Complete Reflection Paper #2 (500 words) and Post to Your Blog in the Ning
Reflect on your language learning so far and the relationship between understanding the target culture and the target language. What do you need to improve your communicative competence?
I think that my language learning has improved since the beginning of the semester. I have been tailoring my learning plan to utilize my most dominant learning skills, such as listening and writing. I have mostly been listening to Korean songs and watching short Korean news clips on SCOLA. I have also been responding to and summarizing everything that I listen to in a journal. Furthermore, I watch Korean dramas to develop my ability to understand normal conversations.Though speaking in Korean is not one of my strong suits, I’ve been trying to develop my speech through speaking with my mom solely in Korean in our biweekly phone calls.
Learning Korean has opened my eyes more to the culture of Korea. I have become more aware of the hierarchy of age. If an individual is older than oneself, the individual must be spoken to in formal speech and treated respectfully through various body gestures. If an individual is younger than oneself, then it is alright to speak informally to the individual and there are no necessary body gestures. Learning about this hierarchy opens my eyes to my previous interactions with older adults and the treatment I received from them due to not knowing how to speak formally to them. I specifically remember one moment when I was in elementary school when I wished my grandpa happy birthday. During a family party, I walked up to him and informally told him “happy birthday” in Korean. He pretended to not hear me, and I remember saying it over and over again. Each time, he did not look at me and seemed to be in a foul mood. In retrospect, I realize now that since I was not speaking to him formally, he refused to acknowledge me. Korean is a different social system than that of which I am used to, so I automatically have the tendency to view this treatment as rude and inconsiderate. In the United States, we do not have a formal and informal speech system. Therefore, with that western cultural background, I admit that I do not like the system of hierarchy of age off the bat. As someone coming from a Western perspective to learn Korean, I am being more and more exposed to social traditions that are different from the ones I am used to in America. However, despite the cultural differences, learning Korean is teaching me how to navigate myself in situations where I need to speak formally. It helps me understand the social behavior necessary to thrive in a Korean environment. As a Korean-American, I realize that learning Korean helps me understand where my two countries clash culturally.
In order to improve my communicative competence, I think that I just need time and practice. I am familiar with Korean, but I think that I just need more practice to better speak and listen in the language. I don’t expect to sound like a native speaker by the time I finish this course. However, I would like to be more well-versed in my ability to recognize the situations I need to use formal/informal speech. Though it’s a difficult concept for me to accept, the hierarchy of age is something that I am trying my best to understand.
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