Shreya Week #1: Am I Still the Same Person When I Speak Differently?

Last year, I spent 30 minutes writing an email to my former band teacher. While the email was only a few sentences long, I kept rereading it, changing the wording, and worrying over many aspects of my email. I wondered whether something sounded too casual, whether the grammar was perfect, or whether something could be misunderstood. When I finally sent it, I noticed a missing comma and felt a wave of panic over something so insignificant. 

Then my teacher responded. 

Her response was short, casual, and only two sentences long. Reading it made me realize just how much more careful I had been than the situation required.



Compared to that email, I do not spend 30 minutes writing a text to a friend. With my friends, I might leave a typo, forget a period, or send a thought before I have completely figured out how I want to phrase it. When I talk to someone I do not know well, I tend to be quieter and more aware of how I am coming across. Without consciously deciding to, I change the way I communicate depending on who I am speaking to.


At first, I thought we changed the way we spoke simply to show that we understood our audience. I would not speak to a teacher the same way I would speak to a friend, and I do not think that makes me dishonest. The same idea can require completely different language depending on who needs to hear it.


However, the more I thought about it, the more complicated it seemed. If the way we speak is one of the ways that we, as individuals, express who we are, then what does it mean when we are constantly changing the way we speak?


Being more careful with my language around a teacher does not necessarily mean I am pretending to be someone else. I am still saying what I mean; I am simply choosing a different way to say it. 


 Identity is not as fixed as I once thought. The version of me who talks with a close friend, the version who carefully writes an email for a teacher, and the version who speaks to someone I have just met are not necessarily “fake” versions of me. Rather, they are different parts of the same person drawn out by different situations. Being more formal in one setting and more relaxed in another does not make either version less real.


Perhaps the more important question is not whether we change depending on who we surround ourselves with. We almost always do. The more important question is whether we are choosing how we change, or whether we are slowly adapting ourselves to fit into whatever environment we happen to be in.


 

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