Polish Translation vs. English Translation

(1) In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. (2) Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters. (3) And God said, "Let there be light," and there was light. (4) God saw that the light was good, and he separated the light from the darkness. (5) God called the light "day," and the darkness he called "night." And there was evening, and there was morning-the first day.

1) Na początku Bóg stworzył niebo i ziemię. (2) Teraz Ziemia zaś była bezładem i pustkowiem: ciemność była nad powierzchnią bezmiaru wód, a Duch Boży unosił się nad wodami. (3) Wtedy Bóg powiedział: "Niechaj się stanie światłość", i stała się światłość. (4) Widział Bóg, że światłość jest dobra, i on oddzielił światło od ciemności. (5) I nazwał Bóg światłość dniem, a ciemność nazwał nocą. " I tak upłynął wieczór i poranek, dzień pierwszy.

Some difficulties in translating from English to Polish is that there are no articles such as "the", "a", or "an". Instead of "let there be light", the more proper Polish translation says "let there happen light", to signify that it was created, and not just brought in. The major difference is that Polish verbs show the gender of the person who is performing the action. "Called", as in named, is "nazwał" in Polish. To say he named, you can simply say "nazwał"; however, if a female is performing the action, the word would be "nazwała." Thus, this automatically gives a masculine gender to God in the Polish translation.

Another interesting difference is that even though Polish doesn't have gender specific articles for nouns like in Spanish, such as la or el, the translation for "that" in Polish does correspond to gender ("ten" and "tamta").

Bilingual Aphasia

This is an amazing story that to my bewilderment, apparently happens somewhat often amongst coma patients. A 13-year old Croatian girl woke up from a 24 hours coma speaking not her native Croatian, but German. She has just started studying German in school, and has been watching TV shows and reading books in order to improve, according to various sources. However, according to her parents, she was "by no means fluent." Doctors believe that a swelling of the injured part of her brain has disrupted neural connections, causing her to lack access to the part of her brain where her Croatian language skills are. A positive explanation is still unclear.

Nevertheless, this case provides support for the theory that second language acquisition occurs in separate areas of the brain. A study conducted in 1997 showed the following findings relating to this theory:

"In 1997, Kim et al used the fMRI method to examine cortical activation among a range of bilinguals who were proficient in various languages. The participant pool was divided into two groups, early (L2 acquisition before the age of five) and late (after the age of twelve) bilinguals. The results suggested anatomical variation between early and late bilinguals such that although early bilinguals showed similar activation in both Broca's and Wernicke's areas during a silent sentence generation task while late bilinguals displayed common activation in Wernicke's but not in Broca's area. These results indicate a role for late language acquisition, suggesting that the "critical period" concept cannot be discarded and that to some extent language learning after a certain age is differentially represented in the brain. "

We talked about the debunking of the "critical period" of language acquisition, but there may be some truth to it. It's possible that after a certain age, we don't lose the capability of learning languages, but instead lose an anatomical availability to acquiring a language. Meaning that the increasing difficulty of learning a language is somehow due to the degeneration of brain plasticity.

If indeed it is the case that we harbor language skills in different areas of the brain, it simply serves as further support for learning new languages. A brain injury may inhibit the use of one language, but at the same time increase the fluency of another, as in the case of this 13 year old girl. Indeed, there is much more to study within the realm of neuroscience and language acquisition and maintenance.

References:

Story:

http://news.gather.com/viewArticle.action?articleId=281474978194066

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/croatia/7583971/Croatian-teenager-wakes-from-coma-speaking-fluent-German.html

Study:

http://serendip.brynmawr.edu/exchange/node/1902

The new language of...texting?

I always thought that we are butchering our languages by the use of texting - a shorthand that changes "you're" into "ur" and "talk to you later" into "ttyl." Then came along words such as sexting, where two people would use texting to send graphic notes to each other. However, never before have I heard of words such as chexting or drexing (cheating via text or texting while drunk, respectively) being used around texting. I then realized the article is on a Canadian website, so maybe those words are more popular there.

Nevertheless, 35.3 billion texts were sent in Canada last year. That is certainly enough to swing pop culture in a certain direction, and increase of a staggering 70% from the previous year. This quick change in culture has also had a relatively quick impact on our language vocabulary.

