At the Midwest Law and Economics Association Meeting yesterday, Professor Robin Malloy of Syracuse showed, as part of his talk, an excerpt from the Disney cartoon movie Pocahontas which I think is a nice example of miscommunication between the sexes. The start of the episode is a romantic idyll between Pocahantas and John Smith. He wants her to see London; she wants them to go to London *together*. For him, the experience is what's important; to her it's the relationship. Then he gets into trouble. Pocahantas sniffs and tries to leave after he casually calls Indians savages, says they are uncivilized, and says that their houses are not as good as London houses. He tries to convey to her that he didn't mean to offend her. But what she really objects to is not his expression of what he thinks, but the way he thinks. And she does not want to argue about it and try to change his mind.

He, on the other hand, doesn't really care what she thinks about Indians vs. Englishmen, though he nonethelesss makes some small attempt to change the way she thinks about it. He does care about what she thinks of *him*, and he tries to change her mind on that too. He sees words as communicating ideas, and he thinks the ideas are important, not the choice of words; she sees words as communicating feelings mainly, and thinks the choice of words is important, not the ideas. [ permalink, http://php.indiana.edu/~erasmuse/w/03.10.11a.htm ]

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