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Korean is written from left to right. Words look like an arrangement of blocks, each block being a syllable. Each syllable is made up of letters which are arranged in a specific ways. All the consonants are placed on the left side and among the vowels, there are some which are placed on the right, at the bottom and at the top of the block. In addition, certain basic vowels can combine to form new vowels whereas some consonants can form double consonants which are pronounced with force.

Some of the difficulties I encountered when reading are that the pronunciation of some letters change according to their position in the word. However, I have not faced any big hurdle when reading and practicing pronunciation because most of the sounds are very similar to the ones used in Bengali. I can fairly easily imitate the pronunciations by listening but it is more difficult to read since some of the pronunciations change from word to word. This is very similar to English where the way we say ‘th’ is different in ‘the’ and in ‘Thames’.

Nevertheless I am fairly certain that with practice and greater exposure to the language, I will be able to know intuitively, how to read properly.

I have previous experience of learning a foreign language. When I learned English I was very young so I do not have any recollection of the process of learning the language. However, I learned French in high school and some of the techniques I used during the different stages of learning were very intuitive. As a result, I found the three articles extremely interesting because I found myself constantly associating the topics discussed in the readings to my experience.

In “How brain handles languages”, the writer discusses how the different parts of the brain are involved in the learning expressions and production of speech. It made me realize that in order to communicate a message in a foreign language, it is at first necessary to conceptualize it. For example, in order to greet someone in Korean without having to spend a few minutes trying to remember the proper word and its pronunciation, it is essential to learn the word for it by not simply memorizing as vocabulary but also associate the concept of greeting someone to the word.

Moreover, this article also made me appreciate all the numerous body parts that are involved in saying a word. In fact it is because of this sophisticated system of speaking that we do not speak in an erratic, disorganized set of noises which are also being constantly monitored as we receive the feedback with the ears. It is also interesting to know that slips of tongue do not occur randomly only happen with the words that are mostly stressed in the sentence.

In the chapter “How we mean”, the writer analyzes the role of words and the meanings they convey in a particular language. A single word can have several meanings depending on the context in which it is being used. In addition, some languages can have words for things or concepts which do not even exist in other languages. For instance, in English, there is no particular word that is used to address older or younger siblings. However, in Korean, elder brothers are addressed as ‘oppa’ or ‘hyung’ whereas elder sisters are addressed as ‘eonni’ or ‘nuna’. The writer also says that the best way to learn new words is by using them in a sentence since it not only shows the meaning of the word but its usage as well.

The last chapter talks about approaching adopting a learning plan. One of the examples provided is phonetics/ phonology/ grammar/ semantics. I realized that making a learning plan will make the learning process more structured and efficient. It also made me reconsider my goals and objectives of learning the language to make sure that I keep it realistic.

From what I've read on Israeli culture, the linguistic aspects are very similar to those in the US. When a man is greeting another man, they shake hands and maintain eye contact. Sometimes, there can be slight touches on the arms. When a woman is greeting another woman for the first time, a handshake is used. When a man is greeting a woman, they also will use a handshake. Something I found interesting is that religiously observant men and women do not touch each other when greeting one another. When Israelis communicate with one another, it tends to be very direct and sometimes foreigners feel that they are being blunt or cold. Israelis also speak very loudly and at a fast pace (which reminded me of Americans). When in the market place, people tend to be very aggressive and impatient. Time is important for Israelis and for social settings it is acceptable to be 20-30 minutes late. Something I found interesting is that Israelis, like Americans, also use the thumbs up sign as a gesture of approval. Israelis tend to stand close to one another when engaging in conversation and it is rude if you are stand-offish when in conversation. 

It is a little hard for me to read Hindi at this stage since I have mainly been focusing on the sounds of the letters rather than memorizing the letters themselves. So, it take me a while to identify each letter. However, I have learned numbers from 1-10, family members, and days of the week.

I found the reading from "Figuring Foreigners Out," to be very interesting, as I was able to compare and contrast the U.S and India. I think the U.S is more of an individualist culture and India a more collectivist culture. Here in the U.S there is a heavy focus on individuality and freedom, always putting yourself forward to achieve the best. In India, it is more common to find groups of people working together toward a common goal. Next, I find the U.S to be a very monochronic society. People always have strict schedules where time is seen as a commodity. There is a sense of urgency and interruptions are seen as a nuisance. On the other hand, I think India is a mix of both monochronic and polychronic. There is definitely less of a focus on running on a schedule. People are more relaxed and will make time for unplanned gatherings or conversations.

