105 Learning Journal # 6

[Rosemary Diaz]

Knowing a language’s history can help you learn the language because language influences culture, so learning a language helps you to understand how other people think, and it also helps you get a general understanding of our world and the many people and cultures that inhabit it. Language is probably the best window we have on the workings of the human mind. All of our thought processes are conducted in language, so really our entire existence, or essence, or soul, or however we phrase it, is inseparably bound to and with the languages we speak. In the Korean language history, words were developed that conveyed to people that they are honored and respected. In other words, in Korea, you cannot say ‘hello’ to everyone in the same way because some people (like the elderly people) are honored and respected more than others. Therefore, there are specific words in the Korean language that one must use towards these people who are highly honored or important because if you don’t then you would be considered disrespectful and insulting.