Do you ever simply not understand a piece of text no matter how many times you read it despite the fact that you understand the language and individual words?

Submitted ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago⁩ by ⁨Free_Opinions@feddit.uk⁩ to ⁨[deleted]⁩

This post made me think of it as it’s a good example of this.

Every now and then I encounter writing like this (often it’s something someone is showing me) and I just read it, and then I re-read it and then I re-re-read it and my mind just stays completely blank and I have no clue of what it’s saying. This seems to be happening to me quite regulardly and honestly I feel quite stupid. I’m wondering if this is some ADHD / autism thing, granted that english is not my first language. However, like I said, it’s not that I don’t understand the words - just not the meaning of them together.

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Diddlydee@feddit.uk ⁨6⁩ ⁨minutes⁩ ago
About half the posts and comments I see are referencing things I’ve never heard of and sound like complete gibberish. Whole comment chains full of in jokes and weird quotes.

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spittingimage@lemmy.world ⁨26⁩ ⁨minutes⁩ ago
Happens to me every time I read an article on quantum physics. Pretty sure the universe is just messing with us at this point.

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CeruleanRuin@lemmings.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨hour⁩ ago
Pretty much every time I stumble across a post from tumblr, yeah.

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partial_accumen@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

This post made me think of it as it’s a good example of this.

That particular post is a combination of poor English grammar, is deeply referential to pop culture, and also has missing/skipped/misspelled words. Don’t feel bad its hard to parse.

Here is his post corrected:

No it’s because I don’t leave my house anymore unless I’m going to work or grocery shopping . Also because I haven’t been drinking at bars, and I don’t use apps. My carapace ~~may~~ is not be as chitinous as a xenomorph (referencing the 1970s and 80s Ridley Scott/James Cameron movies Alien/Aliens where the aliens had exoskeletons and acid blood), and I don’t have me a heart beating with the acid blood , . ~~but~~ Instead my personality is books and jokes, ~~and~~ but at least I don’t reproduce parasitically…(wait…shit I guess we do…)

Does that make sense now?

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superkret@feddit.org ⁨2⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
Generally, if you know the meaning of all words, and the grammar is correct, you should be able to read and understand it.
Most of the time the problem is that you don’t know the meaning of all words.
Even if you know one possible meaning of every word in the sentence, words can have multiple meanings and you’re probably unaware of that which the author meant.

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AbouBenAdhem@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
Colorless green ideas sleep furiously.

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GlassHalfHopeful@lemmy.ca ⁨3⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
The sample provided isn’t typical English communication. Context is critical. Use of language as well.

It’s not you. It’s them.

Perhaps someone “in the know” can help you understand the context and explain the missing subtext. I certainly couldn’t. That post was confusing for many more reasons than one.

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NeoNachtwaechter@lemmy.world ⁨5⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
Seems it was culture in your example. Culture may give new meanings to words. You don’t know one, you can look it up. But if you don’t know five words at once, you are lost.

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- MNByChoice@midwest.social ⁨5⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  Yes! And if one doesn’t know different definitions are used, one won’t know to look them up.
  
  There are also “terms of art”, which are normal words that take on new meaning within a a field. Sometimes these are multiple words that otherwise could have meaning. These appear in legal writing, but also in programming and other areas.
  
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jbrains@sh.itjust.works ⁨4⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
I found that text difficult to parse, due to a relative lack of punctuation. This means that I spent my energy trying to parse the sentences and my brain struggled to engage with the meaning and significance of the text. Maybe if I tried reading it again a few more times, I’d find it easier to follow and therefore easier to understand.

Maybe it’s just as well that I never tried to read any Joyce. Or maybe if I’d tried, then I’d be better prepared for this. 🤷

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IronKrill@lemmy.ca ⁨2⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
I understood the reference post as I’m far too deep into degenerate internet culture, but I have definitely experienced what you say. I think sometimes people write in a way that simply doesn’t welcome people not on their wavelength.

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Nurse_Robot@lemmy.world ⁨5⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
I have a nephew that I’m certain has some flavor of a schizo affective disorder. When he’s in the thick of it I cannot for the life of me figure out what he’s trying to communicate to me, which makes me very sad

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Death_Equity@lemmy.world ⁨5⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
I understood it with context clues. Reading things on the internet definitely feels like I am reading an entirely different language sometimes.

Sometimes when I am scrolling past things, I pickup the words wrong because the words are matched to the look of a word instead of what the word says because I am not actively reading. That results in me reading headlines very wrong because my stupid brain filled in too many gaps and error corrected the headline to say wild shit. I scroll up to find out more and see the mistake. I wish I had an example.

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small44@lemmy.world ⁨4⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
Yes, sometimes i am unable to process the meaning of sencente despite knowing eveey word

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teft@lemmy.world ⁨4⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
In my second language, yes. Sometimes. I just lack the specific cultural references to understand the phrase. In english, no. Can’t say i’ve ever confused myself with a sentence unless it was meant to be confusing (eg garden path sentences).

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hydrashok@sh.itjust.works ⁨5⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
Shakespeare, or really any writing from that era takes me many read throughs to understand it.

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