This week I had the opportunity to meet with Emily for the first time. This was a great meeting for many reasons. I learned the alphabet, vowels, and numbers. I hope by the end of this week I will be able to recognize and write each letter down. It can be hard sometimes because the letters will sound differently depending on the vowel associated with it and the location of the letter in the word. Learning the numbers has been interesting and I believe that the best way to learn them effectively is to write them down multiple times and to make flashcards. Flashcards have allowed me to practice saying and reading the numbers, both the feminine version and the masculine version. Another way I have gone about learning the alphabet is to use YouTube videos that are for beginner Hebrew learners. I have found these videos to be very helpful and have allowed me to speak along with them and hear the sounds and try to match them.

During our first meeting with Emily, I realized that I needed to lower my expectations about how much Hebrew I will be able to learn this semester. I was challenged in many ways during our first meeting and need to have more reasonable expectations for how much I can realistically learn. I was discouraged at first, but have realized that it took me 13 years to become fluent in Hebrew before and I am pretty much at the kindergarten level of Hebrew now.

a) Current Abilities

• Able to read alphabet and create basic words
• Learned greetings and family members
• Learned some common phrases from dramas

b) Goals

• To greet people with ease and say goodbye
• To order food/go grocery shopping
• To know how to find directions
• To have casual conversation
• How to tell time

c) Tasks

• Practice speaking with friends who speak Korean as well as my language partner
• Practice writing in Korean
• Learn numbers
• Learn more about Korean culture in relation to gestures, volume of speaking, direct/indirect communication (what yes and what no means), personal space, etc. 

A)   Current Abilities

1. Know the sounds of the letters in the alphabet

B)   Goals

1. Be able to have a small conversation
2. Greet people
3. Talk about myself and my family
4. Ask for directions/get around a new place
5. Tell time and day of the week
6. Pronounce words correctly
7. Talk about my day and ask others questions

C)   Tasks 

1. Watch Hindi movie/listen to songs
2. Have conversations with my language partner and friends who speak Hindi
3. Learn everyday slang
4. Learn directions
5. Learn numbers
6. Be able to ask/give directions

This week we focused on combining our vocabulary skills with grammar lessons. We are talking this week about occupations, countries, prepositions, and pronouns so we made sentences and questions combining all of those elements. This was really helpful a lot of the sentences I would actually say in real life. An interesting point about working with a Swedish person in real time is that together we can work through insights about the language that hadn't occurred to her (because she doesn't need to think about the language explicitly day to day) or us (because we don't know the language!). Anyway, as an example, I wanted to say "I am a student" and had an intuition that in Swedish (like Spanish) you could just say "I am student". Louise hadn't really thought about it but realized I was right! You can just say "Jag är student".

Also, I am taking a cognitive psychology course this semester and we have been talking a lot about memory in the past few weeks and last week we talked about study techniques that really aid long-term retrieval. I learned that the best way to study vocabulary is to chunk the information into categories (like occupations, colors, etc.). Then you take flash cards and study three words at a time in a particular category and then move on to the next (rather than trying to learn 30 words about occupations at once because you are likely to forget the words in the middle). Obviously it is even better for retention if you can do something like use the word in a sentence too or make a connection to something else in order to store it in your long term memory. But this was really helpful for me because I was trying to learn 30 words in one sitting about the same thing and found that I couldn't encode all the information!

This week we started reading a book with our language partner. At first it was really challenging to understand what the book was saying because we didn't know what any of the words meant. As we started to go word by word and started seeing the same words and phrases repeated the book began to make more sense. I think the repetition in the book was extremely helpful not only in terms of my reading but will also for my speaking abilities.

I think my goals will probably become more related to reading and writing since we seem to be using the book as a guiding force for our language partner lessons. While reading and writing are extremely important, I hope that we will begin to have more Hebrew conversations in our meetings with Emily.