Erin McKeon, CEO of Wordnik, an online dictionary that tracks real-time language shifts, says:

"We know that language changes all the time, but it's usually like the movement of tectonic plates — slow and not necessarily affecting our day to day lives...Then something erupts and it's like, 'WOW!'

McKeon goes on to say that althought there is a massive input of new words being used in association with texting, most of it will be phased out as texting becomes a normal thing, and not a novelty. However, this article has sparked some extra questions in my mind that maybe we can discuss in class. Are new forms of communication affecting our language skills/vocabulary? Is it always negative?

References:

http://www.montrealgazette.com/technology/Hugely+popular+text+messaging+spawns+language+change/2930387/story.html

Elementary Schools & Languages

We have all heard it before. It is easier to learn a language earlier in life, as a child, than it is as an adult. Then why are elementary schools across the country cutting their language classes?

"There's a window of opportunity for language acquisition, says professor Charles Grove of West Chester University, who specializes in teaching foreign language teachers.....Professor Grove says that while you can get the basics of another language later in life, it's starting young that gives the best chance for high level, native-speaker proficiency."

For some reason, Charles Grove says, foreign language classes are being viewed as special commodities. The money that could pay for those classes instead goes towards traditional subjects like mathematics and language arts. However, there is an increasing need for multi-lingual speakers in today's world. And whether it's for pure pleasure, or for career purposes, adults in the US and across the world are scrambling to learn a second, third, or fourth language.

A study led by Rachel Mayberry of McGill University, along with Elizabeth Lock of the University of Ottawa and Hena Kazmi of the University of Western Ontario in 2002 concluded that new language learning is very much linked to early language experience. They collected data that showed that people who were born deaf had a more difficult time learning sign language than people who became deaf later in life had higher results in ASL performance. Thus it could be concluded that some kind of language experience early in life allowed for better learning in the future. This of course explains why we are able to start learning a language at any point in life. But it might also imply that those of us who hit plateaus simply didn't have enough exposure to different languages. Overall, however, childhood seems to be the most conducive time to learn languages, as the brain is at an optimal stage to form new neural connections.

So with all this reasoning supporting language-learning early on in life, why are schools cutting foreign language classes? The answer may lie in how we learn languages. A study published in 2007 in the journal Psychological Science, states that we face another language barrier called first-language attrition, in which we momentarily forget words in our native language after spending time being immersed in a foreign one. It is quite a peculiar mechanism. Our brains actually inhibit, not forget, our native languages in order to help learn new ones:

"In the study, native English speakers who had completed at least one year of college level Spanish were asked to repeatedly name objects in Spanish. The more the students were asked to repeat the Spanish words, the more difficulty they had generating the corresponding English labels for the objects. In other words, naming objects in another language inhibits the corresponding labels in the native language, making them more difficult to retrieve later."

However, the article continues to say that as we achieve fluency in both languages, the necessity for native-language inhibition becomes superfluous. My hypothesis, based on this study, is that elementary schools are facing problems with English-inhibition in the early stages of learning a foreign language. Though if we allow the children to continue studying the language until they become bilingual, we would see that this inhibition would cease to exist. Schools should maintain a strong support for foreign language classes, as these will only become more useful in years to come, as diversity in the US increases.

Articles:

Schools:

http://www.kyw1060.com/In-Elementary-Schools--Fewer-Foreign-Language-Cour/6810706

Language Experience Study:

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2002/05/020502072204.htm

Language Inhibition:

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/01/070118094015.htm

Languages & Plane Crashes

In the last class, we mentioned the plane crash stories that were analyzed by Malcolm Gladwell in his book, Outliers. I came across an article that speculated a possible cause of the Polish plane crash might have been a language barrier between the pilots and the Russians at Smolensk Airport.

"The Russian air traffic controller Pavel Plusnin – who was the last person to talk to the crew of President Lech Kaczynski's Tupolev 154 before it crashed – said he had difficulties understanding the crew who he said spoke poor Russian.

