So, today while watching Ranma 1/2, something interesting (unexpected) happened.
I picked up a new word ("kobu") - which isn't new or interesting in and of itself; I pick up words all the time. But, the thing is, today was not the first time I had heard that word... I heard it yesterday or the day before that, and today was the second time. But when I heard it the first time, it slipped right by me - I heard it, but I made nothing of it at the time; it was sound without meaning at that point, along with most of what I hear at this point in the experiment.
Today when I heard it, the context made the meaning clear - it would roughly translate as 'swelling' or 'bruise'. What struck me as interesting was that, had I not heard the word repeated today in a context that illustrated its meaning today, I would not have remembered hearing the word. Indeed, up to the point where I heard it, I had no particular recollection of hearing it. But now that I a) re-heard it and b) understand what it means, I both remember hearing it before and better understand what was being said that first time that I heard (but did not understand) the word.
I just thought this was kinda cool, because a lot of what I'm listening to nowadays is sound without meaning, and more often than not words rush by me without appearing to leave any trace of either meaning or recollection... it now seems that the last part isn't true; in addition to everything else that listening does for me (allow me to pick up new words, show me how those words are used in context, etc), it also allows me to build up some kind of store of Japanese sound inventory that I'm not even aware of and that comes back to me when it's needed. Of course, this is all pure theory, but until my experience (or that of another person's) proves otherwise, I think I might be right.
P.S. There's an article about language learning that I read recently that talks about something related to what I just said and seems to confirm my thoughts... I'm not going to post or discuss it now because it's late and I'm tired, but do expect to see it up within the next few days.
Sunday, February 1, 2009
Wednesday, January 28, 2009
28-01-09 Progress Report
Some updates on my progress:
Total number of hours spent under the Yellow Experiment thus far: 33.5
The above is a rough estimate.
BTW, I have a long list of animes/dramas I want to watch, but new recommendations are still always welcome. :)
- I've finished CCS... all of it.
- I've started DN Angel.
- I watched 2 episodes of a drama called Code Blue but stopped watching because I was bored (I really didn't understand much of what was going on).
- I watched the first episode of Ranmna 1/2.
- I will most likely continue with DN Angel and Ranma, and I might start MKR or even Tsubasa Chronicle. There's a drama I've had my eye on for a while now as well.
Total number of hours spent under the Yellow Experiment thus far: 33.5
The above is a rough estimate.
BTW, I have a long list of animes/dramas I want to watch, but new recommendations are still always welcome. :)
Tuesday, January 27, 2009
Babies/Children and Language
Since my experiment essentially revolves around language acquisition baby-style (haha, that sounds silly :) ), I feel that it might be relevant to talk about that precise topic. Interestingly enough, if you've ever heard anyone talking about babies and language (or even babies and learning/knowledge in general), you might've heard some pretty contradictory things.
On the one hand, many people seem to be under the (perhaps erroneous) impression that babies are 'stupid' - that they forget everything immediately, cannot learn, cannot think abstractly, etc. There are several flaws with this belief; I can't go into details on every one of them (as I'm not an expert in child psychology/neuroscience), but I can offer my opinion. The fact that babies do not seem to have a long-term memory (how many of us remembering being a one-year-old?) may be linked to the fact that they have not (yet) acquired language. Consider the following quote:
i.e., since our language defines our understanding and perception of the world around us, a lack of language makes it considerably harder to remember things precisely. So to say that babies lack intelligence would be both inaccurate and unfair; it's the equivalent of blaming a plant for not growing when it was never watered. Without the right 'tools', certain things can't happen. Ditto for language and memory.
The reason why all of this is worth mentioning is because there is one more thing that is often said about babies (in relation to language/learning), which is extremely contradictory to the first one. It is often said that babies have some kind of "language advantage" - only babies can learn languages properly. Adults (or teens) can't do it - we have bad hearing, our brains are fried, we're too white/black/yellow/rich/poor/American/Canadian/OCD/ADD/etc to ever get anything done right.
