This essay tries to reveal the temporal sense of communicative processes, and particularly the role of listening. This perspective was suggested by M. Heidegger and W. S. Condon.
Heidegger made the following appropriate comment concerning verbal communication:
Zum redenden Sprechen gehoeren als Moeglichkeiten <Hoeren> und <Schweigen>. ('Sein and Zeit' S. 161)
His philosophical insight seems to me totally united with Condon's linguistic?kinesic microanalysis of sound films of communication. From the point of Condon's view, interactional communication is considered as singing and dancing between speakers and listeners. Expression and reception both involve synchronization.
But the function of silence in communication suggests that listening as reception is more important than speaking. The cases of Momo and Eliza seem to contribute to proving the powerful acceptive role in listening.