"Numbers were hard for them so I could not determine their altitude," he told a Russian news portal"

It is staggering to imagine that over half of airplane crashes are due to human error. Could many of these be due to language barriers? That, of course, is one very valid assumption. Gladwell also offers the argument that culture's influence on languages can affect communication between pilots and air traffic controllers. For instance, Flight 052, a Columbian jet that crashed in January 1990. The first officer not only failed to express the gravity of the situation to the ATC (did not repeat "emergency" as the captain said it), but it is believed that his calm speaking tone was due to the nature of his language and culture. In other words, his language and culture didn't permit him to speak to his superiors in any other tone of voice.

If the recent plane crash in Smolensk was due to a language barrier, and if Columbian culture and Spanish language teach one to speak in a formal voice to one's superiors, is there a cause to use a universal language amongst plane carriers? Is English best fit for the job? With hundreds of international flights every day, we can imagine that many pilots are at least somewhat familiar with the language of their destination. But is there a culture beyond language that has to be taught as well?

"investigators had "concluded there were no conditions for landing". The plane tried to land despite being advised by air traffic control "not to do so" he said."

In the above, we also see another possible problem. "Advised." The ATC simply advising the pilots to divert to another airport doesn't sound as grave if one gave a command. A simple choice of words, even if translated correctly, can lead to massive problems.

Gladwell, Malcolm. "Outliers"

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/apr/12/language-president-theories-polish-air-disaster

A monopoly in languages?

I came across an article in the New York Times that described the efforts of universities such as SUNY Stony Brook to revive lost languages of native American Indian tribes. Of 300 languages that were indigenous to the United States, only 175 remain. Current scholars and ordinary families are attempting to revive their dead languages by use of documents, remembered prayers and greetings, and whatever other resources they can come across that will enlighten them with not only the vocabulary, but also the structure and grammar of these languages.

However, even if you gather a complete dictionary of the language and a book of grammar rules, you still need a group of people, even whole societies, to learn the language and become fluent. You have to speak it everyday, said Stefanie Fielding, and adviser of the Stony Brook project. And here we come across a problem. Many people are reluctant to disturb their lives with learning a "dead" language and having to work to incorporate it into their daily lives. It seems easier to just use what we already know.

You can learn a lot about a culture from the language. Referring to Stephanie Fielding and her studies of Mohegan:

"She notes, for example, that in an English conversation, a statement is typically built with the first person — “I” — coming first. In the same statement in Mohegan, however, “you” always comes first, even when the speaker is the subject.

“This suggests a more communally minded culture,” she said."

This seems to suggest that not only are we losing languages, but also certain cultural values and knowledge of the societies that used these languages. But is it important for us to preserve these languages? Will suffer negative consequences if we lead the world to speak one language? Or will we simply lose a taste of cultural intelligence and worldly sophistication?

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/06/books/06language.html

Map

Hey, my name is Kathy and I'm also a freshman at Stanford. I am undeclared, but considering majoring in biology or human biology. I am on a pre-med track, with a possible intention of becoming a doctor.

I wanted to take this class because it seems like it will be able to string together many questions I have had about the influence of language amongst people and creation of society. Languages are our main choice of communication, and it is important to study them in order to make the best of our communication skills. I mean, not only studying languages, but how they impact our growth, thinking, and perspective.

As an immigrant from Poland, I was exposed to many languages at a young age. I am fluent in Polish, which is the sole language I speak at home. Sometimes English words trickle in, and we watch some English tv, but I generally speak to my family in Polish. Thus, my reading, writing, and speaking skills have developed on their own in this language. I recall during my first year of American school bringing home cassettes and books that would help me learn English. My mom and I listened to and read these together. Like I said before, I initially believed that when you speak a different language, the other person hears you in Polish. Wasn't I a patriotic little girl? Hahaha...

I hope that with this class, along with continuing my studies in Spanish and maybe other languages, I can gain a new perspective on culture and society. It's always interesting to note the influence of culture in a person's belief and speech (such as much of the less developed world believes in home remedies as opposed to western medicine - important to note as a doctor when speaking with patients). However, it's time to establish a further understanding by analyzing the impact of language on cognitive thinking, beliefs, and structure of society in order to understand others beyond a comprehension of words.