Posted by Becky Walker on April 16, 2009 at 11:26am
My favorite part of the week was spent researching for my cultural project about the Iranian Youth. I am focused my research on unemployment, marriage, university enrollment rates, and the relationship between the youth and state/religion dynamic. Though I did not touch upon divorce rates in Iran in my presentation, I have since done some investigating as to the rates and reasons of divorce. A very liberal media site said that one of the reasons that Iranian women are divorcing their husbands is due to sexual dissatisfaction. This is interesting for a variety of reasons. The first being that women are initiating these divorces. The second being that they are allowed to divorce on the grounds of sexual dissatisfaction--when traditionally sex was reserved exclusively for procreation. It was not until 2002 that women were even allowed to divorce their husbands without their spouse's written permission. I have yet to come across what I would consider an accurate statistic for the divorce rate, but when I find it, I will be sure to include it in one of my posts.Otherwise, this past week was spent piecing a lot of things together. I built upon my knowledge of the verbs I already know, using them in new tenses, and new ways. Additionally, I am working on constructing more complex sentences, with direct and indirect objects, which is creating a variety of questions that I am continually on a quest for answering.
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Here are some of the bands I came across for my project (the ones I thought were decent, at least):O-Hum: http://www.myspace.com/ohumThey're the best rock band I found. They mostly use Hafez's poems for lyrics which is probably why they were the first ones allowed to perform a concert abroad. You also can actually buy their CDs.Salome: http://www.myspace.com/salomerapA female rapper. I don't really like rap but I think she's really good. She speaks really clearly too so I can actually understand some of it.Hichkas: http://www.myspace.com/hichkas021Another rapper. I think he might be the most popular one in Iran as far as I can tell.Khashayar: Khashayar-Doostam_(www.Bia2.com).mp3Yas: http://www.myspace.com/yaspersian2
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Week 10 and 12Although I am happy with my progress in my knowledge and conformability with jokes and riddles, I don’t think I’ve progressed as extensively when in comparison to my accent. I initially thought this was the easier of the two semester goals but its proving otherwise.My language instructor recommended a few youtube comedy clips that have Farsi voiceovers, where the actual visual is an American movie but the dialogue as been altered to Farsi and unrelated at all to the movie. For example, I watched a 5 minute clip of a dialogue between two generals in the Trojan war but instead of talking about the war the Farsi voiceover had them talking about circuses and flying boats. My language partner recommended such odd variations of clips that had a separation of visual and oral elements because they would help reinforce on relying just on sound to understand the flow of conversation without any aides.I am getting a bit more comfortable with the 15-30 second mullah nasrudin jokes, I definitely haven’t mastered them in all there rudiments but I think I’m a the point where I don’t have to worry about understanding them but just finding the reasons why the punch lines are funny and sometimes with no fault of my own, unknown cultural references hinder me on this.I have tried the >1 minute jokes and although I am struggling with them, I think they by extension will really help master the 15-30 second jokes which really is what I am more concerned with. According to my language partner, no one says a one minute joke at social gatherings in Afghanistan but rather short and quick ones like the 15-30 second variations I have been practicing with. However I still find the >1 minute jokes very interesting because in some ways there not just longer variations of the 15-30 second jokes, they really are more confiscated in their cultural references.Here are some of my favorite >1 minute mullah nasrudin jokes that also make sense in english:One day a friend of Mullah Nasrudin visited him with a chicken as a gift. Nasrudin was very happy to receive such a rare and expensive gift. Consequently he killed the chicken and made a delicious soup from it and enjoyed it with his friend. Several days later, a stranger came asking for Mullah Nasrudin. Upon inquiring, Nasrudin was told that he is a friend of the friend that brought the aforementioned chicken. So Nasrudin invited him to have dinner with him and offered some chicken soup that was still left in the house. A few days later another stranger appeared claiming that he is a friend of the friend of the friend that brought the chicken. Nasrudin, now a bit annoyed nevertheless invited him to supper and offered him a soup. Yet another day, one more friend of the friend... came to see Nasrudin. Without further questions Nasrudin offered him a soup. "This is the worst ever soup I tasted. It tastes almost like water. Is this the way you treat a friend of a friend of a ...?" the angry friend shouted. "Pardon me sir, this is a soup made from the soup, that was made from the soup,..... that was made from the chicken."When Nasrudin was a magistrate, a woman came to him with her son. "This youth," she said, "eats too much sugar; I cannot afford to keep him in it. Therefore I ask you formally to forbid him to eat it, as he will not obey me." Nasrudin told her to come back in seven days. When she returned, he postponed his decision for yet another week. "Now," he said to the youth, "I forbid you eat more than such and such a quantity of sugar every day." The woman subsequently asked him why so time had been necessary before a simple order could be given. "Because, madam, I had to see whether I myself could cut down on the use of sugar, before ordering anyone else to do it."
