Critical Thinking
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Critical thinking and language can be a hard thing to understand. For a better understanding one must understand the meanings of critical thinking and language. When in an argument or debate or when a decision is to be made, critical thinking comes into play. As we grow we learn the fundamentals of language, and communication, and these key essentials will help us with our decisions and critical thinking. This paper will discuss the meanings and how they play a role in critical thinking and language.
Critical thinking is using your mental process with your skills, application, and analyzing to come to a conclusion.
Language is: “Communication by voice in the distinctively human manner, using arbitrary sounds in conventional ways with conventional meanings; speech” (Language. n.d.).
Definition of Diversity
The fact or quality of being diverse; difference. (Diversity, n.d.).
Definition of Communication
The exchange of thoughts, messages, or information, as by speech, signals, writing, or behavior (Communication, n.d.).
The Role of Language and Language Diversity
In the role of language and language diversity, the purpose is a method in which an individual communicates to get his or her opinion and ideas across to the other individual. From region to region languages are developed, the diversity of languages are therefore formed. The United States has approximately 250 different languages spoken. That being the case, in todays workforce there may be more of a chance to work with someone who may not be as fluent in the English language as another (Thiederman, 2006). In order to communicate effectively one needs to use critical thinking to break the barriers of language diversity.
When hearing an individual with an accent, the assumptions are made that what is being said is not understood, the tendency is to speak louder and more slowly in order to allow the other individual to understand. Truth is, many foreigners from different regions read, write, and understand the English language more than we realize. Because, the English language has different Latin and Germanic roots than other languages, it is not surprising that most foreigners have their heavy accents (Thiederman, 2006).
When we communicate, we want to speak clearly and correctly, most important is to avoid using slang. The use of some words needs to be properly explained, for instance when using the word soon one must explain exactly when. To some individual the word could mean now or later, it may not be understood. The word often is also a word that needs to express an exact amount, to some it may only mean twice; to others it may express a multitude of times. Therefore, we must learn language if spoken improperly may lose the correct meaning of what is being conveyed (Thiederman, 2006). Learning to speak clearly, correctly, and using the appropriate language is extremely important to convey what is being communicated. Critical thinking is a major component within language diversity, in order to communicate.
The Importance of Communication
Language varies in the way it may be communicated; language may be verbal and physical, as in the use of body language. We learn the use language from the time we are born and taught to us by