
































SECTION C: ENGLISH USAGE AND GRAMMATICAL CONCEPTS



7

Trends in Sentence Meaning: A Conceptual Review

Basil F. Ovu and Queen E. Anyanwu

Abstract

Every language, regardless of its name and users, is meant to express meaning. This can be
through a lexical or structural means. Lexical meanings are expressed through the various lexical
relations inherent words while the structural meanings come through the ways words are
manipulated to generate meaning. Both processes are language specific. This paper, therefore,
focuses on one specific aspect of structural meaning known as “sentence meaning” functions in
the English Language. The paper identifies three major types of meaning a sentence can generate
in English, viz: conceptual meaning, associative meaning and thematic meaning. The paper
argues that conceptual meaning is universal, stable and not affected by contextual colouring or
emotional overtones while associative meaning open-ended, unstable and heavily influenced by
the diverse historical epochs within the language. The paper goes further to argue that thematic
meaning depends on how information is organised within a language. The concludes that
sentence meanings depend on how lexical items in a sentence are organised and the relative
interpretations that speakers of the language assign to them, any disparity between speakers or a
writer’s intention and what the listener or reader interprets the expression to be, will be a
breakdown in communication. Thus, to avoid any breakdown in communication, all the factors
which may disrupt the free flow of information between the encoder and decoder must be
eliminated to make for easy flow and sequential presentation of information.

Keywords: structural meaning, conceptual meaning, associative meaning, thematic meaning

Introduction

Every language, regardless of its name and users, is meant to express meaning. This expression
of meaning manifests in two principal forms – lexical and structural. Lexical meaning refers to
the various forms of meaning expressed by lexical items in that it is not analysable beyond the



domain of words (Ndimele, 2007). On the other hand, structural meaning refers to the meaning
that a sentence generates as a result of how lexical items within the sentence are positioned. This
comes in various ways such as ambiguity, presuppositions, entailment, etc. (Saeed, 2016, p. 87).
Thus, structural meaning is usually determined not by the individual meanings of the lexical
items but rather the structural relationships between the words. How the words are organised
determines the meaning that will be attached to the sentence. For example, the meaning of the
following two sentences varies on the basis of the relative positions occupied by the lexical items:

(1) John killed the rat.

(2) The rat killed John.

Sentence (1) shows that John was the one that performed the act which resulted in the death of
the rat but in (2), the reverse is the case. However, the meaning of the individual lexical items
remained consistent in each case, viz:

 John = [+MALE, +HUMAN, +ANIMATE, etc.]

 rat = [+MALE, -HUMAN, +ANIMATE, etc.]

 killed = [+ANIMATE, +CONCRETE, +ACTION/MOTION, etc.].

The set of semantic features above combined with the position of the individual lexical
items to determine the overall meaning of the two sentences such that each would elicit different
reactions from the reader or listener. But nothing inherent in the words forces the particular
reading or meaning attached to the sentence except their structural positions in the sentences.
This explains why the semanticists insist that lexical meaning is more stable than structural
meaning in that the former is fixed while the latter is decomposed. Accordingly, Saaed (2016)
remarks that the semantic relations that hold between sentences are not only restricted to the
words in the sentences but also depend on syntactic structure of the sentences.

Aspects and Dimensions of Sentence Meaning

Sentences generally express three major types of meaning such as conceptual meaning,
associative meaning, and thematic meaning (Ndimele, 1999). Conceptual meaning refers to the
cognitive, denotative, logical, primary or central meaning expressed by a word or a sentence. It is
the “ordinary, basic dictionary meaning of a word [or sentence] which is stable and not affected
by contextual colouring or emotional overtones of either the speaker or hearer (Ndimele, 2007).
As Ndimele has rightly observed, conceptual meaning is universal in that all the speakers of the
same language share this type of meaning when considering a linguistic expression. In this case,
the sentence is given the same interpretation by the people who speak the same language. Hence,
words like “boy” and “girl” possess the following conceptual meanings: [+HUMAN, +MALE, -
ADULT] and [+HUMAN, -MALE, -ADULT] respectively and their basic meaning remains
consistent and universally accessible to the users of the language.