Journal Entry # 3:  Linguistic Aspects

I was researching some interesting facts relating to Korea and found an intriguing section about holidays. I am primarily focusing on the holidays  Valentine’s Day and White Day in Korea. Firstly, Valentine’s Day is a big deal in Korea and is also celebrated on February 14, 2014 similarly to the U.S. While countries like the U.S. usually have guys running around to buy chocolate and flowers for their significant others, it is interesting to note that this is a holiday which focuses mainly on the men in Korea. This is a day in which women show their love by giving chocolates and gifts to their husbands/boyfriends. Then there is  March 14 to consider. In Korea, March 14^th signifies White Day which is a holiday where men buy gifts for the girls. An extreme aspect of this holiday relates to the fact that the guy is supposed to spend three times the amount of the gift he received on Valentine’s Day apparently. These gifts are in always in the color white. Although these are some of the more important romantic holidays in Korea, there are also many others to consider. The 14th day of every month is a romantically themed holiday as well as a day for reminding people who are single of how unlucky they are. There is Kiss Day in June and Hug Day in December. There is also Photo Day in September when couples take photos of each other as well as Yellow Day/Rose Day  in May when lovers dress in yellow and give each other  roses. The saddest holiday is April 14 which is known as Black Day. This is when singles mourn their lack of love by eating “jajyangmyeon,” which are sticky, black noodles. All of these holidays illustrate how the culture in Korea revolves a great deal around  love, couples, and celebrating one’s love in public displays. Adversely, it seems to stigmatize the idea of being single and thus “miserable.” These are such interesting parts of the Korean culture which I found in my research. 

a) Current Abilities

• Recognize basic consonants and vowels; Future improvement: Learn double consonants and double vowels
• Recognize basic greetings, farewells, and introductions
• Recognize basic honorifics
• Decipher pronunciation of Korean words that only use the basic consonants and vowels; Future Improvement: Learn to read faster

b) Goals

• Have a novice level, but stable foundation in reading to be able to translate texts
• Reach intermediate speaking level
  • Pronounce words correctly
  • Hold basic day conversations
    • Order food from a restaurant
    • Buy food from a grocery store
    • Talk about my day

c) Tasks

• Speaking with tutor and native speakers on campus (Develop pronunciation and basic conversational skills)
• Practice identifying words at a grocery store (Video recording to develop pronunciation)
• Learn slang and sayings
• Learn alphabet and numbers
• Learn how to ask for and give directions
• Learn daily objects

When reading Korean non-verbally, I learned that Korean is actually quite similar to English. If you do not know what a word means, you can still pronounce it as long as you have the alphabet memorized. Sentences go from left to right and only differ from English by the fact that each word is organized in a 'block.' If an English sentence has words that are spelled left to right, and has the words lined up from left to right, the Korean language has words that are spelled out in two rows in block formation and the words are lined up from left to right.

There are some differences, however, between Korean and English. If a sentence in English is organized as [noun-verb-direct object], then the Korean language organizes with a [noun-direct object-verb] format.

Also, when pronouncing Korean words, I realized how important it is to have correct pronunciation. One example is the difference between the "b" and "p" sounds. One mistake between pronunciation could mean a totally different word.

My abilities: I can read korean pretty well. I know how to write it in roman form but my pronunciation of the words could use a little more help. I can write pretty well too for an amateur. The really simple words I can pronounce pretty good.

Goals:

- to be good at listening and understanding Korean either spoken to or not.

- be good at pronouncing words, especially the letters that I am having trouble with

- be able to speak and respond quickly

- be able to understand and order for myself at restaurants

- can listen, understand, and respond during everyday normal conversation

- accumulate enough interpersonal skills

Tasks:

- practice speaking with Korean friends -->conversation with friends

- try to make sure that I pronounce words right the first time --> recording

- learn restaurant phrases, formal and informal --> recording

- practice pronouncing the letters and words every day --> recording

- have Korean friends respond in Korean to get better practice with picking out recognizable words --> conversation with friends

- learn formal and informal phrases --> recording

- learn phrases and questions that are used everyday among friends --> conversation w/ friends

- learn formal and informal greetings/farewells --> diigo, maybe

- practice introducing myself --> diigo

- learn how to ask for time and date --> recording

- learn phrases relating to family and friends --> recording

- learn phrases that will be helpful for traveling in Korea --> recording, presentation

In week 4 & 5,
I should have learned how to speak to someone informally and formally. Try to remember the words. I should have brushed up on my alphabet and be able to pronounce the sounds decently. Then I will learn phrases that are spoken when someone enters a restaurant. Try to remember the phrases. I will acquire knowledge of these phrases and practice with friends until I get it right either from friends or my Korean partner. Practice practice. Then I should try to go to a restaurant and see whether I can pick up on the sentences spoken in a faster manner.