Something smells fishy here. One minute babies have 0 memory or reasoning skills, the next minute they're the ones with intelligence and it's us adults who are stupid? Well, which one is it? It can't be both. I think a logical approach to the question would be best:
At what age do children generally start speaking fluenty? 3, 4 years of age? If the average baby/toddler spends a total of ~12 hours a day sleeping, that leaves up to 12 hours a day that they are awake and receptive to the sounds of their mother tongue (for simplicity's sake, let us assume that said baby is being raised monolingual). Of course, in practice, I doubt very much that any baby actually hears their language being spoken every single second that they are awake; it would be nigh on impossible for any parent to talk that much without ever taking a break. But even if a baby spends anywhere from 4-8 hours a day listening to their language directly, that would mean that by their 4th birthday, they will have spent 5840 - 11 680 hours listening to their language.
4 hours x 365 = 1460 x 4 years = 5840
8 hours x 365 = 2920 x 4 years = 11 680
You'd be kidding yourself if you said that this is an insignificant amount of time, and yet, some people in the language-learning community will tell you that you can "learn" a language in 300 hours... I don't know who these people think they're kidding, but the morale of the story is, you can't. Especially when anyone who's ever studied a foreign language before will know that 300 hours is literally just scratching the surface; you can't put in that little effort and then, upon seeing your lack of results, vear off into pseudo-scientific theories about babies having magical superpowers.
Babies are neither the epitome of human intellectual capabilities nor the epitome of human stupidity; they're normal people (intellectually-wise) who happen to have acquiring their language for a very, very long time. And you were honestly thinking that half an hour of grammar excercises a day for a year or two would get you somewhere? Please.
For anyone interested in more on the topic: Cute Girls, Mathematics, & Language
On the one hand, many people seem to be under the (perhaps erroneous) impression that babies are 'stupid' - that they forget everything immediately, cannot learn, cannot think abstractly, etc. There are several flaws with this belief; I can't go into details on every one of them (as I'm not an expert in child psychology/neuroscience), but I can offer my opinion. The fact that babies do not seem to have a long-term memory (how many of us remembering being a one-year-old?) may be linked to the fact that they have not (yet) acquired language. Consider the following quote:
...language and memory... seem to be linked in important ways. Several studies (e.g., Rose, Feldman, Wallace, & Cohen, 1991) have demonstrated that memory is related to verbal ability... preliminary results provide support for the idea that the emergence of language is linked to the development of memory.
i.e., since our language defines our understanding and perception of the world around us, a lack of language makes it considerably harder to remember things precisely. So to say that babies lack intelligence would be both inaccurate and unfair; it's the equivalent of blaming a plant for not growing when it was never watered. Without the right 'tools', certain things can't happen. Ditto for language and memory.
The reason why all of this is worth mentioning is because there is one more thing that is often said about babies (in relation to language/learning), which is extremely contradictory to the first one. It is often said that babies have some kind of "language advantage" - only babies can learn languages properly. Adults (or teens) can't do it - we have bad hearing, our brains are fried, we're too white/black/yellow/rich/poor/American/Canadian/OCD/ADD/etc to ever get anything done right.
Something smells fishy here. One minute babies have 0 memory or reasoning skills, the next minute they're the ones with intelligence and it's us adults who are stupid? Well, which one is it? It can't be both. I think a logical approach to the question would be best:
At what age do children generally start speaking fluenty? 3, 4 years of age? If the average baby/toddler spends a total of ~12 hours a day sleeping, that leaves up to 12 hours a day that they are awake and receptive to the sounds of their mother tongue (for simplicity's sake, let us assume that said baby is being raised monolingual). Of course, in practice, I doubt very much that any baby actually hears their language being spoken every single second that they are awake; it would be nigh on impossible for any parent to talk that much without ever taking a break. But even if a baby spends anywhere from 4-8 hours a day listening to their language directly, that would mean that by their 4th birthday, they will have spent 5840 - 11 680 hours listening to their language.