Associative meaning on the other hand, refers to the type of meaning that “a word
conveys over and above its ordinary, basic or commonly shared sense” (Ndimele, 2007, p. 34).
In this case, associative meaning is “unstable, open-ended and variable” because it is the type of
meaning that is influenced by sex, experience, the historical epoch in which the expression is
used, or the society and culture. For instance, the word “gay” in Elizabethan England meant
nothing short of the state of being happy but the word has over the years acquired the meaning of
a homosexual male. It is on this note that Barnwell (1980), Leech (1981), and Ndimele (2007)
have all recognized five subcategories of associative meaning to be connotative, collocative,
affective, reflected and stylistic meaning.

Ndimele (2007, p.36) posits that connotative meaning uses non-criteria semantic features
unlike conceptual meaning. According to him, the linguistic expression is infused with both
purely conceptual meaning and the individual language users’ personal experience which they
bring to bear on the expression. Thus, an expression like “Emeka is nothing but a woman,” may
contain either a positive or negative connotation depending on the context. Even an overtly
negative expression may have a positive connotation depending on the context. For instance,
“Jane is a bad girl” may constitute an expression of approval and endearment or that of
disapproval and reprimand depending on who uses it and where it is used. Where the sentence is
uttered by a fellow girl before her peers, being “bad” may mean that Jane is a very smart girl
who outwits men rather than fall victim to their antics. On the other hand, if the same expression
is used by an older woman, for instance, her mother, her character and moral virtues will likely
be called into question. It is in this regard that Ndimele (2007, p.37) makes it abundantly clear
that the major determinant of whether a sentence should be given a conceptual or associative
meaning is the context in which the sentence is or has been used. He, therefore, asserts that while
conceptual meaning is “determinate and non-open-ended, associative meaning is indeterminate
and non-open-ended”.

Accordingly, connotative meaning varies from culture to culture, society to society or
even from individual to individual. For instance, “fox” is associated with cunning or deception
such that if an individual is called a fox before a western audience he or she will be immediately
associated with the art of deception. The same applies to tortoise in Igbo society and spider
among members of the Akan tribe in Ghana. In other words, the range of possible connotations
an expression may invoke in language users depends on the shared experiences of the individuals.
However, unlike conceptual meaning, connotative meaning cannot be universally shared.

Collocative meaning on the other hand deals with “the habitual co-occurrence of
individual lexical items” (Crystal, 2008, p. 86). It is the meaning that lexical items express within
a sentence which depends solely on the company they keep. According to Ovu (2010),
collocation may be viewed from both grammatical and semantic angles. From the grammatical
angle, he notes that any violation of the collocational requirement of lexical items normally
results in ungrammaticality although it may not affect the intended meaning of the expression.
For instance, he observes that expressions like “congratulate for” instead of “congratulate on”,



“shout on” instead of “shout at” etc. are all instances where the collocational restrictions of
lexical items have been violated. Violation of semantic collocates, on the other hand, results in
oddness rather than ungrammaticality as in the expression (3) below:

(3) The stone is now pregnant.

Leech (1981) had earlier observed that the lexical relation of synonymy shows the extent
of collocational variations. For instance, while animals may “wander” human beings usually
“stroll”. Also, we “tremble” with fear but “quiver” with excitement. Thus, words are
compulsorily bound to keep their appropriate company just like human beings do. This also
helps to maintain the fine distinction between grammaticality (syntactic considerations) and
acceptability (semantic considerations). Affective meaning conveys the attitude of a speaker or
writer towards his or her listener or reader as well as “the subject-matter of discourse”. Ndimele
(2007, p.39) opines that the choice of certain words can either trigger a positive or negative
emotional response based on how it is perceived. For example, while “fat” bears a neutral
connotation “flabby” and “plump” have negative and positive connotations respectively. In this
regard, the choice of either word depends partly on the speaker or writer’s attitude and the actual
shape of the individual being described. The use of interjections, according to Ndimele (1999),
exemplifies the canonical instances of affective meaning in language. Again, affective meaning
may run into a continuum of lexical choices such as father, dad and daddy or mother, mum and
mummy used to describe one’s parents.

