There are only two languages I have learned in a school setting: English and Mandarin Chinese. English is the primary and the only language I use when completing academic work. I learned spelling to grammar and how to write essays in English during my school career. Mandarin Chinese was the second language I had the opportunity of learning at school since the eighth grade. Starting out with the basic tones of the Chinese language to how to write simple sentences and how to ask for a cup of water, I slowly learned the language and the excitement that comes when successfully grasping a concept in another language. Being able to then pursue Korean as a language learner in college has been a grounding experience. Korean was primarily a language I interacted with through modes of entertainment, food, and reciting my address to a taxi driver. I had never exposed myself to the specific grammar rules of spacing and spelling; I never learned that my Korean skills were rooted in pragmatic competence, specifically the sociolinguistic competence, rather than a mixture of organizational and pragmatic competence; and I never sat down with a language instructor (since learning “가나다라”) to go over the basics of Korean I had learned unconsciously.
Just as I had expected, I found grammatical rules difficult to pin down to memory. It takes not only memorization but practice to better Korean spacing and spelling. I hope to continue my advancement in becoming a more proficient writer in Korean by fixing my mistakes. I look forward to texting more people, perhaps more adults who can provide corrections, in Korean as well as adding Korean subtitles to the content I watch to provide a visual representation of the language in understanding by ear. A surprising topic I had enjoyed, despite the unfamiliarity, was something from the linguistic side of becoming a language learner. Learning about the different linguistic terminology––morpheme, syntax, phonetics, and more––opened up my knowledge to overall language learning. Alike to the idea that knowing more languages expands one’s ability to describe the world, knowing more linguistic concepts and terms has expanded my view on the study of languages.
As I continue my exploration of linguistics and the Korean language, I hope to reread concepts of the life of a language (how they form, evolve, and die) and reflect more about what it means to be bilingual, specific to the Korean-English case. The first topic was compelling to me because of the vast numbers of existing languages and an even larger list of dead languages. The way languages merge, evolve, and develop before dwindling away or preserving a spot as an international language is truly fascinating. The latter issue of bilingualism and bilinguality is more appealing on a personal level as a person who identifies as a bilingual. I would like to look further into the brain development of children who learn to live with two languages as well as the different categories of being bilingual (as explained in the short video from class).
Overall, SDLAP 105 has given me the content and time to reflect on my language experience as a whole, encompassing my goal of becoming more proficient in Korean as well as finding another interest in the world of linguistics.
Comments