Urdu has the same alphabet as Arabic. And though this gives a big advantage, it also makes a bit difficult in the beginning. As I was trying to read Urdu, I had to always be mentally aware of the pronunciations. Readings in Arabic scripts comes naturally to me but the difficulty here is because though we have the same script, not all letters are pronounced the same. Urdu's grammar is also very different from Arabic. I still don't have a firm grasp on it. 

Urdu vocabulary reflects a three tiered system of politeness called Adab. This means that any verb can be conjugated in three different ways depending who is being addressed. To add to the formality and politeness, Urdu has a host of auxiliary verbs and expressions. For example, the expression "no" could be nah, nahin, nahin ji or ji nahin in order of politeness. Nouns can also vary depending who is being addressed. For example, us ki walidah, is a polite way of saying "his mother". Us ki walidahyi muhtarmah is an even more polite reference. 

Due to its emphasis on politeness, Urdu has always been considered a somewhat aristocratic language in South Asia. It continues to be preferred for song-writing and poetry, even by nonnative speakers.  

Urdu has a writing system very similar to Arabic. It is written in a Perso-Arabic script since the 12th century and is normally written in Nastaliq style. Similar to Arabic, Urdu is written from right to left. This is because it is an extension of the Persian alphabet which is an extension of the Arabic alphabet. 

Urdu is formally written in Perso-Arabic script,however, many people are starting to write it in Roman script as well. Though many people attribute this to the younger generation of Urdu-speaking people around the world because of the internet, Roman Urdu has been used since the days of the British Raj. This is partly because of the low cost and availability of Roman movable type for printing presses. This form of writing is now popular than ever before because of text-messaging and internet services. 

I have found Rosetta Stone to be helpful in many ways. I think that it has worked best for me when I listen to a word or phrase over and over again and eventually speak in sync with the person speaking. I find that I like hearing how it sounds many times before I try to speak the word or phrase myself. I have enjoyed using Rosetta Stone, but find that it is somewhat limiting in the topics of what you can learn. I think this is a great tool for pronunciation, but I don’t think it is the only resource I should use when learning a language such as Hebrew. The two links I bookmarked in Diigo are from YouTube. They are helpful because they are very basic and easy to understand. Unlike Rosetta Stone, however, they are less repetitive. I like to watch the whole clip and then re-watch and try to speak along with the video. These resources both lack in the cultural aspect of the language. They don’t give me a lot of information of varying topics that I may want to learn more about. This is where my language partner, Emily, comes in. I think that I will use these online resources to practice speaking/listening, but I would love to know more casual aspects of the language from Emily. 

 Final Learning Plan

A)   Current Abilities

1. Recognize basic letters, but do not understand meaning of words

B)   Goals

1. Reach Kindergarten speaking level
2. Pronounce words correcting
3. Learn alphabet, greetings, and farewells
4. Write a Valentine’s Day card
5. Order food
6. Describe my family

C)   Tasks 

1. Speak with language partner about culture and learn slang sayings from her
2. Learn words about love
3. Know how to order food in a restaurant
4. Know how to write about my family

After studying Hebrew for a few weeks, I have reevaluated my goals for learning Hebrew this semester. I have found that I enjoy writing and reading more than I enjoy speaking. I find I am more confident in writing and reading and want to improve my skills in those areas more so than in speaking. Although I used to be able to read, speak, and write Hebrew confidently, I have lost almost all of my ability. This was discouraging at first, but I am excited to re-learn and see how far I can go!

4/23/14

This plan is my adjusted and final learning plan. Based on my progress this semester, I have adjusted it for what I have learned and for what I feel I can do. I feel that I would rather be assessed on my reading and writing more than my speaking. Those areas I am much more comfortable with. I will send an email with my "I can" statements for the final exam.