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Posted by ReidSchluter on April 14, 2009 at 11:30am
This week I learned a lot of interrogative phrases as well as the future tense.Interrogative phrases are very self-explanatory, and require only that I memorize them. The questions who, what, when, where, & why, are instead wie, wat, wanneer, waar, & waarom. They also introduced me to useful words like 'hoe-how', 'hoeveel-how many', 'welk(e)-which', 'elk(e)-each', as well as some other slightly more complicated phrases.The future tense is fairly straightforward as well, and was far easier to learn given that I already know the more complicated past tense. The future requires a conjugated form of either 'gaan-to go' or 'zullen (no infinitive translation, but generally means 'will' exclusively in the future tense). Either word is always the second in the sentence after the pronoun, and there is an infinitive of the future verb at the end of the sentence (& therefore not too dissimilar from the past tense). 'Gaan' is used if it is something in the immediate future that you will definitely do, whereas 'zullen' is used for more vague situations such as 'Ik zal een niuew auto kopen-I will buy a new car'.As it is getting to the end of the semester, Jan has also given me a fair amount of websites to look at that will help me contextualize all that I have learned. I can now read Dutch, and understand the majority of what is being said. I still have something of a working knowledge of the language, but now possess a rounded knowledge of most of its fundamental aspects, and can therefore understand the majority of it.
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Posted by Will Cragin on April 14, 2009 at 11:30am
Week 9 goals – My goals for this week are simply to learn more about Dari, the differences between the two languages, and how best to go about the transition from studying Farsi to Dari. I will then adjust my lesson plans to go on from there.Week 9 Review: The transition from Farsi to Dari has been a little easier than I imagined. The hardest part is that because the differences are not great, its easier for me to slip back to Farsi without thinking, simply because that is what I have been studying for the last 8 weeks. However, working with Muska has helped a lot, especially because it is one on one. I think I learn much better when its one on one rather than in a small group.Resources - BBC Farsi, Farsi Textbook, Class notes, handouts, EasyPersian, language partner for speaking practice, and a new Blog in Dari that I have begun to follow.Week 10 Goals: This week I will continue to study Dari and try and practice over and over so as to re-enforce the subtle differences in the two languages. I also plan on watching youtube vidoes, in both Persian and Farsi, in order to be able to listen to the difference in accents in the two languages.Week 10 Review: Overall, I continue to see progress in the transition from Farsi to Dari. I also had a long conversation with Muska about culture in Afghanistan, and I am beginning to see how the difference in culture is reflected in the difference in dialect.Resources - BBC Farsi, Farsi Textbook, Class notes, handouts, EasyPersian, language partner for speaking practice, Hamesh blog.Week 11 Goals: This week I will begin to shift my focus to the cultural project, which I am doing on Farsi and Dari. I plan on seeking out people from Iran and Afghanistan to interview, conducting an initial literature review, and trying to get an overall sense of where this project needs to go. I will also continue to practice Dari with Muska, and hope to add 10 new vocabulary words to use.Week 11 Review: This week went well overall. However, after beginning my interviews and literature review on the Dari versus Farsi subject, I realized that it might be a little to ambitious for both my skill-set and the small time period I am working with. So, I have decided to change the topic of my cultural project to Kabul. I am interested in looking at the historical, political, and social dynamics that have made Kabul what it is today. Otherwise, I reached my goals of learning 10 new vocabulary words and have continued to adjust to Dari after spending most of my semester doing Farsi.Resources - BBC Farsi, Farsi Textbook, Class notes, handouts, EasyPersian, language partner for speaking practice, Hamesh blog, you tube videos.Week 12 Goals: This week I will focus on my cultural project and begin preparing for the exam. I am not going to attempt to study much new material, instead I am going to make sure that everything I have learned this semester is still there. I also want to continue to practice speaking with Muska, which has been very helpful in my language study so far. I am also going to work more on my portfolio and make sure it is complete.
