Language Barriers

The story “Put Down Your Paper and Talk to Me” takes such an interesting perspective on the issue of communication between women and men. It is something that I have certainly not thought of before. It is such an interesting concept to think that we are all still human beings but at the same time the way we function is so different.

I have often taken offense when anyone talks over me; it has never been especially offensive because it is a man doing so but never the less it is still offensive. The author makes a good point that she feels that this is a way for them to assert themselves. It is way for them to grab power and a certain aspect of control in a group. Women, however, feel if they where to dominate a conversation is would be rude and disrespectful to the other members of group. They want to give everyone an equal chance to talk and express their opinions, while men feel that if a woman, or anyone else wants to express their opinion they are free to do so. It is always interesting to hear someone’s perspective over your own to take more from an experience.

The reasons for this may come from the difference in the male and female mind. While a female feels more comfortable around their closest friends a male may feel comfortable around complete strangers. I completely agree with the author on this issue. I feel completely comfortable around my friends and will tell them anything, and at the same time my father feels completely comfortable around stranger and will tell them everything, and sometimes does.

Many people could learn from this article when they are having issues in any type of relationship between themselves and a member of the opposite sex. It is an interesting issue to talk about, but I still feel that this language barriers may never really change.

Latin is a Dead Language

Like many of the authors that we have read over the past couple of weeks I have also come across difficulties while trying to acquire a new language. Of course like every other high school student in this nation I was required to take a couple of years of a foreign language. I then choose Latin as my foreign language. This foreign language class gave me a greater insight to the usage and misusage of English than the majority of my English classes ever did.

During my first couple of days in this class I was not sure about what I had gotten myself into. My teacher was fresh out of college and did not even have the certification to become a teacher. The kids in my class were not my favorite either. Many of the kids had attitudes and had no desire to learn anything from this Latin class. While I had little appreciation for the majority of the students in the class we now had something in common; we where now attempting to learn a new language that none had previously spoken.

I felt that this experience of attempting to learn such a strange language brought us so much closer. There was only one Latin class in my high school so we were pretty much stuck with each other. We spent all of our class time in a collaborative effort trying to learn this crazy language that many of us knew very little about. Through this I began to see that not all of the people where as bad as I had made them out to be. We even began to form our own Latin class jokes. Funny vocabulary and making inappropriate sentences in Latin were always the guy’s favorites. Nobody else in the school got these jokes because they had no idea what we were talking about. I could now relate to these students in my class because we had this new bond created through our attempt to learn Latin.

Soon I came to know a girl named Kristen in my class. I did not really know much about her but she seemed to be pretty decent, or at least much better than the rest of the kids in the class. While during the struggle of both of us trying to learn a foreign language it was almost as if we had forgotten how to use English. We were working on grammar worksheet together, and we were not doing to the best. We looked to the paper and saw that there had been a typo. The sheet said that Harry Potter reached for his wand. We had no idea what a whand was. We then looked over at each other, and asked each other what exactly a whand was. We then knew it had to be our teacher; she probably had gotten something wrong on the paper and we could just not wait to tell her. Kristen and I beckoned for our teacher, and as she walked over we proudly proclaimed that she had messed up. She had messed up and we could prove it to her. We then asked, “ What exactly is a whand.” She then nicely reminded us that it was not a whand it was a wand. She then said, “Like Harry Potter has a wand, get it.” We got it, but we felt really stupid. This one little mistake made on a grammar worksheet brought me and Kristen much closer, and because of a simple grammar mistake made we are still best friends today.

While I will agree that Language has had a severe impact on my life, it is not like many of the others such as Sedaris and Rodriquez. My experience is one that is much different, and much more positive. In my attempt to learn Latin I saw English more clearly. I also developed bonds and relationships with people that were all strengthened by this tie of language. This language was something that was relatable and understandable by us, and that is something that can be understood by people all over the world.

Learning English Good

Many Americans will be the first to bring up the topic of non-English speakers in the United States. Many believe that if you are coming to this country you could at least learn the language. As shown in, “Learning English Good” by Elyssa this may not always be the easiest task and that some of the blame for this should be put on all English speaking people in the US. While it is not the responsibility of America to teach these foreign people English we must understand that English is an extremely complicated language with many variations created by us. We are constantly shortening words to minimize the words we have to speak; many also have the habit of slurring words together. This slurring is not usually purposeful it is just a way that we have come to speak. There is a great use of slang in all parts of the US, as in many other countries, but this is a trait that makes it difficult for students to learn and use English. Many ESL students also may find it difficult to adapt depending on the region they are in because of the varying dialect in the United States. Stresses and emphasis’s on certain words can easily lead to a great misunderstanding of a certain word or sentence that is written the same way, but means something completely different. Another attribute of English that makes it difficult to learn is the order in which words are placed in sentences. There are only certain rules for sentence composition, but beyond these rules English speakers have added new ones. There are many sentences that make perfect sense, but because of the order in which they are written or expressed they are said to be wrong.
This article has given me a new perspective in which I can now more clearly see the difficulties of adapting to a new language, especially one so difficult as English. People may spend many years attempting to learn a language but the transition from their native language is not always such an easy one because of the vast differences in languages.