Reflect on the readings. Do you have any questions about the texts? Are there any claims that you find problematic? Do you think language is a purely biological phenomenon? What parts of the brain are most important for the production and comprehension of speech? How do you conceptualize or process meaning? Do these readings inspire any special insights or motivations that could help advance your foreign-language abilities, retention, and recollection?
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I wonder if there is any evidence for certain languages holding emotions or more emotions than other languages with certain words. I felt like certain Korean words had more emotion and more meaningful in certain situations than American English words. And some words I felt like they held a different emotion than American English words. I also felt like there were a mixture of complex emotions with certain Korean words or combination of words than there were in American English and wonder if there were any studies on that and if anyone else held that perception and or observation as a multilingual person.
I find that polychronic and monochronic claim a little hard to understand. Not to completely dispute it as I only know (vaguely) three languages at different levels of fluency. But within those three, I don’t see much of a difference in the frame of time with words and levels of urgency. Mayhap there be slight differences of levels of how urgent such as “see you later” and “salut” as in goodbye in French, but French also has an equivalent of “see you later” in the form of “a bientot”. Perhaps that was not the best example, since they are so similar and also share some cognates and forms with each other in vocabulary, but in general languages that I have encountered aren’t so different in the timescale.
I do think that language can be largely biological as in how it functions, but I don’t think it is purely a biological phenomenon. Sure, parts of our brains are engaged and works to form and produce these neurological signals to help us listen, comprehend, speak and form the speech with our mouths, lips and tongue. But the debate on the difference in ability to learn languages based on a person is not sound argument in my opinion. I think the brain does play a function and it is largely a biological task, but I don’t think there is a genetic link to who has more ease in learning a language more so than the other person. The Broca’s area is the part that is responsible for the ability to speak and the Wernicke’s area is the part that is responsible for the ability to comprehend speech and language. People conceptualize and process meaning by using several different semantic relationships such as collocations, sense relations, synonymy, hyponymy, antonymy, and incompatibility. Using semantic relationships, people can bridge words and sentences together and process meaning this way.
These observations that were made allows me to think about tips and tricks to study and learn Korean. Instead of simply looking up “words” and hoping to learn to conjugate and piece word for word, it’ll be more efficient using the semantic relationships, and learning full sentences and idiomatic phrases and collocations and other semantic relationships instead. It will help with not only active learning, but also learn them faster through word association and recollection would be faster.
discussion 1 SDLC 105 Ariana Kim.docx
The readings focused on various different understandings of languages but the two that stood out to me the most were the ideas of sense and reference. I remember learning English in Nepal versus the English I learned once I moved to the United States were mostly similar, except for ones that required referential information and a general sense of the conversational topics that were included. I think that when people try to learn new languages, they get caught up in the vocabulary of the language or the words that are involved, which the reading mentioned. What I think people don't really grasp until they start talking in that language is the general phrases that languages involve. Sometimes, especially in English, words tend to break the norms or rules that usually apply to most other words (one example could be words like pterodactyl, colonel, flammable/inflammable, goose --> geese but not applicable for moose). These are something that don't make sense and do not follow normal conventions and people usually don't find out until they try speaking it themselves.
The chapters mention that the Wernicke and Broca areas are important for comprehension and speech production. Damage to certain areas of the brain area associated with loss to certain capabilities for humans. What I find fascinating and biologically odd is that the human brain functions are inverted in the sense that right half of the brain controls most of the left side body functions and vice versa. Stating that, I do not think language is a biological phenomenon for the most part, unless that person has some sort of limitation or hinderance that does not allow them to learn languages in general. I think with enough practice and exercise people can generally pick up new languages, although the time it takes to learn might vary significantly.
I think for me personally, I learn languages through visual and verbal association and in a way, non-intentional repetition. I think in terms of processing meaning from something, it is mostly relational to the context that is in play. Learning English alone has taught me to check for context because not all words are what they mean and one of the reading even states that when words are alone, its not that they lack context, it's that they have too much meaning in the sense that the word may be applicable in many ways.
For my personal foreign-language learning process, I think the idea of conceptualization of meaning and contextualization of words will be important for me while I am learning a new language. There is sort of a cultural aspect to learning languages that we have to keep in mind as well.
As a biology major studying a new language, I found the “How the brain handles language” chapter fascinating as it presented the concept of localization, while also highlighting how coordination among different anatomical sections of brain is crucial for us to be able to communicate via language. Given the critical role that our central nervous system plays in allowing us to learn and speak languages, I think it is suitable to specify language as a neurological phenomenon that is aided by our vocal system and sense organs. In regards to production and comprehension of speech, Broca’s area and Wernicke’s area seem to be the most important parts of the brain. This makes me wonder if there are techniques to specifically enhance certain parts of brain to advance our language learning abilities. A quick google search did not yield any reliable methods for targeted enhancement. However, I did find articles connecting bilingualism to a higher cognitive control, creativity, and lesser risk of neurodegenerative diseases as a result of constant brain stimulation.
The article “How we mean and How we analyse meaning” really made me reflect on how expansive and complex languages are- although there seems to be ample variation on the level of complexity. For example, the author starts the chapter by giving an example of how the word “mean” can be used in over twenty different contexts. This reminded me of all those times I would sit down with an English dictionary and get discouraged by how diverse the usage of certain English words are- making English learning look like an impossible task. However, one interesting thing that I have noticed is that this does not hold true for Nepali and Hindi, where most words tend to be monosemic or only tend to have two or three types of usage at most. So, I wonder if it is easier to learn Nepali or Hindi than it is to learn English for a new language learner.
The author’s example about how different languages around the world can have different terminologies for same biological relationships is really interesting. I remember reading an article that claimed cultures dedicate a wider variety of words to things they value the most. For example, south Asian cultures prioritize family over anything else. Hence, there are more words dedicated to describe family relationships. In Nepali, father’s side of the family is called gau and mother’s side of the family is called mamaghar. Similarly, mother’s sister is called sanima whereas father’s sister is called fupu and there are even more words within these categories to differentiate among relationships such as oldest sister, middle sister, younger sister and so on. While the English language uses “you” to address everybody, Nepali uses a hierarchical version of “you” to address other people: ta= “someone either younger than you or lower in social class”, timi= “someone that you love, but might not respect much”, tapai/hajur= “someone that you respect a lot”, and mausuf= “royalty or people in highly respected government roles”. This definitely raises the question about why languages like English might have felt a single word-“you” was enough while languages like Nepali felt the need to make further distinction.