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Posted by Becky Walker on April 14, 2009 at 11:24am
Morgh baraye sham mipazam. I cook chicken for dinner.Ghahveh ba sohbhane minoosham. I drink coffee with breakfast.Seeb va noon kikhoram. I eat apples and bread.Moaleme khaharam ra mishnase. The teacher recognizes my sister.Shoma ra nemitoonam beshnavam. I can’t hear you.Daneshjooe oloom dare migeere. The student is taking science.Man a bra tarjee mikonam be sheer. I prefer water to milk.Baraye man benevees. Write it down for me.Zire yek mobl paydash kardam. I found it under a couch.Shekle madar bozorgam astam. I resemble my grandmother.
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Objectives:Learn 5 rooms in the houseLearn 5 pieces of furnitureLearn how to form present tense ing verbsLearn 3 verbs in the present ing formLearn about family life in Iran by talking to Mona, reading on it and watching moviesEvaluationBe able to describe the different rooms in a house to someoneBe able to ask what pieces of furniture are in certain rooms in a houseBe able to look at a picture of a living room or kitchen and tell someone the furniture in the roomBe able to form sentences using 3 verbs in the present ing formBe able to tell someone not from Iran about family life in English
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So last week I spent a lot of time working on my cultural presentation in addition to studying my learning objectives. My learning objectives went well and I am feeling confident about them, but the most interesting part of the week was learning about the poet Hafiz. He is considered to be one Iran's most beloved poets and his works are found in pretty much everyone's house. The cool thing that I found was that people use his poems as a sort of fortune teller or an oracle. There are even websites where you can have your fortune told by Hafiz's poems. Mona was telling us how this is a common game to play after a nice dinner at people's houses. Apparently people get really emotional about the poem that is chosen and how it relates to their life. Hafiz concentrates a lot on the theme of love which is pretty easy to relate to a lot of people's lives, which is part of his popularity. The only issue I have had with my project is the fact that there are so few substantial and credible facts about Hafiz's life. Apparently not much is known about his life and as a result there are a lot of myths and legends surrounding it. The same also goes for Hafiz's Diwan, his collection of poems, because collections can range from roughly 500 poems to almost 1000. Still, it has been an interesting project and I look forward to sharing what I have learned with the class. I am also excited to see what others are doing their presentations on.On a side note, I am still having trouble with figuring out the present tense stems of some of the verbs I am learning, but I found this helpful chart that gives a rough approximation as to how to figure out the present tense stem from the past tense stem. It has been pretty helpful so far and I'm thankful that Brian shared it with Becky and me in class.
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A friend of my dad's and his wife who both grew up in Iran came over my house over spring break to talk to my about Iran and practice my Farsi. I wrote a thank you letter to them for visiting and the tea and map they gave me in Farsi so I figured I might as well post it.
