That's Not What I Meant!: How Conversational Style Makes or Breaks Relationships [Paperback]

Deborah Tannen (Author)

Book Description

Release date: July 5, 2011

“Tannen combines a novelist’s ear for the way people speak with a rare power of original analysis....Fascinating.”
—Oliver Sacks, author of The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat and The Mind’s Eye

In That’s Not What I Meant!, Deborah Tannen, renowned communication expert and author of the New York Times bestsellers You’re Wearing THAT? and You Just Don’t Understand, explores how conversational styles can make or break interpersonal relationships at home, at work, or at play. Fans of her books and the healthily curious reader interested in popular psychology, feminism, linguistics, or social sciences will be fascinated by Tannen’s remarkable insights into unintentional conversational confusion.  That’s Not What I Meant! is an essential guide to recognizing and adjusting what we say and how we are saying it in order to strengthen or save a relationship.

Editorial Reviews

From the Back Cover

At home, on the job, in a personal relationship, it's often not what you say but how you say it that counts.

Deborah Tannen revolutionized our thinking about relationships between women and men in her #1 bestseller You Just Don't Understand. In That's Not What I Meant!, the internationally renowned sociolinguist and expert on communication demonstrates how our conversational signals—voice level, pitch and intonation, rhythm and timing, even the simple turns of phrase we choose—are powerful factors in the success or failure of any relationship. Regional speech characteristics, ethnic and class backgrounds, age, and individual personality all contribute to diverse conversational styles that can lead to frustration and misplaced blame if ignored—but provide tools to improve relationships if they are understood.

At once eye-opening, astute, and vastly entertaining, Tannen's classic work on interpersonal communication will help you to hear what isn't said and to recognize how your personal conversational style meshes or clashes with others. It will give you a new understanding of communication that will enable you to make the adjustments that can save a conversation . . . or a relationship.

About the Author

Deborah Tannen is Professor of Linguistics at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C. Her books include the New York Times bestsellers You Just Don't Understand, You're Wearing THAT?, Talking from 9 to 5, and You Were Always Mom's Favorite!. She has written for and been featured in numerous major newspapers and magazines, including the New York Times, Newsweek, USA Today, the Washington Post, and Time.

Product Details

• Paperback: 224 pages
• Publisher: Harper Perennial; Rei Rep edition (July 5, 2011)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0062062999
• ISBN-13: 978-0062062994
• Product Dimensions: 8.1 x 5.4 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #20,660 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #10 in Books > Education & Reference > Etiquette > Conversation

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Much better than You Just Don't Understand January 31, 2012

By Klint Hull

Format:Paperback

I assign Tannen's That's Not What I Meant for my college students to read. They frequently report how reading and discussing it for our class has transformed their close relationships with friends and family - particularly with their spouses - as they're much better able to understand each other and how they and others communicate. Most say they can't wait to finish reading the book so they can make their husband or wife read it. Occasionally, a student will complain (unfairly, perhaps) that Tannen uses too many examples, but most recognize that each example serves to illustrate a concept Tannen discusses, keeping the book grounded in the concrete and tangible and staying away from getting too abstract. From an instructor's perspective, I see Tannen's examples as well-balanced with the rest of the book's content; there are enough examples to make the concepts clear but not so much that one gets bored waiting for her to make her point. Her prose is clear and concise, and the book is organized so that the later concepts build upon the earlier ones in a helpful and logical way.

Tannen helps us understand how we don't just pay attention to the words spoken: in fact, we pay less attention to the message than what she calls the "metamessage": the implied and inferred meanings that each utterance evokes. Language is a lot more complex than we think, and by understanding that, we'll be much better able to understand each other - and understand why we sometimes seem to "click" so well with someone we've only just met, or why conversations sometimes feel awkward or go very badly awry (and how to avoid or at least mitigate such failures). For example, with the (now-cliche'd) question "Does this dress make me look fat?", there is no right "yes" or "no" answer, because the question is not about the affect a particular garment has on one's appearance. The real question (carried in the "metamessage") is about whether the listener still finds the questioner attractive. Miss the real question, and conflict follows (or at least hurt feelings).

Tannen makes linguistic concepts clear and accessible for the lay person, and moreover, she makes it easy to see how knowing those concepts leads to real-life change and improvements in our conversational communication with others, and therefore, in our relationships. This book is a practical guide for those seeking to improve how they communicate with and relate to others, and it is intellectually engaging for those wanting to ponder the psycho-linguistic underpinnings of human communication and social interaction. Highly recommended.

One note: On the first page (or so) of the chapter on Power and Solidarity (I'm referring to page 93 of the 1986 Ballantine paperback edition, or page ~101-2 of the 2011 Harper Perennial / Rei Rep edition being sold on Amazon currently), there's a key editing error that makes one passage confusing: the passage is "Solidarity is the drive to be friendly, similar to what we have called rapport, but _power_ also establishes equal footing between people, so neither can tell the other what to do." The word "power" here needs to be replaced with "solidarity," which is what the passage is talking about, not power, which was defined in the previous sentence. (I'm surprised it hasn't been fixed in this new edition - but then, maybe nobody bothered to point it out to Tannen before.) Changing the word to the correct one will make the passage much easier to understand in the context.

-RC

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent book October 31, 2011

By C. Symons

Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase

I am so glad that the publishers released this book again. I have seen Tannen speak about the book's content on a video recording of a talk given (I think) at Georgetown. The content is so enlightening; I am convinced that her work could save many a marriage, if studied. I teach conflict management, and I am adding this to my required reading list.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Beyond useful! July 11, 2012

By CK

Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase

This book may not be the most exciting read . . . but the information soaks in usefully. It's a great help in not taking personally situations that would have been previously experienced as hurtful and offensive. The information doesn't necessarilly suggest solutions; but it certainly offers a way out of schismogeny.