In the case of reflected meaning, a sentence is usually given more than one conceptual
meaning with one of the meanings arising out of sustained usage or metaphorical extension.
According to Ndimele (2007), this type of meaning is found mainly in the use of polysemous
words. Leech (1981), on the other hand, maintains that words like “ejaculation”, “erection”,
“intercourse” and even “turgid” through constant usage have acquired some kind of reflected
meaning where they are stripped of their innocent, non-sexual connotation to their current status
in the English language where they conjure sexual images whenever they are mentioned. The
internet and social media have also given a word like “adult” a reflected meaning where it almost
unambiguously refers to pornography. Hence, “adult sites”, “adult films” etc. refers to
pornographic sites and films. In this regard, a man may not use the word “gay” to describe
himself unless of course, he wants to acknowledge that he is a homosexual unlike what used to
obtain in the past when the word simply meant “happy” or “light-hearted”. Against this backdrop,
Ndimele (1999, p.40) has stated that among the many shades of meaning that an expression may
conjure by virtue of reflected meaning, one is usually prominent as a result of frequency of usage
such that others may disappear with time.

Stylistic meaning refers to the associated pattern of word or sentence usage which makes
it suitable to a given communicative situation. Variations in stylistic meaning are usually
captured even in the dictionary entries for words with labels like “rare,” “formal,” “informal”,
“popular”, “written”, “spoken”, “colloquial”, “taboo”, etc. in order to guide the language users



towards understanding suitability of the relevant words to a given discourse situation. Thus,
Ndimele (2007, p.40) illustrates stylistic meaning using simple requests in English as in the
following examples:

(4) Might I have your book? (Very formal or rare)

(5) May I have your book? (Formal)

(6) Can I have your book? (Casual or less formal)

Thus, while “offspring”, “children” and “kids” may refer to the same concept their stylistic
meanings vary such that their usage is dictated by the communicative or discourse situation.

Apart from conceptual and associative meanings which have been explored hitherto,
there is also another kind of meaning known as thematic meaning. This type of meaning depends
on how a speaker organises his message to indicate focus or emphasis. Thus, thematic meaning
shows whether the message is new or given and what part of the sentence is emphasised above
others. Quirk and Greenbaum (1973) and Radford et al (2009) have all observed that thematic
meaning is enhanced by the speaker using such grammatical devices like clefting, passivisation,
topicalisation which result in structural paraphrase (Ogbulogo, 2005).

Furthermore, Ogbulogo (2011, pps. 34-35), has identified various ways in which sentence
meaning can be analysed such as paraphrase; ambiguity; vagueness; tautology; presupposition;
entailment; anomaly; contradiction and analyticity. According to him, paraphrase occurs when
two superficial structures possess the same underlying meaning. Hence, he states that
“paraphrase is to sentence what synonym is to words”. In this case, paraphrase may be lexical
and structural paraphrases. Lexical paraphrase can be seen in the sentences below:

(7) Mary is a spinster.

(8) Mary is unmarried.

In (7) and (8), spinster and unmarried are synonymous thereby making it possible for the
two sentences to contain the same underlying meaning. The difference in meaning between the
two sentences lies in the substitution of spinster with unmarried. On the other hand, structural
paraphrase is achieved through some transformational processes like clefting, pseudo-clefting,
topicalisation, passivisation, etc., where the arrangement of the original sentence is altered. This
can be illustrated in sentences below, where (9) is the basic and the rest (10-13) represent the
various transformations (paraphrases) of the basic sentence:

(9) John bought a blue car. [Basic]

(10) It was a blue car that John bought. [Clefting]

(11) What John bought was a blue car. [Psuedo-Clefting]



(12) A blue car was what John bought. [Topicalisation]

(13) A blue car was bought by John. [Passivisation]

Ndimele (2007), however, distinguishes between paraphrase and ambiguity. According to
him, in a paraphrase two sentences have one underlying meaning while in ambiguity, one
sentence contains two or more meanings. Supporting him, Crystal (2008,p. 22) observes that
ambiguity refers to a situation where a word or construction “expresses more than one meaning”.
Thus, an ambiguous word or structure has more than one possible interpretation. Again, linguists
generally differentiate between lexical and structural ambiguities (Jackson & Amvèla, 2001;
Akmajian, Demers, Farmer, & Harnish 2004; Ndimele, 1999; Saeed, 2016; Crystal, 2008;
Umera-Okeke, 2008). According to Akmajian et al. (2010: 242), lexical ambiguity is caused by
the presence of one word which may be interpreted in two or more different ways within a single
construction while structural ambiguity takes place when no particular word is ambiguous, rather
the “ambiguity is due to structural relations in the sentence. Hence, the use of bank as in (10)
below illustrates lexical ambiguity.

