I’ve been seeing the use of the phrase “functinally illiterate”, and it got me thinking that I don’t think there is such a thing when it’s speech instead of the written word. There are plenty of instances I can think of where I or someone I knew was simply not capable of or didn’t want to try to understand something that was said. Is there something that means not bring able or refusing to comprehend speech when that person is fluent in the language being spoken?
Yeah, in interpreting (at least the program we were in) they broke down language into production (speaking/writing/signing) and comprehension (listening/watching). You generally need to have good comprehension before you can have good production. Without both, you’re not fluent.