In order to write this reflection paper, I revisited my learning plan along with the notes that I took during the semester. In my learning plan, I had five major goals that I wanted to accomplish. My first goal was to write discussion posts analyzing and reflecting on the readings. The second goal was to get accustomed to type in Persian using the keyboard on the computer. The third goal was to become comfortable when reading text that is written in the Iranian Persian dialect. The fourth goal was to converse and deliver presentations in Persian in a formal manner. My last goal was to expand my knowledge on the history of Dari and Farsi by exploring and engaging in cultural activities such as listening to Persian songs, watching videos and reading poetry. Looking back at these goals, I am proud to say that I have accomplished all of them. I have significantly improved in my writing analytical reflections about the readings. I feel comfortable reading both in Persian and Dari dialects and I have a better knowledge of some aspects of my culture than I did before. And most importantly, I am proud to say that I am able to type in Persian now using the computer keyboard. When I started this goal, I did not even know where the letters were and what keys to press to get to those letters. However, today I am able to call that from memory.
This past semester has taught me that I love languages and exploring its cultural component. I have really enjoyed diving deeper into the Iranian culture by listening to their music, watching interviews of their former royal leaders, and reading their poetry. I have realized that I really enjoy reading poetry and want to spend more time reading poems in Persian. While most of my lessons have been great, however, at times it was difficult to read news articles from Afghanistan. The news from Afghanistan is usually full of sad realities of life that can be emotionally and mentally stressful. So I tried to balance how much I read from Iranian news stations and how much I read from the Afghan news stations. But in regards to reading in both dialects, I did not have much difficulty. The most difficulty I came across during my language class was learning to type in Persian. It required me to spend about 2-3 hours outside of class to practice my typing so I can memorize the keyboard and type freely. However, it all paid off because now I have acquired a new skill. Given this, I will continue with my language lessons by writing poems in Dari and Farsi and typing it on the computer. Additionally, I will read news and articles on Dari on things that interest me along with what I see on the news. Lastly, I will practice my speaking via conversing with Zari in Dari whenever we speak again.
The strategies that were most useful to me during this semester were reading articles, writing discussion posts, typing reflections posts, listening to music and watching videos. I found news agencies such as BBC Persia and native news stations very helpful in finding information to read and interact with. In class, I really enjoyed reading the article about how our brain handles languages and what parts of our brains are used for production and comprehension of speech. It was fascinating to see the different parts of our body to interact and work together to produce a sound. Another reading that I really enjoyed was about figuring foreigners out in which an important phase stood out to me that said something similar to “when in a new country, eat like the native people, dress like them, talk like them...etc”. This basically showed that if you want to learn a language, then it's better to dive in it fully so you can learn like a native.
Going forward, what I would like to learn more about is the relationship between power dynamics and languages/dialects. One of our discussion posts was about what we would do if we had an approved grant for a project dedicated to linguistics. I wrote that I would explore the power dynamic between the dialects spoken in Afghanistan and the status of those communities that speak it. I think it would be fascinating research that would show the relationship between how a dialect or language may become as one of the major languages spoken and how this power dynamic can contribute to causing languages/dialects go extinct. Overall, this has been a wonderful semester, and I am grateful to both my language instructors for doing their best so I can have a productive semester.
Comments
I agree, Lina! That would be such an interesting research topic as language and culture and society are linked to so tightly. I think there is also a difference in dialect preferences in different places, for example in the U.S. the African American dialect is seen as starkly differently than others and is often stereotyped as lower class. This is not because of the dialect itself but the cultural and societal implications.