I don't only mean 'how to not speak gibberrish in a context we don't know well' but also 'how to understand someone in a context we don't know well.'
For example, foreign languages such as Russian or French. Where we don't know the rest of the language very well(i.e. we don't have a best understanding of words in the context of that language.)
(1)I was in a Russian Metro Station in Moscow and I didn't know what 'B.D.N.H.' stood for but it seemed to stand for the station I was in. So I could take off from that point on that basis.
(2)I was in a Tallin pastry store in Estonia where a lady bought me a pastry without speaking. She made it obvious physically that it was a gift. Somehow.
(3)In the same store there was a very small child running around under the tables and everyones coats. His mother was trying to get him to behave, but she could not physically reach him. I looked in the eye of the lady giving me the pastry and looked around me at the ground(the kid was about 10 feet away so that it was evident that I was not literally looking for a kid but trying to communicate something about small children. I looked up and looked meaningfully into her eye and she got somekind of idea of about what I was trying to say. The nuace must certainly have been somewhat off, but w/out much context there was still some meaning transferred.
In each case above, the context was limited both by the enviroment and by language limitations. In each case nevertheless meaning was transferred but also presumably with an error or possible error of nuance.
To what extent then is it possible to speak and understand something in a language you don't know well?
Math. has been described as a language so the implication is, I think, obvious.
Btw 'nuance' means a 'fine difference in shade of meanng', if you had a hard time (understandng
) above.