The localization of the cerebral and the brain in general was not particularly unfamiliar to me; some of this was also covered in my psychology 101 class. However, while I can see that there are parts of the brain more essential for the production of speech, I find it hard to believe that the same could be said for comprehension of speech. Comprehension somehow to me seems more of a brain-interactive activity than production, making all parts integral. Furthermore, the reading made me wonder what part of the brain allows you to hear language in your head. When you think of a word like “hand,” you can also hear the sounds associated with it in your head and is the part responsible for audible production the same for production inside your head? On another note, what I found interesting and particularly resonated with me was the idea of a highly sophisticated control system to control language and speech. I’ve found that when I feel brain-tired I tend to make more tongue slips and occasionally, I would even struggle to remember a word and end up having to describe the word I’m thinking of to the person I’m speaking with. For example, I would say “you know…that thing that you use to turn the car and has a horn,” to describe a steering wheel.
Additionally, I found the reading on meaning of words particularly relevant especially the idea that different languages identify and label the world differently. The example used was mother’s sister or father’s sister not being separate in English. I sometimes help edit Asian web novels online into English and those differences between languages makes it particularly hard for translation. The struggle between accuracy and making it make sense in a foreign language usually means that there has to be a ton of footnotes and even then the full meaning might not be conveyable.
While learning a new language, the differences in the meaning of words is something to think about. For me, since my speaking and listening skills are at the advanced level, there would be words that I recognize and think I know the meaning to, but what I think of as the English equivalent might not be what my language partner thinks. For example, the minute differences between the words ‘kind’ and ‘nice.’ For the future, I should think about not only expanding my vocabulary, but also to be more precise in my vocabulary.
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