April Meeting Review:
Gentle Art of Verbal Self Defense for TCs

Workplaces and social gathering venues offer opportunities for productive, rewarding interaction. Unfortunately, interactions in stressed and pressurized situations may lead to disagreement and confrontation. How can we detect and verbally defend ourselves in situations that become emotionally charged and potentially dangerous?

Elisa Miller, Aroxanne Ullman, and Kristin Kirkham were the featured speakers at the April meeting of the Lone Star Community. They presented and led an interesting, entertaining workshop titled, “The Gentle Art of Verbal Self-Defense (GAVSD) for Technical Communicators.”

Kristin, Elisa, and Arroxane - our GAVSD presenters

A goal of verbal self-defense is establishing and maintaining a calm environment with your language that prevents escalation from occurring. A second goal is dealing with unavoidable verbal violence efficiently and effectively with no loss of face on either side.

GAVSD relies on two categories of communication modes: Sensory and Satir. When we are under stress, we can get locked into our primary sensory mode, for example sight, hearing, or touch. The Sensory Mode technique asks us to match the sensory mode coming at us and if we can’t do this, don’t use any sensory language at all.

The Satir Mode technique involves observing how our language during confrontations falls into one of five consistent modes: blaming, computing, placating, distracting, and leveling. Each mode uses tools that disarm the aggressor, diverts the aggressor’s energy, and decreases hostility.

Elisa, Aroxanne, and Kristin took the group through several enlightening group activities that demonstrated the power and broad application of The Gentle Art of Verbal Self-Defense. The approach may be summed up as paying attention, rejecting preconceptions, staying in tune, and preserving face.

Elisa with a group exercise