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Three posts from this page will be included in my final assignments as informal assignments.
For this three months, I have used my second language, English. I have studied it for long, but when it comes to using it in real situations, it is much more difficult to understand other people and to tell what I want to say. Thus, to improve my English skill, I have tried to think in English while I use it. For example, when I write in English, I use English to think about the topic, and when I read in English, I try to understand it without translating it into Japanese. While struggling with it, I noticed the relationship between language and culture.
The first thing I realized is that I feel or think in a little different way when I use English. For example, I am more confident when I use English than when I use Japanese. That might be because English is more direct when you tell something. The way you tell something in Japanese is more euphemistic. It might be able to be said that language have effect on your identity or characteristic. Also, I noticed another thing. People cannot understand a concept because there is no way to explain it in their language. On Hiraeth Assignment, I wrote about kendo, which is affected a lot by Japanese traditional cultures. When I wrote the drafts, I struggled with explaining the concepts that cannot be translated in English. There was no word that can explain it, so I tried to explain it in some sentences, but no one could understand it. Thinking it was because of my English skill, I asked my friend, who has an American mother and a Japanese father and can speak both English and Japanese well, for his help. However, he couldn’t explain it as well. Thus, I might be able to say people think differently because their language limits their perception. I used to think it was a one-way process that only culture affects language, and I still think culture forms language. Words emerge based on the users’ way of thinking or categorizing things. However, because of these realizations, I came to think it is like an interactive process, and language forms people’s way as well.
2 Comments
Kayla Horta
11/21/2016 08:54:25 am
Katsuki, I absolutely admire the fact that you're taking the whole art of the English language and learning it for your own self-interest! The dedication is exceedingly admirable! One thing I will say is that you're definitely right when you say that the English language is a lot more direct, but personally, I love the abstractness of the Japanese language. I think it's extremely beautiful and poetic.
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Tuan
11/21/2016 07:29:59 pm
" I have studied it for long, but when it comes to using it in real situations, it is much more difficult to understand other people and to tell what I want to say". I know exactly what you are taking about. It is really hard when we wasn't born in here. But you should communicate to other people more then your English will be better for sure.
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Katsuki Iio
Born in Osaka, Japan in 1997. Archives
December 2016
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