Due by 5:00pm on Sunday, September 8: Discussion Post #1 on the Ning

The thing most interesting to me after reading this is how scientists have found ways to correlate which side of the brain is correlated based on hand dominance and how many parts are involved in learning language. More specifically, it was found that the left side is dominant for languages for right-handed people 95%+ of the time and about 60% for left-handed people. The claims I have read are not particularly problematic because if they did research and found a pattern it is cool that many people were similar in that way. I do think language is a biological phenomenon to a certain extent because people wouldn't be able to speak languages and interpret them the way we do in society today if it didn't have a beneficial use to our cultures and survival. The front part of the parietal lobe is related to hearing and speaking in a language, the fissure in front of the Rolando is important for studying and writing language, the Wernicke's area is important for the comprehension of language, the Heschi's gyeri is important for auditory understanding and a few pieces around the area help to write, manually sign, and process things visually. We process meaning through lexumes which are semantic fields that are grouped together based on similarity. They are different from ideas but related in a way of grouping which is interesting. I will use these to better grasp and understand Korean quickly. These readings inspire me in thinking about how complex the human mind and humans are and help me want to dive further into language study.

I find it fascinating that for most of the population (95%), the brain mainly uses the left hemisphere for language, but that doesn't apply to everyone. I don't think language is purely biological; there is something beyond neurotransmitters that initiate action for ourselves and produce speech. The brain is also interestingly interconnected in such detail. For example, the Brocas area is connected with the ability to speak and Wernicke's area is connected with the ability to comprehend speech, but one area doesn't influence the other.

We conceptualize and process meaning through lexemes, which are semantic fields similarly grouped together. How words are group together is hazy, but this is not to be confused with the association of ideas. I realized for Korean that lexemes are going to be different from what I am used to, and though they may have similarities (i.e. translation for specific body parts), not all of them translate as cleanly. I realized that I will have to learn these new collections of lexemes.

Replies

Tommy Na September 10, 2019 at 5:02pm

The thing most interesting to me after reading this is how scientists have found ways to correlate which side of the brain is correlated based on hand dominance and how many parts are involved in learning language. More specifically, it was found that the left side is dominant for languages for right-handed people 95%+ of the time and about 60% for left-handed people. The claims I have read are not particularly problematic because if they did research and found a pattern it is cool that many people were similar in that way. I do think language is a biological phenomenon to a certain extent because people wouldn't be able to speak languages and interpret them the way we do in society today if it didn't have a beneficial use to our cultures and survival. The front part of the parietal lobe is related to hearing and speaking in a language, the fissure in front of the Rolando is important for studying and writing language, the Wernicke's area is important for the comprehension of language, the Heschi's gyeri is important for auditory understanding and a few pieces around the area help to write, manually sign, and process things visually. We process meaning through lexumes which are semantic fields that are grouped together based on similarity. They are different from ideas but related in a way of grouping which is interesting. I will use these to better grasp and understand Korean quickly. These readings inspire me in thinking about how complex the human mind and humans are and help me want to dive further into language study.
Heera Ha January 28, 2019 at 10:47pm

I find it fascinating that for most of the population (95%), the brain mainly uses the left hemisphere for language, but that doesn't apply to everyone. I don't think language is purely biological; there is something beyond neurotransmitters that initiate action for ourselves and produce speech. The brain is also interestingly interconnected in such detail. For example, the Brocas area is connected with the ability to speak and Wernicke's area is connected with the ability to comprehend speech, but one area doesn't influence the other.

We conceptualize and process meaning through lexemes, which are semantic fields similarly grouped together. How words are group together is hazy, but this is not to be confused with the association of ideas. I realized for Korean that lexemes are going to be different from what I am used to, and though they may have similarities (i.e. translation for specific body parts), not all of them translate as cleanly. I realized that I will have to learn these new collections of lexemes.

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