Hello, Sherlock: Looking for Context Clues

Detective Edogawa Conan/Shinichi Kudo from anime.com

  One important skill we need to acquire for a more powerful communication is the skill to decipher messages the  originating party has sent. This skill is called decoding. Decoding is also present while we are reading.

  It will be very hard, however, to decode, if one has limited vocabulary and the item to be read is full of difficult words. Colloquialism, idiomatic expressions, jargon, and words deep in meaning are hard to understand for the beginner and novice. There are also denotative, connotative, and contextual meanings behind every word. These things enumerated we are now convinced that we must master the skill of decoding.

 Aside from grabbing Mr. Noah Webster, a technique you have in your possession is looking for context clues. Context clues are hints the author gives the reader to understand difficult words. This is especially essential in fictional works set in the fantasy genre--perhaps Tolkien's LOTR saga.

Now this is a step-by-step direction to help you look for those context clues.

Ask. What is the unknown word? What sentence the word is in? Ask, then, what the sentence is trying to decipher. If you can, go back to the previous sentence and the next, thinking of what the sentences collectively mean. What are the other words in the sentence?  What part of speech is the word?

Link. Decipher how the other words in the sentence connect or relate to your unknown word. For instance, the sentence is John ate the boudin noir. You don't know what boudin noir is, but the sentence here includes the  verb ate.


Create your guess. Since the verb is ate, what might boudin noir be? It might be some kind of food. But then, look at the other sentences, too, to be sure.


John ate the boudin noir. As he finished, he thanked the mistress for the delightful meal and left.


Now, it is said that John thanked the mistress for the delightful meal. With those connections, we can now be rest assured that boudin noir is a dish. Reading the first sentence alone, without any knowledge of what boudin noir might mean, we might have assume that it was toxic material that could've killed John.

So that's a rough outline on looking for context clues. If you want to improve your decoding skills using context clues, just surf 'round Google or visit this website.

Best wishes, Sherlock.

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