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question: would communication benefit from individuals displaying distinctive
personalities/characters? Or, would characters overshadow what is being
communicated? What is a distinctive character? Is it possible not to have a
distinctive character?
1. 1. Style asCharacter
The Mirriam-Webster Dictionary gives a few descriptions for the word
“character”, one of which is: “the way someone thinks, feels, and behaves :
someone’s personality”[Mirriam-Webster Online: Dictionary and Thesaurus, 2014].
The origin of the word is given as the Greek “kharaktēr”, “to scratch, engrave”; a
stamping, graving tool or its mark [Dictionary. com, 2014]. The words “character”
and “personality” seem to contain from their origination the virtue of “distinctive-
ness” since “character” comes from “engraving”, making something visibly
different, long lasting and “personality” comes from “person”, which is very nearly
the concept that is the heart of distinction in that, the recognition of one’s self as a
“person” is the formation of the idea that, that individual is different and separated
from everything else. Therefore, it may be stated that, when things or people are
perceived as separate and not as one-big-whole but individual beings, then everyone,
every character is different and distinct.
While every “character” is distinct, there may be similarities between
characters, thus, the psychologist Erich Fromm has grouped characters in various
“character types”. According to him, a person fitting one type does not have to
remain that type and it is the duty of the psychologist to get individuals to grow “out”
of their types, especially when the type is one that is considered “negative”. He states
that“the positive type person will grow because it is a characteristic of this type to
grow through productivity”. One basic factor contributing to the well-being of a
mature character is described by Fromm as that character’s “need to produce”. This
“productiveness” is described as the realization and use of the individual’s
potentialities and includes “a person’s mode of relatedness in all realms of human
experience”. The psychologist elaborates on the subject by describing “productive-
ness” as an “attitude”, “a mode of reaction and orientation to the world, to oneself,
and to others in life” [Klein, 2010: p. 636-637]. The examination of the mature
individual seems to lay down the attributes of a person who has strong opinions
formed through that person’s involvmentand interest in the wide world of human
experience. This brings to light the similarity between Fromm’s definitions for
“mature character” and “productive love”. Hedescribes that, there have to be four
components for a love to be considered a productive one: 1. Care, 2. Responsibility,
3. Respect, 4. Knowledge [Klein, 2010: p. 639]. Taking this idea as the basis, it may
be considered that the productive, mature individual “loves” the world. Since the
mature individual loves the world, s/he is related with all its realms of experience,
has an attitude and orientation towards it and therefore is able to put her/his
potentialities to use, to better serve it. Therefore, going back to the beginning of the
paragraph, while every “character” is distinct, a “productive character” is an attribute
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every person should posess. People with a “productive character” constantly try to
grow “out” of their charactertypes due to their love for, and need to better contribute
to, the human experience.
The question that was posed, “would communication benefit from individuals
displaying distinctive personalities/characters? Or, would characters overshadow
what is being communicated?”, through Erich Fromm’s ideas on character, has
morphed into: would communication benefit from individuals displaying a
distinctive lovefor life? Or, would love for the world overshadow what is being
communicated?The answerwould seem to be that communication would benefit
from individuals who love the world.
1. 2. In Harmony with the Logos, the Good, the Tao and “the Message”
Before moving on, one point expressed in Erich Fromm’s writings may need
clarification; how will an individual operate in life while both having a sturdy
character and trying to grow out of this character? It has been discussed that having
a specific mode of reaction towards the world is a characteristic of the mature
individual and also that the mature individual constantly grows out of her/his
character types. Having a “specific mode of reaction” towards the world would seem
to mean that the mature individual has a firmly established character. Since it was
also noted that the mature person must constantly grow out of her/his character types,
it would appear that this individual would be stuck between having a sturdy character
and trying to grow out of this character. The mature individual will be able to
manuver through this conundrum due to the fact that this person will not be focused
on changing her/his character but on what is the “best” mode of being, in the
situation, at the moment, s/he is in. If we are to be reminded of the interview with
director Wes Anderson, he had stated that he only thought about the world of the
movie he was working on [Davis, 2013]. In a different interview, when production
designer Rick Heinrichs is asked about what the discussions were, to differentiate
the look of the animated feature “Frankenweenie”, directed by Tim Burton, from
everything else that Burton had directed, his response is:“The point is never to
intentionally make it not look like something else. The intent is always to go back to
the source and figure out how that is informing this project”. In the same interview,
he notes that “if you do your due process and go back to the well, grab the original
inspiration and just develop it from the ground up, it is just, by its own nature, going
to be different”[Radish, 2012]. While Anderson draws attention to the importance of
being in the “moment” and focusing on what is at hand, Heinrichs’ words like
“source”, “well” and “original inspiration”, used to define the reason something will
be different by its own nature, call to mind the term “logos”, brought to attention in
ancient Greece by the philosopher Heraclitus. The word that originally stood for
concepts such as “word”, “principle”, “plan”, “formula” and “measure”, through
Heraclitus’ utilization of it, came to mean, the plan with which “all things come to
be in accordance”[Vamvacas, 2009: 112, 113]. This “logos”, the “guidingprinciple”,
“well”, “source”, “original inspiration”, corresponds, in graphic design, to “the
message”. If Heinrichs’ ideas were to be rephrased, they could be represented as