I have been abroad to Paris, but during my stay, I did not experience culture shock. I feel like was able to do avoid it by having a strong connection with the culture before arriving on Paris soil.Culture Shock is a loss of familiar signs and symbols in social interaction.There are 4 stages involved in the culture shock:A) Fascination: everything is new and exciting, aka "the honeymoon stage"B) Aggression: a hateful attitude for the host country (ethnocentric)C) Superiority: the traveller develops a sense of humor and instead of criticism, deals with differences by cracking jokesD) Acceptance: the traveller is finally able to adjust and not feel any strainWays to avoid culture shock are through:1 - getting to know the people, their interests, norms, and language (especially important)2 - Removing yourself from an outsider/tourist position
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This week I worked on two short units on my book that explicated use of apostrophe's and family vocabulary. More importantly, I also learned a list of important adjectives that Jan gave me, as well as when to apply an '-e' ending depending on whether the adjective is used predictively or attributively (before or after the noun).Apostrophe's are only used to indicate possession following a name, in all other cases it is typical to use the preposition 'van'. The apostrophe goes before the 's' if the person's name ends in a vowel (i.e. Anna's), whereas it comes after the last letter if the name ends in a consonant (i.e. Marius'). Cases in which possession is not indicated with a proper noun name or a possessive pronoun use 'van' as the means to indicate possession.Family names I learned are very straightforward. I learned 'vrouw-wife', 'moeder-mother', 'zus-sister', etc.... 'In-law' is dictated by a 'schoon-' prefix to any of these words, while 'groot-great/big' & 'klein-small/little' amend 'son' & 'daughter' into 'grandson' & 'granddaughter'.Jan gave me a list of 30 frequently used adjectives to boost my vocabulary. This helped me as the book covered the spelling changes that affect adjectives. As a result, I have for the first time incorporated a basic understanding of adjectives into my knowledge of Dutch as the book had not discussed them yet. Adjectives are subject to the same spelling changes as the conjugation of verbs in order to maintain the long or short nature of the vowel. As a result, an '-e' ending is added to adjectives occurring before the noun, but only in a definite circumstance (i.e. 'mijn-my' or 'dit-this' rather than 'een-a' or 'elke-each'). Examples include: 'een groot huis' / 'dat grote huis'; 'de kind is slim' / 'de slimme kind'. Spelling changes are necessary to maintain the long & short vowels in 'groot' & 'slim' respectively. These rules work in conjunction with the rules for conjugating verbs however, so I already have a fairly good grasp on it.Next week I work on interrogatives (i.e. who, what, when, where, why questions) and the future tense.
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ObjectivesLearn 3 more verbs in the past tenseLearn 5 more countries and 5 more nationalitiesLearn words for city,village, state and countryLearn 5 geographical locations (river, mountain etc)Review objectives from last weekEvaluationBe able to ask people's nationalities and say what nationalities people are.Be able to ask and answer what city, village or state people are from.Be able to describe the geographical features of my city and ask people what the geographical features look like where they are from
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Last week was a disaster in terms of following my learning plan and meeting my objectives. I was really unfocused and unmotivated. Partially this was due to the fact that I had my senior thesis presentation last week, but also because I applied for several jobs in Afghanistan and wasn't sure if I should stay with Farsi or switch to Dari. I have decided that since my job plans aren't solidified and since I enjoy learning Farsi, I am going to stick with it. If I get offered a job in Afghanistan then I can decide if I want to start studying Dari. Hopefully this upcoming week will be a lot better and I will be able to focus more. I wish I had more to contribute to this reflection, but I really did not work on my Farsi all that much last week so didn't really encounter any obstacles except for the ones already mentioned.I did start researching Hafez for my culture project and it has been really interesting to see the different ways that he has contributed to Iranian culture. I'm looking forward to learning more about him and figuring out how to present all of the information on him in 15 minutes.
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Posted by Becky Walker on April 6, 2009 at 10:22am
Culture week was great. I watched a movie, which gave me the opportunity to practice my aural skills while observing the cultural interactions between the characters. In addition to watching the movie, I also spent time researching for my cultural project--how Iran's youth is affecting the country, and vice- versa--which provided a cleared image of Iranian culture for me.I did not have the chance to look into the customs declaration phrases, so I have moved that for next week's task. I made this decision as I spent far longer watching, and rewatching scenes in the movie than I anticipated. It was something that I needed to do however, because though I was constantly frustrated not being able to understand the conversations, simply observing Iran through the lens of an outsider (the character was not a native) was beneficial.This upcoming week I will return to more grammar based learning in order to improve the ways in which I can build upon what I already know.
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Posted by Becky Walker on April 6, 2009 at 10:06am
Reintroducing the Rosetta Stone was a good decision. At the beginning, using the Rosetta Stone was not entirely too helpful, for without knowing any of the words, I would rely on using the pictures to remember them, as opposed to taking the words to memory. Fortunately, I am much more familiar with the words used in the first lessons of the Rosetta Stone, and this helped me to practice my aural skills. Though next week I am planning on focusing more on culture--knowing what gestures I can use to accompany the phases I am learning--I will continue to use the Rosetta Stone and other aural programs to practice my skills.
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