The Four Whys

I have an ambiguous relationship with the word ‘why’. Some I love. Some provoke a strong reaction against the question or a 'rabbit in the headlights' freeze where my brain has no idea how to process or understand the question. 

So here we go with the Four Whys

1. There’s the criticising why of ‘Why didn’t you do the washing up?’
2. There’s the being curious (and autistic) why of ‘Why didn’t you do the washing up?’.
3. There’s the a-ha moment why of ‘This is why you didn’t do the washing up.’
4. There’s also the condemnatory ‘This is why you didn’t do the washing up’

And, yes, you spotted correctly. Sentences 1 and 2 are identical. Sentences 3 and 4 are identical. And there's not much difference between 1/2 and 3/4 as words on the page.

And yet the four sentences have four very different meanings of why.

Understanding why there are four whys involves unpacking some of what goes on with communication that goes way beyond words on a page. 

In all communication, meaning is a glorious combination of:

• Words 
• Intonation 
• Body language 
• Culture 
• Past experience between the two people
• Past experiences with other people
• Current context 
• Current emotions 
• Current energy, resilience and health 
• Other things occupying the person’s mind

Clear communication that reaches a shared understanding of the meaning of a sentence depends on two people decoding and interpreting all of these in a more-or-less the same way. 

It is hardly surprising there is so much mis-communication in the world, and that's even before we start thinking about the challenge of communicating across neurotypes. 

I've found the most helpful approach in all situations is to assume good intent and to be curious. I would prefer to get it wrong that way than by assuming ill intent when none is meant. 

I find it wonderful how frequently everyday good-enough communication occurs when people have a desire to communicate. 

And, as an aside, I'm not posthumously diagnosing Erving Goffman as Autistic (although I guess I am). However, if he was autistic and had written Presentation of Self in Everyday Life as a guide for other autistic people on navigating social relationships, he couldn't have done a better job. It transformed my ability to choose when and how to make others feel at ease in different social settings rather than them feeling awkward at my social awkwardness. 

Footnotes and the neurodivergent writer

 I write with footnotes. Footnotes have replaced the parentheses that were littered through my writing. I used an eclectic mix of brackets, commas and dashes, depending on the type of parenthesis or my mood that day.

I still free-write chaotically. However, I now edit most of the parentheses out the main text and into a footnote. Why? Parentheses tend to disrupt the clarity of the story or narrative. I prize clarity highly and I can see how the parentheses within the text are disruptive. Yet, diversions feel essential to me as a neurodivergent writer.

I am autistic, and as a writer I can be pedantic about the need to qualify an assertion or provide additional context. As a reader, my concentration gets broken when I hit something that I feel needs more explanation or context for me to process what I’m reading.

I also have ADHD which, for me, means linear thinking is an impossibility. I need to draw connections and show people some of the treasures I found down rabbit holes.

And that brings me to footnotes and the neurodivergent academic writer.

I still thank Gideon Calder in my head every time I sit to write. He became my main doctoral supervisor and I am amazed he still has hair and that it hasn’t gone white. He was the person who suggested using footnotes for my thesis.

Footnotes provide a simple way to alert a reader to additional context or connections without disrupting the flow. As a writer, it enables me to craft something that means the reader isn’t left struggling to find the key information or flow in an argument. As a reader, other people’s footnotes let me postpone diving down the rabbit hole of wanting to know more in order to assimilate what I am reading. For me at least, the tiny superscript number doesn’t distract from the flow of reading because my brain doesn’t try to read it.

Endnotes and footnotes fulfil this purpose. However, having a footnote at the bottom of the page means it is easy to glance down to check the additional context or connections whenever suits. I value this highly. The act of flicking to the end of a chapter or paper destroys the flow of my thinking about what I am reading.

Footnotes will not work for all writers or all readers. However, if your writing is littered with parentheses, you may want to explore their use.