Understanding and Language

Much of what Mason has said so far seems fairly straightforward. It seems that he is trying to lay some groundwork and will delve deeper into the concept of understanding later. Still, I found a couple of his points interesting and relevant to what we have been talking about in class so far. Mason discusses different things that we try to understand, but then on page fourteen he says, "Naturally, it is possible to limit discussion of understanding explicitly to the understanding of language." He goes on to say that understanding cannot be viewed solely through this lens. Nonetheless, I have noticed several times in class discussion that much of what we think we understand depends on the manner in which we talk about it. A slight tweak in the language used can greatly change the way we understand something or what it means to say that we understand a specific concept or idea. 

I also found interesting Mason's discussion on page twenty-two about how each discipline does not have its own unique method of understanding with which to be matched. This reminded me of our painting project. We are not looking at our topic only through one discipline or way of thinking, but through many. With each added lens, we both add onto and change what we understood before. Maybe strong understanding involves this sort of multiple lens idea.