(14) I saw the bank this morning.

In (14) above, the ambiguity in the sentence comes from the word bank which has
several meanings. A dictionary entry for bank contains different meanings like financial
institution; side of a river; a place for storing things (e.g. blood bank), as well as other meanings
as in a mass of earth, cloud or fog (Longman active study dictionary, 2008: 53). A question then
arises as to which of these meanings was intended by the user of the above sentence, especially
as each of them can pass as a possible interpretation of the construction. This particular fact
seems to have influenced Ovu (2011:16) who observes that lexical ambiguity can be triggered by
the use of homograph, homophone, homonym and polysemy. According to him, homography,
which refers to a situation when two distinct words are spelt alike but pronounced differently,
induces ambiguity especially in written discourse in that the reader may be clueless as to the
appropriate pronunciation of the ambiguous word and the meaning to assign to it as in (15)
below:

(15) The man smiled and took a bow.

Ovu (2011) observes that sentence (15) is ambiguous in that it has two possible
interpretations namely, bow as in /bəu/, meaning “a hunting device or instrument” and /bau/
meaning “to bend oneself” (p. 18). Ovu, therefore, argues that although the above expression is
an acceptable English sentence, a closer look at it proves it to be ambiguous. He observes that
one who reads the sentence may want to know if the man smiled and bowed down or that he
smiled and picked a bow (perhaps to shoot at an animal). He concludes that the sentence is
ambiguous as a result of the dual meaning invested in the word bow, stressing that it is
communicatively desirable to recast the sentence in order to reflect the exact meaning intended
by the user. Similarly, he identifies homophones as one of the sources of ambiguity in a sentence.



Accordingly, while it is true that homophonous words by their nature are not usually ambiguous
when they are written since their spellings often provide a clue to the meaning intended by the
user (although sometimes spelling errors may occur as a result of wrong pronunciation), they
usually pose difficulty to interpret in conversation as one may find in a dictation class where the
listener finds it difficult knowing the particular meaning intended by the speaker (Ovu, 2011).
This is illustrated in the table 1 below:

Table 1: Homophone-Induced Ambiguous Sentences

Spoken Forms Written Equivalents

[hi: went tə δi: aɪl jestədei] He went to the aisle/isle yesterday.

[δə gɜ:l wɒz fӕsɪneɪtɪd baɪ maɪ ɔ:rəl skil] The girl was fascinated by my aural/oral skill

[δə flauə ɪz tu: ɪkspensiv] The flour/flower is too expensive.

[δə bɔɪ wɒz puld aut əv δə si:] The buoy/boy was pulled out of the sea.

[məust hɒspitəlz dəunt ju:z bɪə veri ɒfn] Most hospitals don’t use bier/beer very often.

Culled from Ovu (2011, p. 19)

Based on the analyses recorded in (Ovu, 2011,pps.19-20), the ambiguity in table 1 above
takes the following pattern: the phonological word /aɪl/ may be written as either “aisle” (meaning
a passageway) or “isle” (meaning an island); the phonological word /ɔ:rəl/ may be written either
as “oral” (relating to the productive aspect of spoken language delivery) or as “aural” (referring
to the perceptive aspect of the speech); the phonological word /flauə/ is also ambiguous because
it may either be heard as “flour” (referring to corn or cassava powder) or “flower” (referring to
part of a plant). In the fourth sentence the ambiguity lies in the word /bɔɪ/ which has two word-
forms, viz: boy and buoy, referring to a male youth and safety device respectively while in the
last sentence, the ambiguity was caused by the presence of the word /biə/ which may either be
heard as bier or beer, referring to a stretcher and a type of alcoholic beverage. It is important to
know that none of those meanings identified above was forced into the sentence, rather each of
them is justifiable both on syntactic and semantic grounds.

Furthermore, homonyms also contribute to ambiguity in sentences. According to Ovu
(2011), writers have consistently confused homonyms with polysemy. In his words,

The true nature of homonyms has been misunderstood by many writers. To some,
homonyms include cases where words have identical spelling (i.e. homographs) and/or



where the words have identical sounds (homophones). This view is however wrong
because doing so will only amount to subsuming what should ordinarily be treated as real
homonyms within polysemy. A better approach would have been to distinguish
homonyms from polysemy. This is particularly important given the fact that polysemous
words mostly result from a metaphorical extension of meaning (p.21, emphasis in the
original)

Thus, Ovu remarks that one principal observation to make about homonyms is that their
meaning does not emanate from a common core unlike in polysemy. Yet each can contribute to
ambiguity as the sentences below illustrate:

(16). Those men are gay.

