A few random thoughts
May. 2nd, 2006 08:39 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
matrilI just feel like blathering a bit, with no particular direction. So, in the order that they pop into my brain, here are my thoughts:
1. Language change is a sign of a vibrant, growing culture, and people who try to resist it are not only mistaken about the way language works, but they're fighting a lost cause. It's gonna change; people will say "gonna" instead of "going to" because it's easier and flows better; get over it! I am very fond of old forms of English, but they're not lost entirely. Even Old English, from all the way back in pre-medieval times, still exists in written forms; imagine how much more we'll be able to save newer forms of English now that we have recording devices. Meanwhile, the newest forms are the way language naturally evolves to adapt to a changing people. It's why Latin is an intellectual curiosity, but not a viable language - it doesn't have a community to speak it and help it adapt. And the people with the authority to change the language are - guess what - the people who speak it. Uneducated, illiterate, whatever - from ancient Phoenician to Middle English, languages have been shaped by all classes of speakers. Why try to change that now? It's not gonna happen. Oh, and there's no such thing as "written language." Language, which is a form of complex communication naturally emerging among cultures, occurs either as verbal exchanges or in sophisticated gesturing systems like sign language. Written systems are devised to represent those languages, but they are not languages in and of themselves. The changes of the language filter down into the written systems, which resist change more because records have a semblance of permanance. But that does not make writing systems a more proper or correct form of language. They're just more polished, having the chance to be edited. The Internet, of course, has thinned the line between spontaneous speech and written representations of it, what with extremely informal email and blog language. The spelling and punctuation can be downright painful, of course, but that's a matter of mechanics and has no bearing on grammar and usage.
2. I hear lots of mothers talking about how busy they are, and realize that most of my guilt comes from the fact that I'm not busy at all. I have pretty leisurely days, except for when my children gang up on me to demand my attention at the same time. Usually, my son's at school, my daughter's playing somewhere that I can smile at her and make sure she's all right, and I'm muddling around on the Internet. And I think cringingly that I should wash the dishes or mend that hole-y clothing, or at least go write something or play the piano. But I just spend another hour online. It's because a homemaker's responsiblities are largely self-enforced. If I don't get them done, my husband doesn't worry, my children don't notice, and no one else cares. I don't have a lot of real deadlines or actual appointments. I should be making them myself and writing it in a handy little day planner. But I don't. And I spend another hour online.
3. People always greet each other with "Hey" in TV shows. It's not as noticable when you're just hearing it, but if you put on the close captioning, you see, "Hey" "Hey" "Hey" "Hey" and it begins to seem ridiculous. I usually say "hi" or "hello" myself. I wonder when "Hey" became the default for television.
4. There's something weird with our email - certain buttons don't respond to being pressed, including "Reply" "Forward" and "Attach files," which is monstrous inconvenient. I think it has something to do with our "cookies," but unless it involves adding more butter or cooking for another five minutes, I don't have the slightest idea how to fix them. Also I can't get our printer figured out, even though it says it should work. In our previous homes we could call on various friends or family members with computer know-how, but none of them live nearby now. I'm sure we could find someone if we just asked, but I'm not big on asking people for help. One of my stupid stubborn streaks.
5. If I had Photoshop, I would go seriously icon-happy. I had a desk calender with Episode II pictures, and when the year was up I cut out all the pictures and made a collage out of selected images, with snippets of lines that went along with them. This took quite some time and effort, and verged on obessive. Now, if I had access to such collage-makers on the computer...well, the results might be dangerous. This is why it might be a good thing that we can't really afford Photoshop right now.
6. I hate cell phones. I hate talking on the phone; why extend the areas where I would have to do it? I don't want to be reached in every place I'm in; I don't like having a stupid little box attached to my ear. And it bewilders me that commercials now target their products at families, like parents are really thinking, "Gee, I want my child to have a cell phone, but I just haven't found the perfect family plan." What the heck does a teenager or even younger child need with a cell phone? Now I'm in crochity old lady mode, poking my cane around. Young upstart whippersnappers...maybe I'm secretly a Luddite.
Well, I'm done.
1. Language change is a sign of a vibrant, growing culture, and people who try to resist it are not only mistaken about the way language works, but they're fighting a lost cause. It's gonna change; people will say "gonna" instead of "going to" because it's easier and flows better; get over it! I am very fond of old forms of English, but they're not lost entirely. Even Old English, from all the way back in pre-medieval times, still exists in written forms; imagine how much more we'll be able to save newer forms of English now that we have recording devices. Meanwhile, the newest forms are the way language naturally evolves to adapt to a changing people. It's why Latin is an intellectual curiosity, but not a viable language - it doesn't have a community to speak it and help it adapt. And the people with the authority to change the language are - guess what - the people who speak it. Uneducated, illiterate, whatever - from ancient Phoenician to Middle English, languages have been shaped by all classes of speakers. Why try to change that now? It's not gonna happen. Oh, and there's no such thing as "written language." Language, which is a form of complex communication naturally emerging among cultures, occurs either as verbal exchanges or in sophisticated gesturing systems like sign language. Written systems are devised to represent those languages, but they are not languages in and of themselves. The changes of the language filter down into the written systems, which resist change more because records have a semblance of permanance. But that does not make writing systems a more proper or correct form of language. They're just more polished, having the chance to be edited. The Internet, of course, has thinned the line between spontaneous speech and written representations of it, what with extremely informal email and blog language. The spelling and punctuation can be downright painful, of course, but that's a matter of mechanics and has no bearing on grammar and usage.
