Signifying Acts: The Overlooked Effort

I think I remember that time where Jonatan and I got into a heated argument and end up solving it. Though so, I can also remember that the tension lingers because I demanded an apology (to satisfy my ego) but he didn’t think it was necessary.

Even so, Jonatan is the best person to break my ice and provide an equal action to cover up the unmet need of ‘apology’. Sometimes, he’ll offer to cook dinner for me or let me pick a rom-com movie (which he despises), or pick a piece of cute jewelry for me. I’ve always thought that this is just an act of diversion, so sometimes I didn’t appreciate it as much as I’d appreciate an apology. Little did I know, this is what’s called the Signifying Act, and I believe it’s definitely overlooked!

Listening carefully to your partner is one of the key things to maintain a relationship. Listening to the words used, the intonation, the emotion, the excitement, or disappointment, everything from the most shallow to the deepest has its meaning. But in the course I took from the University of Toronto, Professor Tsang mentioned that it’s not only through careful listening we can gain understanding, it’s also to see the acts that follow.

“People sometimes can express their feelings and very significant emotional state through other channels than talking. One of the concepts that I really want to introduce is the concept that I call “Signifying Acts”, which simply refers to acts or actions that we take that signify something.”

Say for example, in some cultures, parents are not to apologise to their children because it’s just not appropriate, even if they’ve done something wrong with them. So say a child accidentally breaks a glass and her mom yelled at her, and the mom immediately felt bad. Because of this cultural background, the mother might not apologise. Instead, the mom would probably go to her daughter and ask her to go shopping for toys or cook her favourite meal. That is sort of an indirect way of saying “I’m sorry, I should have not yelled.”

Signifying Acts have a lot to do with the cultural background of a person. In some cultures it might be okay to kiss in public to show affection, in some other cultures it’s taboo. In some cultures bringing flowers to a partner might seem romantic, and in other cultures, it might seem like a general thing to do and values nothing.

If you’re in a relationship with different cultural backgrounds, I suggest you take into account the differences that might come up in your relationship. I think negotiation and open-mindedness is always the key to meet in the middle.

From this lecture, I now understand Jonatan and myself better. I think some of the things he did makes more sense these days, and how I reacted to it makes sense too. Maybe sometimes overthinking is good when directed to a positive attitude, but it doesn’t mean justifying a certain bad act. We know our own boundaries and it’s up to us when to keep going or to stop.

The next time Jonatan does something sweet after an argument, I for sure know I’ll appreciate it better.

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Previously published on medium

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