Deborah Tannen Quotes - Page 2

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• False dichotomies are often at the heart of discord.

  Deborah Tannen

  Heart, Discord, Dichotomy

  Deborah Tannen (1998). “The Argument Culture: Moving from Debate to Dialogue”, Random House Incorporated

  5 Copy quote

• Communication is a continual balancing act, juggling the conflicting needs for intimacy and independence

  Deborah Tannen

  Communication, Independence, Cogs

  Deborah Tannen (2013). “You Just Don't Understand: Women and Men in Conversation”, p.27, Harper Collins

  8 Copy quote

• It's our tendency to approach every problem as if it were a fight between two sides. We see it in headlines that are always using metaphors for war. It's a general atmosphere of animosity and contention that has taken over our public discourse.

  Deborah Tannen

  War, Taken, Fighting

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• All conversation, in addition to whatever else it does, displays, and asks for recognition of, our competence.

  Deborah Tannen

  Doe, Recognition, Conversation

  Deborah Tannen (1986). “That's not what I meant!: how conversational style makes or breaks your relations with others”, William Morrow & Co

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• Girls are not accustomed to jockeying for status in an obvious way; they are more concerned that they be liked.

  Deborah Tannen

  Girl, Way, Obvious

  Deborah Tannen (2013). “You Just Don't Understand: Women and Men in Conversation”, p.44, Harper Collins

  4 Copy quote

• Many women feel it is natural to consult with their partners at every turn, while many men automatically make more decisions without consulting their partners.

  Deborah Tannen

  Men, Decision, Natural

  Deborah Tannen (2013). “You Just Don't Understand: Women and Men in Conversation”, p.27, Harper Collins

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• If women are often frustrated because men do not respond to their troubles by offering matching troubles, men are often frustrated because women do.

  Deborah Tannen

  Frustration, Men, Offering

  12 Copy quote

• Life is a matter of dealing with other people, in little matters and cataclysmic ones, and that means a series of conversations.

  Deborah Tannen

  Mean, People, Littles

  Deborah Tannen (2013). “That's Not What I Meant!: How Conversational Style Makes or Breaks Relationships”, p.28, Harper Collins

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• When people realize that in the long run you may be turning off the audiences more, even though they will look temporarily--in the end they turn away, we really need to develop other metaphors and not talk about two sides, but talk about all sides.

  Deborah Tannen

  Running, Two Sides, Long

  5 Copy quote

• The allure of love is to have someone who knows you so well that you don't have to explain yourself. It is the promise of someone who cares enough about you to protect you against the world of strangers who do not wish you well.

  Deborah Tannen

  Love Is, Promise, Wish

  Deborah Tannen (2001). “I Only Say This Because I Love You: How the Way We Talk Can Make or Break Family Relationships Throughout Our Lives”, p.23, Random House

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• It can be the best of relationships and the worst of relationships - often at the same time. The bond between a mother and daughter is one of the strongest, but it's also among the most complicated.

  Deborah Tannen

  Daughter, Mother, Complicated

  11 Copy quote

• Relationships are made of talk - and talk is for girls and women.

  Deborah Tannen

  Girl, Made

  9 Copy quote

• To say anything about women and men without marking oneself as either feminist or anti-feminist, male-basher or apologist for men seems as impossible for a woman as trying to get dressed in the morning without inviting interpretations of her character. Sitting at the conference table musing on these matters, I felt sad to think that we women didn't have the freedom to be unmarked that the men sitting next to us had. Some days you just want to get dressed and go about your business. But if you're a woman, you can't, because there is no unmarked woman.

  Deborah Tannen

  Morning, Character, Men

  11 Copy quote

• When those closest to us respond to events differently than we do, when they seem to see the same scene as part of a different play, when they say things that we could not imagine saying in the same circumstances, the ground on which we stand seems to tremble and our footing is suddenly unsure.

  Deborah Tannen

  Play, Events, Different

  11 Copy quote

• Each underestimates her own power and overestimates the other's

  Deborah Tannen

  Underestimate, Overestimate

  7 Copy quote

• Some days you just want to get dressed and go about your business. But if you're a woman, you can't, because there is no unmarked woman.

  Deborah Tannen

  Want, Ifs

  11 Copy quote

• The chivalrous man who holds a door open or signals a woman to go ahead of him when he's driving is negotiating both status and connection.

  Deborah Tannen

  Men, Doors, Connections

  Deborah Tannen (2013). “You Just Don't Understand: Women and Men in Conversation”, p.34, Harper Collins

  11 Copy quote

• The Pavlovian view of women voters - plug the words in, and they will respond - sends a chill down my spine because it sounds like an adaptation of something I have written about communication between the sexes: When a woman tells a man about a problem, she doesn't want him to fix it; she just wants him to listen and let her know he understands. But there's a difference between a private conversation and a presidential election, between what we want from our leaders.

  Deborah Tannen

  Sex, Women, Communication

  4 Copy quote

• In an ongoing relationship, each current criticism packs the punches of all the others that have gone before.

  Deborah Tannen

  Criticism, Gone, Ongoing

  Deborah Tannen (1986). “That's not what I meant!: how conversational style makes or breaks your relations with others”, William Morrow & Co

  4 Copy quote

• any criticism heard secondhand sounds worse than it would face to face. Words spoken out of our presence strike us as more powerful, just as people we know only by reputation seem larger than life.

  Deborah Tannen

  Powerful, People, Criticism

  Deborah Tannen (1986). “That's not what I meant!: how conversational style makes or breaks your relations with others”, William Morrow & Co

  4 Copy quote

• But if you parry individuals points - a negative and defensive enterprise - you never step back and actively imagine a world in which a different system of ideas could be true - a positive act.

  Deborah Tannen

  Ideas, Negative, Different

  Deborah Tannen (1998). “The Argument Culture: Moving from Debate to Dialogue”, Random House Incorporated

  4 Copy quote

• The one who decides who goes ahead has the upper hand, regardless of who gets to go. This is why many women do not feel empowered by such privileges as having doors held open for them. The advantage of going first through the door is less salient to them than the disadvantage of being granted the right to walk through a door by someone who is framed, by his magnanimous gesture, as the arbiter of the right-of-way.

  Deborah Tannen

  Power, Doors, Hands

  Deborah Tannen (1986). “That's not what I meant!: how conversational style makes or breaks relationships”

  4 Copy quote

• The argument culture urges us to approach the world-and the people in it-in an adversarial frame of mind. It rests on the assumption that opposition is the best way to get anything done: Conflict and opposition are as necessary as cooperation and agreement, but the scale is off balance, with conflict and opposition over-weighted.

  Deborah Tannen

  Agreement, People, Mind

  4 Copy quote

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