Orality

Oral Communicators: Think Different

Jesus taught with stories, parables, and dialogue. Then, as now, most people in the world communicated orally, processing and remembering information only when it’s clothed in narratives, poems, songs, and similar formats. Modern research confirms that people who don’t read or write well (or at all) learn the way Jesus taught. This makes mother-tongue Audio Bible New Testaments a powerful tool for evangelism and discipleship in oral cultures.

The impact of Scriptures, of course, is not lost on literate people. But while the highly literate can also learn from exposition and analysis, people from oral cultures cannot. Outlines, bullet points, lists, and steps – all fundamental to a PowerPoint world – are meaningless to oral communicators. What they need is a story.

Official statistics on world literacy rates do not reflect this vital insight. Many countries consider a person literate if he can sign his name or compose a short sentence about everyday life. Often, however, individuals who have these skills can’t apply the written word to get the information they need. They learn differently, in a way that’s unique to oral communication.

This understanding is changing the way we think about literacy, shifting to an emphasis on the culture of orality rather than on the inability to read and write. Orality has many strengths as a learning style: it emphasizes connections, is based on community, and focuses on the big picture. Oral communicators are “here now.” Print culture, by contrast, organizes thoughts and actions linearly, breaks things down into smaller units, and sets its sights on the future.

Orality is found all over the world, including the U.S. – tens of millions of Americans are oral communicators by choice or necessity. The 43 percent of adult Americans who test at or below basic literacy levels are clearly oral communicators. Surprisingly, so are increasing numbers of readers who would simply rather not use a literate communication style. These “secondary oral learners” prefer instead to receive information through film, TV, and other electronic media. The bottom line: neither group will learn the life-giving truths of the Bible by reading it. 

American churches, largely pastored by highly literate people, face the challenge of conveying Christ’s teachings to congregants who think and communicate differently. Fortunately, new strategies like Audio Bible listening programs bridge the culture gap, bringing the Words of Life to all who hear. 

1. Oral and Print: Two Distinct Communication/Learning Styles, Dr. Donna Beegle, 2006.  Published in http://www.oregonread.org/Beegle/OralPrintHandoutforORA.pdf

2. 2003 National Assessment of Adult Literacy, National Center for Education Statistics, U.S. Department of Education.  Published in http://nces.ed.gov/NAAL/PDF/2006470.PDF

3. MAKING DISCIPLES OF ORAL LEARNERS, Lausanne Occasional Paper No. 54, Produced by the Issue Group on this topic at the 2004 Forum for World Evangelization hosted by the Lausanne Committee for World Evangelization In Pattaya, Thailand, September 29 to October 5, 2004, p. 8. Published in http://oralbible.com/Downloads/MDOL_Booklet.pdf