines:
M5: No I don’t think we can call them arrows, they are just lines. If they were arrows they should be having a pointer to show where it is pointing
M3: They are just sticks
R: What do you say now; did you hear that somebody calls them sticks?
F2: I still maintain that they are arrows, because their purpose is to point
M5: But what does the question want or say? You’re not being asked for their purpose at this stage
R: What does the house say, what do you call these things; are they arrows, lines or sticks? (LCE: 52-63)
166 After some discussion, the majority decided that these were lines. This confusion was also apparent in Maseru, though it came in the form of a recommendation:
F2: It should clearly be indicating what is happening
F6: …and they should say what these lines are for, if they wanted to point at people they should be precise, they should use arrows (NUL: 1847-1850)
Even though during the group discussions in Quthing (TIL) respondents appeared to have looked upon the symbols that seemed to connect people in the picture as arrows, one of the individual interviews revealed otherwise and indicated that he had not understood how the lines or arrows worked. This suggested that the symbols were not as clear as they had appeared to be during the group discussions, but it may have been the discussion that helped to make the message clear to him and also to the rest of them:
M1: No, but going back to the poster, I did not quite understand how these lines, or arrows as they are called, arrows worked (TIL: 2963-2965)
There also seemed to be a fairly consistent sense of confusion about this poster among the respondents in Maseru. Learners here came up with very interesting misinterpretations that usefully illustrated how different signs can influence this and drive people to make an interpretation of a picture difficult if there is not enough elaboration; that is, if the text message is not elaborated in the picture or the picture message is not elaborated in the text:
F3: To me this does not say anything, because we’re assuming that this is what is happening and yet it may not be that way. If the people who developed this poster were to stand here and explain what it means, you may find that we are all lost F1: Of course they may all be redundant yet we’ve classified them…
F6: This one may be sitting in a bar waiting to be served with drinks, yet we decided he’s an officer
F3: …this one a student and yet she may be the one who is a sex worker
F1: …and this one just a passenger who wanted to know if the taxi can take her somewhere or maybe asking for a lift. Poor soul, she may not be a sex worker
F3: After all, these arrows may be meant to show that these people are talking to each other, not sleeping with each other. This one may even be insulting this one, who knows? (NUL: 1749-1759)
Moreover, efforts to establish the signs (text and images) that made up the poster indicated some mix-up in their understanding where respondents sometimes appeared to be completely off track, especially because AIDS seemed not to be the first thing that attracted their attention
167 to the HIV and AIDS related publications. The next section demonstrates examples of these mixed messages that contributed to some of the confusion.