Question: Are they happy or are they homosexuals?

(17). Jane’s lock is better than anyone else’s.

Question: Is the speaker talking about Jane’s hair? Or her performance in a

game?

(18). They can fish.

Question: Is the speaker talking about ability to fish or about someone’s

occupation? E.g. the job of preserving fish in cans to sell it.

(19). She cannot bear any child.

Question: Is she barren or is she hostile towards children?

Sometimes an ambiguous expression produces a ridiculous interpretation as can be seen
in the sentence below:

(20). Prostitutes appeal to the Pope.

Question: Is it that the Pope admires prostitutes or that they solicit help from him?

Extra linguistic knowledge (or our understanding of a real-world situation) would make
us accept the latter interpretation and reject the former bearing in mind that the Pope by virtue of
his position as a pious religious leader would neither contemplate going to patronize prostitutes
nor even admire them! However, nothing in the individual words suggests that this second
interpretation is better except that the alternative meaning sounds rather unexpected and
mischievous.



In the case of polysemy, which is a term originating from the Greek word poly i.e. many
and semeion meaning sign, a reference is made to “words or other items of language with two or
more senses” (McArthur, 1996, p.715). So polysemy is used for situations where “the same word
has two or more different meanings” (Jackson & Amvèla, 2001 p.58). But it needs pointing out
that polysemous words often have related meanings. It is this relatedness of meaning that
distinguishes polysemy from homonymy especially as polysemy is usually a product of
metaphoric extension of meaning (cf: Ovu, 2011, p.21). Saeed (2016) has noted the traditional
distinction between homonymy and polysemy. He maintains that “polysemy is invoked if the
senses are judged to be related…polysemous senses are listed under the same lexical entry while
homonymous senses are given separate entries” (p.64).

Furthermore, lexicographers often depend on the ideal native speaker/hearer’s intuition
and/or what the lexicographers themselves know about the historical development of the words
whenever they want to know whether different lexical items share common semantic primitives.
In fact, this method was reported to have been used by editors of Collins electronic dictionary in
categorizing the following words: barge, court, dart, fleet, jam, pad, stem, stuff, watch, etc. into
homonymy and polysemy respectively (Jackson & Amvèla, 2001 p.191). Thus, polysemous
words usually have different but related senses or meanings. Ambiguity arises when other words
that occur with the polysemous words fail to provide sufficient clues to clarify the meaning of
the keywords as the sentences below illustrate:

(21) I need the paper.

(22) There is a mouse under the table.

(23) My glasses have broken.

(24) Refill the barrel.

Owing to the various meanings attached to the words in italics each of them turns out to
make the sentence ambiguous. To disambiguate them, more words are needed in the sentence as
in the following examples:

(25) a. There is amouse under the table; kill it (i.e. a rodent).

b. There is amouse under the table; use it to replace the damaged one.

(i.e. computer accessory).

(26) a. My glasses have broken because the water is too hot. (i.e. cups)

b. My glasses have broken, so I can’t read well. (i.e. spectacles)

(27) a. He refilled the barrel with bullets (i.e. part of a gun)



b. He refilled the barrel with wine (i.e. a storage vessel).

Ndimele (2007, p. 61) has further observed that regardless of the number of meanings a
polysemous word may generate, one of such meanings is usually central to the word while others
are mere “metaphorical extension” of the sense of the word. i.e. meaning acquired by the word
through constant usage. This is illustrated in words like surfing the internet, foot of a hill,
computer virus, computer mouse, eye of a needle, banking of an aircraft which are a mere
metaphorical extension of the original meaning.

Aside from the above instances of ambiguity, scholars have identified cases of structural
ambiguity which also relate to sentence meaning as illustrated below:

(28) He killed the woman with a knife.

(29). Call me a taxi.

(30). Flying planes can be dangerous.

(31). Visiting relatives can be boring.

