by Thokozile Gurganious

Created on: October 08, 2010   Last Updated: October 09, 2010

Indeed words, just like actions, can be ambiguous.  Ambiguity of speech can lead to misunderstanding, frustration and a lot of problems. A few examples can illustrate how words can be ambiguous.

At the camp site in Botswana, we had kept all our dirty clothes in a laundry basket under a tree. The day after we arrived back home, Gugu, my daughter, wanted to go and practice soccer. So she looked for her practicing pants in the laundry basket and got them and went into her room. Then we heard some loud screaming, and Gugu bolted out of the room with the pants half down her legs. Then I saw a thin golden snake, about three feet long, slide out of the pants.

“That is not poisonous to man,” I said.

“I am not a man,” shouted my daughter back at me angrily.

Obviously, the meaning she attached to “man” was different from the one that I had attached to the same word.  The word “man” can refer to the human species in general (the meaning I intended to convey), but can also be used to refer to the male members of the human species (the meaning my daughter attached to the word. “Man” can also be used to mean “to operate, be in charge of, staff or work”.  

Another example is the word “reception”.  I was looking for someone who could give me the directions around the school at St. Thomas University School of Law, Miami Gardens, Fl. I met a young man overloaded with books, and stopped him. It was about 430 pm on a Friday afternoon.

“Sir, would you know where the Reception is?” I asked.

“You mean there is a party around here tonight?” the boy asked me getting excited.

“No. The front desk, you know, the office that receives visitors to the school,” I said.

“Oh. Over there,” the boy said disappointed.

The word “reception” can mean “welcome, greeting, reaction, response or treatment” as well as “party, function, cocktail party, gathering, get-together”.  The boy thought I was talking about a party, but I was thinking about a welcome office.

I used to work for a large company down in South Florida, and sometimes I and the other workers left together in a large group. One day a group of about ten of us all went to the restrooms as we were leaving work. I was still in the cubicle when everybody else had gathered by the hand basins.

“Come on Miss T, we need to go!” one of the girls

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