Blog 5: Learning Language

My newest ProetryPlace blog finds me lost in linguistics.

Blog 5, 10 June, 2013:

Lost in Linguistics

    I am thoroughly immersed, i.e. way over my head, in the study of a new language that I mentioned a few weeks back. As often occurs when beginning the study of any new subject, more questions have been raised than resolved.

    Some of the questions are specific to the new language—strange concepts or constructions that are only vaguely understood from the text material and DVD presentation. Others involve more general aspects of language and learning.

    Think of how you first learned language. It was an oral language that started with unintelligible (to adult humans) sounds, perhaps word fragments. Then simple words that named familiar objects—Mama, Dada—or mimicked what the ear perceived—No!

    Your baby vocabulary focused on nouns. Later, you learned some verbs and simple sentences or phrases, e.g. “I want.” Gradually, quite complex aspects of oral expression (as well as facial expressions and body language) were added. You learned sentence structure, other parts of speech—articles, adjectives, adverbs, etc. “I want that now!” not “That want now, I,” without even knowing that subjects like syntax and semantics existed.

    My point is that we become proficient in language and oral expression long before we study anything about language—grammar, vocabulary, punctuation and spelling, the latter two being manifestations of the written word. Learning a language as an adult takes different, more varied, forms unless one takes a crash course from Primsleur or Berlitz or Rosetta Stone expressly to be able to ask how much a glass of wine costs while vacationing in Romania or Hong Kong.

    To learn to write and to understand the written language requires a different approach, an expanded set of cognitive skills and abilities. Words are still the basis of most language, so we start with building a lexicon or a vocabulary of words. Soon after that relatively painless launch, we are adrift on an ocean of grammatical waves and syntactical seaweed. Occasional bouts of mal de mer are relieved by sightings of the distant shore—new knowledge, new appreciations.

    

    It may seem that I have wandered off the trail to the new language I am studying, and true enough, I will delay details of that specific study to a future blog. But language and writing is the primary subject matter of ProetryPlace, so I offer no apology for the brief detour.

    Indeed, it is difficult to bypass some still more esoteric aspects of linguistics. The field is amazingly complex and interesting, comprising a multitude of branches such as phonology and psycholinguistics and involving other fields of study such as anthropology and ancient history. And about those questions that continue to arise, here is one that language experts still argue: What is the purpose of language?

    The two main answers are communication and enabling thought process. I subscribe easily to both of these, but the question leads only deeper into more questions. When and how did human language come into being, what were its origins? This issue may never be fully resolved, but I believe a fortuitous juxtaposition of anatomical, social and biological evolution made speech possible if not essential. While humans evolved several million years ago, language is likely to have emerged over the relatively recent history of 50,000 to 200,000 years, for whatever reasons.

And the earliest known written language, cuneiform, was set forth a mere 6000 years ago. Today, over 6000 languages are in use. It is projected that 50 to 90 percent of them will become extinct during this century. Progress?

Next blog: My new language study. I promise. (Fingers crossed)

Richard Allen Anderson   < :- (