In each of the examples in (28-31), the ambiguity stems from the structural patterns of
sentences rather than the individual words that make them up. On the other hand, vagueness may
arise due partly to the attempt by the writer to express his or her thoughts in a more colourful and
literary language.

(32) The sun smiled to her beauty (personification)

(33) The ocean surged and rocked crest by crest to welcome a brand new

season

(34) She drove, moved with all the fury within her little frame to escape the

aborted town.

(35) Colourless green ideas sleep furiously.

Ogbulogo (2011) has observed that vagueness arises because of “the incompatibility of
the semantic properties of some words” in some sentences. While vagueness may be deployed as
a literary device by seasoned authors, it nevertheless becomes a source challenge when the
language user fails to match words appropriately. In this case, vagueness results from the
violation of collocational meaning of words in a sentence. In the case of tautology, Ogbulogo
(2011) opines that it arises when there is unnecessary repetition of words without making the
meaning of the sentence clearer as in (36) below:

(36) John is an unmarried bachelor.



(37) The dead man is no longer alive.

Ogbulogo (2011, p.64) distinguishes tautology from mere redundancy. According to him,
redundancy occurs when new linguistic elements are introduced into a sentence without affecting
the meaning while tautology is a ridiculous repetition. On the other hand, Ovu (2010) maintains
that the effect of semantic redundancy is less dramatic than tautology. For instance, in the
sentence “She ate the food without no salt” is tautological while “The man reversed back” is
redundant. However, it seems that in reality the distinction between tautology and redundancy is
harder to establish than the authors have shown. Another type of sentence meaning is the one
called anomalous sentence. Like vagueness, anomalous sentences are a result of collocational
meaning violation. For example, while “tall” and “long” are closely related semantically, they do
not colligate nor collocate with the same type of nouns. Thus, there may be long ropes, long
essays, long journey but there is tall building, tall man, tall tree, etc. Non-observation of this rule
results in an anomalous sentence. Sentences that are ambivalent are capable of expressing double
meaning in a way that they express a dual proposition. Ambivalent sentences are used in a way
that either yes or no is a valid response to it. For instance, a sentence like the following is
ambivalent:

(38) Are you a student or a Christian?

In this case, any response to the question may be valid in that the listener may be a
Christian and a student at the same time. Another example was the answer given to Macbeth by
the three witches which was neither true nor false; which also deceived him into waiting to be
defeated by Macdoff.

Theoretical Framework

The paper is anchored on the version of semantic theory developed by Katz and Fodor in 1963,
modified in Katz Postal (1964). According to this theory, semantic rules like syntactic rules are
recursive and infinite in that the range of possible meanings like sentences in a language is both
large and infinite. Also, the relationship between a sentence and its meaning is not arbitrary in de
Saussure’s sense nor unitary; rather it depends on the interaction of both the syntactic structure
of the sentence and its lexical contents such that the meaning of a word is determined by its
function. Thus, this theory obviates the fact that two sentences may differ in meaning despite
sharing the same exact number of words. This can be illustrated in (39-42) below:

(39.). John killed Fred.

(40.). Fred killed John.

(41.). The snake frightened Mary



(42.). The movies delighted Mary.

The above view of sentence meaning is now called Katz-Fodor and Katz-Postal
hypothesis. According to Saaed (2016:250), the Katz-Fodor and Katz-Postal hypothesis is a
semantic parallel to Chomskyan syntactic theory in that it aims at specifying the meanings of
lexical items; explicitly accounting for how the meaning of lexical items builds up into sentence
through what they called projection rules in order to derive a universally applicable
metalanguage. Specifications on the meaning of lexical items are achieved through the use of a
dictionary that pairs lexical items with semantic representations (i.e. in the lexicon) while the
rules that account for how sentence meanings are built from lexical meanings are known as
projection rules which are achieved with introduction of semantic components.

Conclusion

The position taken in this paper is that sentence meanings depend on how lexical items in a
sentence are organised and the relative interpretations that speakers of the language assign to
them. Where there is a disparity between speakers or a writer’s intention and what the listener or
reader interprets the expression to be, there will be a communication breakdown. Accordingly,
several factors can play a role in disrupting the free flow of information between the encoder (i.e.
speaker or writer) and decoder (i.e. listener or reader) such as failure by the encoder to structure
the message in manageable units for easy flow and sequential presentation. Or when the decoder
is ill-prepared to listen or read what is being relayed to them.

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