2. I hear lots of mothers talking about how busy they are, and realize that most of my guilt comes from the fact that I'm not busy at all. I have pretty leisurely days, except for when my children gang up on me to demand my attention at the same time. Usually, my son's at school, my daughter's playing somewhere that I can smile at her and make sure she's all right, and I'm muddling around on the Internet. And I think cringingly that I should wash the dishes or mend that hole-y clothing, or at least go write something or play the piano. But I just spend another hour online. It's because a homemaker's responsiblities are largely self-enforced. If I don't get them done, my husband doesn't worry, my children don't notice, and no one else cares. I don't have a lot of real deadlines or actual appointments. I should be making them myself and writing it in a handy little day planner. But I don't. And I spend another hour online.
3. People always greet each other with "Hey" in TV shows. It's not as noticable when you're just hearing it, but if you put on the close captioning, you see, "Hey" "Hey" "Hey" "Hey" and it begins to seem ridiculous. I usually say "hi" or "hello" myself. I wonder when "Hey" became the default for television.
4. There's something weird with our email - certain buttons don't respond to being pressed, including "Reply" "Forward" and "Attach files," which is monstrous inconvenient. I think it has something to do with our "cookies," but unless it involves adding more butter or cooking for another five minutes, I don't have the slightest idea how to fix them. Also I can't get our printer figured out, even though it says it should work. In our previous homes we could call on various friends or family members with computer know-how, but none of them live nearby now. I'm sure we could find someone if we just asked, but I'm not big on asking people for help. One of my stupid stubborn streaks.
5. If I had Photoshop, I would go seriously icon-happy. I had a desk calender with Episode II pictures, and when the year was up I cut out all the pictures and made a collage out of selected images, with snippets of lines that went along with them. This took quite some time and effort, and verged on obessive. Now, if I had access to such collage-makers on the computer...well, the results might be dangerous. This is why it might be a good thing that we can't really afford Photoshop right now.
6. I hate cell phones. I hate talking on the phone; why extend the areas where I would have to do it? I don't want to be reached in every place I'm in; I don't like having a stupid little box attached to my ear. And it bewilders me that commercials now target their products at families, like parents are really thinking, "Gee, I want my child to have a cell phone, but I just haven't found the perfect family plan." What the heck does a teenager or even younger child need with a cell phone? Now I'm in crochity old lady mode, poking my cane around. Young upstart whippersnappers...maybe I'm secretly a Luddite.
Well, I'm done.
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Language acquisition
Date: 2006-05-05 03:46 pm (UTC)Re: Language acquisition
Date: 2006-05-05 04:32 pm (UTC)A newborn baby has the "wiring" to learn any language. See, its brain has tons and tons of synaptic connections, and will not need most of them as it grows older. So brain development includes the process of snipping off the unnecessary connections, so that the brain can specialize on the connections that remain. For language, this means that as a baby spends time in a particular language environment, it picks out which phonetic distinctions are meaningful and which are not. As an example, in English we distinguish between "l" and "r." "Low" means something other than "row." Not so in Japanese - those sounds are just two variants of the same phoneme. So a Japanese baby, after a few months, will discard the brain connection that notes a difference between the two sounds because it's unncessary for its native language. As time goes on, the baby's hearing perceptions become more and more focused on the language being spoken around it. This specialization is one of those miracles of development.
Now, as far as grammar - the formation of words, sentences, word order, etc. - there is strong evidence that all babies are born with a sort of "universal grammar." They have an inherent notion of things like nouns and verbs and the logic behind putting them together for meaning. This is indicated by the study of Creole languages, which are literally created by the second generation of two peoples with unrelated languges who have generated a basic lexicon of shared vocabulary. A lexicon, not a full-fledged language. But get this - The children create a grammar. Not only that, but Creoles across the world, with no contact with eacht other, have markedly similar grammatical systems.
But the trick is learning the specifics of their native language. After all, whatever grammatical similarities all languages share, over time they're going to diverge. So a child must learn this. And most children (I say most because I'm the mother of an exception) have the natural ability and desire to learn it. They don't need to be pushed or prompted (although encouragement is exciting for them) and they don't need to be taught. They listen, they make deductions, and they experiment. The pattern is typically to learn a general rule (ie, past tense is formed with -ed), to then note the exceptions ("rang" instead of "ringed"), to temporarily apply the exception to every word ("brang") and then finally apply the general rules and exceptions correctly. It's absolutely remarkable. Every child has their own pace (my son is currently stalled)(children in bilingual environments tend to go slower, but they learn each language eventually, and know how to distinguish between the two!) but the pattern is very predictable. And it's totally self-motivated. If you correct a child a hundred times, it won't sink in - the child just keeps repeating the mistake. Then, suddenly, the next day, it's been absorbed, and the correct usage comes up naturally. All they need is to be surrounded with people speaking the language, and they listen and observe.
The best way to encourage learning the correct usage is not "No, that's not it - say it like this" but rather, if the child says, "Him go to school today" to reply, "That's right! He did go to school today!" Eventually, the child will get it, and not feel crushed in the process. Language "mistakes" are a regular process of acquisition, and no child yet has learned their native language wrong. Mind, I mean that they all learn to speak just as those around them. If those around them speak so-called "sub-standard" English, then the child is simply learning what is being presented as its native tongue. They haven't yet been poisoned with moral judgements about language. (Oh, I'm ever so slightly opinionated about that...)
To sum up, language acquisition is one of the most miraculous of human abilities, and it's something that an infant does more expertly than an adult with the best of language courses. To me it's wonderful to think that we're born with the capacity to speak in ways more complex and sophisticated than any other life form on the planet. That's why I love to study it. I could go on....
Re: Language acquisition
Date: 2006-05-08 01:42 am (UTC)