Bernard Sahlins Quotes

It gets tiresome being spoken to as if you are a child, even if you happen to be one.

I don't like the idea of talking down to kids. I think I was talked down to, and you rebel against that.

Look, I think if you talk down to a kid or aim specifically at a kid, most kids aren't gonna like it, really, because most kids can feel when you are being patronizing.

You've got to be vulnerable when you're talking to kids. There's nothing worse than some adult standing up there just talking down to some kid. You can't work that way.

Don't talk to us like we ignint!

In general, I think audiences are a lot smarter than people think. So, it's not "know your audience", it's "respect your audience, and really know your content".

Adults are interested if you don't play down to the little 2 or 3 year olds or talk down. I don't believe in talking down to children. I don't believe in talking down to any certain segment. I like to kind of just talk in a general way to the audience. Children are always reaching.

When trying to teach someone a boundary, they learn less from the enforcement of the boundary and more from the way the boundary was established.

I abhor 'baby talk.' I speak to kids like I would any other person, and they seem to respond to it.

If you have any trouble sounding condescending, find a Unix user to show you how it's done.

You're not there to spread any particular- if you're Bob Marley you're there to spread a message, but very few people can do that effectively without shoving opinions down someone's throat.

Professor Obama has at least talked to us like we're adults.

You'd be surprised how condescending people can be.

I don't believe in condescending to children. I don't change any writing technique.

When you don't talk down to your audience, then they can grow with you.

We tend to assume that we have a baseline of speech that's going to be normal in all contexts, but the truth is, we all change our ways of speaking depending on who we're talking to. And so I think it's kind of a gesture of politeness to the people you're speaking to to try to say something in their own idiom.

You may use different sorts of sentences and illustrations before different sorts of audiences, but you don't -- if you are wise -- talk down to any audience.

He speaks to Me as if I was a public meeting.

If I'm writing a story and you're reading it, or vice versa, you took time out of your day to pick up my book. I think the one thing that will kill that relationship is if you feel me condescending to you in the process.

There are no ugly questions except those clothed in condescension.

One thing I hate is people screaming at me. If you want me to do something, talk to me. When someone screams at me to hurry up, I slow down.

We don't talk, we hold forth. We don't converse, we expound.

Being reviewed is being condescended to by your inferiors.

No matter what Hitler said, he spoke with a fine feeling for the particular circle which he addressed. ... He was a great psychologist.

I have some friends whose sermons are extremely practical - so practical that I can put them right to use. I'm trying to learn how to do that better; but I don't think my approach or style really has changed in these 30 years. Whether that's good or bad I don't know, but I don't think it has.