An incisive reflection by Sohaila Kapur on speech and silence, moving from personal memory to cultural critique, revealing how words manipulate, silence dominates, and communication today mirrors power, morality, and the uneasy contradictions of modern life. 

In A Silence That Shouts, writer Sohaila Kapur examines the cultural, political and emotional power of speech and silence through lived experience, literature, cinema, capitalism and social behaviour, questioning communication, ethics, and authority in contemporary life.

The other day, I was contemplating the tools of communication. What was more effective? Talking or silence? Poles apart, they often tread into each other’s territories. ‘His silence spoke volumes about his life’, or ‘Her talk communicated the silence of her mind’, are the kind of interchangeable states that I am talking about. But each quality has its distinct identity.

The Commodification Of Talk 

During our hoary past, rishis and sages believed that chattering distracted the mind, while silence helped one communicate with the Divine. Today it’s a different ballgame entirely. A person who can prattle on is considered confident, even (god forbid!) knowledgeable. Even in popular culture, the chatterbox is considered bubbly and communicative. Jab We Met, Bombay Talkies, Ajeeb Dastaans are some of the films that have non-stop talkers driving the plot in an attempt to explore the power of constant conversation.

Chatter has also led to the booming of modern careers. One cannot overestimate the power of the monologue in theatre, or, currently, talk shows and podcasts. Call centres have also mushroomed because of it. Employees are trained to talk people into parting with their money. Many of them are scams, defrauding people, especially the elderly, with promises of big returns. I read about one such case in Delhi a few weeks back.

This is an old business and I have a story to narrate.

When I moved to Toronto in the 1990s and was hunting for a job, the only opening I got was in a call centre. I had read a tiny advertisement in that morning’s paper about ‘walk-in interviews for communication executives’. I prided myself on being a journalist and thought that this would probably be an easy one.

I reached the rather plain-looking building in a busy neighbourhood. Was this their office, I wondered, climbing the old, wooden stairs, looking for a nameplate. Instead of that, there was a number nailed outside a heavy-looking door. I didn’t realise that this was a fly-by-night operation. And that they never had a nameplate, because they moved from place to place, whenever the law caught up with them.

Cautiously, I opened the door and stepped into a large and ill-lit room that looked more like a warehouse. It was partitioned into tiny cubicles, each with an occupant, whispering urgently into a rotary phone. The sibilance added to the ominous air. Before I could turn on my heel and flee, a deep and heavily accented voice spoke up. ‘Darlin’, have you responded to the ad?’ I nodded dumbly. She walked up, looked me up and down, and asked me a few questions to ascertain whether I understood and spoke English.

Apparently satisfied, she took me to one of the cubicles. I was hired! But there was a caveat. I would be paid according to the clients I got them. No client, no payment. I stood there, looking confused. She rolled her eyes and simply handed me over to a lanky Jamaican woman, who explained the requirement of the job hurriedly and sent me to the empty cubicle beside her. I sat there dumbly while she chatted and chatted on the phone; sweet-talking, pushing her way towards an investment. A bundle of nerves, I was unable to summon the guts to call one of the numbers on the list provided to me.

Finally, she took pity on me and, leaning across, called a number on my list. Someone picked up the phone. Her rehearsed speech started. She counselled, cajoled, persuaded, persisted and finally noted something on my slip of paper and put down the phone. Immediately, a gong rang out. The employees clapped. The supervisor came around to me and congratulated me. ‘Fine girl, this one’, she boomed. ‘Made a hit on her first day!’ My Jamaican colleague winked at me and went back to work. I tried to thank her for her kindness but she was already busily chattering on another call.

Next to her, a sassy and plump African-Canadian woman poured syrup into the phone every time she made a call. Her sing-song and soothing baritone was infused with endearments, as though she was talking to her grandmother!

I understood they were targeting elderly people. Occasionally, her voice would tremble with emotion. But when the phone was put down, the mask was off and she would shout out her victory. The gong would sound again and the room would erupt in claps. I could see she was the company’s champion saleswoman; notching up four to six sales every hour.

I simply could not bring myself to be the drama queens they were, despite my background in theatre. My tentative voice and Indian accent brought out the worst in the people I called. They berated me for disturbing them and invariably slammed down the phone.

Finally, someone actually heard me out. There was silence on the other side after I read out my speech. And then I heard a sob. The old woman informed me that she had just lost her husband and was appalled at my insensitive business call. My first call was such a failure. I blushed with shame and teared up. Stammering that I had no idea about her circumstances and apologising profusely, I put down the receiver. She had made me aware of the ugly side of capitalism.

Of course, I quit the job. I could never imagine that 30 years later, the trend would kick-start and be bucked, in India too.

The Many Meanings Of Silence

Now on to the quality of Silence.

Paramahansa Yogananda, the great Kriya Yogi, once wrote, ‘Build the Temple of Silence within yourself… to experience Divine Peace & Joy’. There is much in literature about the multifaceted nature of silence. It can be the result of oppression, resilience, rebellion, or simply be a spiritual force. In popular culture, it has been treated as an existential and modernist theme. As a powerful presence (as opposed to being just the absence of chatter), conveying reflection, protest, identity and inner life. Writers like Shakespeare, Virginia Woolf, Robert Macfarlane, Tenzin Palmo, Henry Miller, the playwright Samuel Beckett. All of them explored the power of silence. Ihab Hassan, an Egyptian-American writer, has compiled an anthology titled The Literature of Silence, which examines the concept of silence in contemporary and post-modern writing.

Cinema, which is animated literature, has produced dialogue-free films like All Is Lost and The Artist. The popular horror flick, A Quiet Place, explores silence as a survival tool. There’s also Scorsese’s Silence, Jonathan Demme’s The Silence of the Lambs. Mainstream music produced Simon & Garfunkel’s lilting lament, The Sounds of Silence. Talkative Bollywood also has explored silence in films that have garnered praise. Masaan, Pink, Ship of Theseus, The Lunchbox, A Death in the Gunj, Pushpak, Khamoshi, Barfi, etc.

The Politics Of Ignoring

But like chatting, we have redefined silence too. Its non-communicative aspect has reached an elevated status today and can mean anything from arrogance, to indecisiveness, non-commitment, to playing it safe. It carries the subtext, ‘I am ignoring you, buddy.’

We have emulated the West in its technology, lifestyle, attitudes and social behaviour, but not their candour. Their plain speak saves one from an ambivalent state of mind about their intent.

Sometimes it is better to hurt someone once, with a polite ‘No’. At least there is clarity for the other person, who can then move on. But we believe in dangling people on a string; keeping them on tenterhooks for eons, before an answer (if at all), is given. It’s basically a power game that humiliates.

Whether it’s politics, the media, films or theatre, this taciturnity has parallel universes; it’s up to you to interpret the meaning and decide the path ahead.

Many good friendships are lost because of this habit and people one has respected and looked up to have lost that privilege in my life. I used to smart when I was ignored. Today, I strike them off my preferred people’s list. And move on merrily with the thought that the loss was entirely theirs!