4 hours x 365 = 1460 x 4 years = 5840
8 hours x 365 = 2920 x 4 years = 11 680
You'd be kidding yourself if you said that this is an insignificant amount of time, and yet, some people in the language-learning community will tell you that you can "learn" a language in 300 hours... I don't know who these people think they're kidding, but the morale of the story is, you can't. Especially when anyone who's ever studied a foreign language before will know that 300 hours is literally just scratching the surface; you can't put in that little effort and then, upon seeing your lack of results, vear off into pseudo-scientific theories about babies having magical superpowers.
Babies are neither the epitome of human intellectual capabilities nor the epitome of human stupidity; they're normal people (intellectually-wise) who happen to have acquiring their language for a very, very long time. And you were honestly thinking that half an hour of grammar excercises a day for a year or two would get you somewhere? Please.
For anyone interested in more on the topic: Cute Girls, Mathematics, & Language
Saturday, January 17, 2009
17-01-09 Progress Report
Just wanted to mention that I am now officially half-way through the anime series 'Card Captor Sakura.' I have another 35 episodes + 1 movie left, so I'll probably be done in just over a week or so.
Total number of hours spent under the Yellow Experiment thus far: 16.4
After I'm done with CCS, I'll probably watch either DN Angel or Magic Knight Rayearth... I might even watch both at the same time, just for the sake of variation.
Total number of hours spent under the Yellow Experiment thus far: 16.4
After I'm done with CCS, I'll probably watch either DN Angel or Magic Knight Rayearth... I might even watch both at the same time, just for the sake of variation.
Tuesday, January 13, 2009
Sentaku & Mama - Context Defining Meaning
One of the useful things about having a compulsive habit of browsing random Wikipedia articles is that it need not be done in English :) Recently while browsing the site in French I came across an article called Acquisition du langage (Language acquisition) that had the following to say:
In translation:
This struck me as interesting because it resonated with something that I've experienced thus far, early on in my "Yellow Experiment." Nowadays, I'm watching an anime series called Card Captor Sakura... it's quite childish, but it's cute, and it gives me the advantage of working in a context I'm already familiar with. In one of the episodes early on, after two of the characters (Sakura and Kero) do a bunch of chores and Kero puts up some laundry to dry, a Clow Card (fantasy beast thing... long story) messes up the house, including the laundry. Upon noticing this, Kero cries out "wai no sentaku~!" ("my 'sentaku'!").
Now, sentaku could have meant several things. Washing, laundry... even clothing; spoken Japanese is very vague. Then I heard the same word again several episodes later in a context where the characters were talking about chores, so I could safely rule out that sentaku means either laundry or washing, but probably not 'clothing' (it may mean BOTH washing and laundry - Japanese words tend to have vaguer, wider definitions than their English counterparts).
What's interesting about this whole sentaku thing, and how it relates to the 'mommy' thing from the French wikipedia article, is that it really goes to show how (multiple) context(s) are needed for an acquirer of a language to fully comprehend a concept (word). If you've ever thought about the definition of a word, or flipped through a dictionary, you might have noticed that many words have unusually specific definitions - how is it that every native speaker of a language, even a very widespread one like English, is able to have a very specific connotation/definition attached to each and every single word?
It seems, based on my 'sentaku' deal and from the French wiki article, that it is context (more than one) that teaches us narrow, specific definitions of words. In the case of the baby, their entire vocabulary consists of only a few words - they haven't been exposed to their first language enough (yet) to be able to have specific definitions/connotations for each word. So 'mama/mommy' covers a wide range of meanings because with the baby's barely existent grasp of language, expressing themselves more concisely is impossible. Likewise with me and sentaku... it took (is taking) me several context to narrow down the word. Until context has narrowed it down for me as much as it has for a native Japanese speaker, the connotation behind 'sentaku' is more vague in my mind than it is in the mind of a Japanese person.
I'm not sure where exactly I intended to go with this... I just thought it was a cool observation. Btw, if you know what sentaku means concretely, please do not leave a comment telling me. Honestly, I don't care. Context will teach me whatever's left to be taught of this word/concept.
[Le] premier mot a plus de signification pour l'enfant qu'il n'en a pour l'adulte, c'est pourquoi on le qualifie de mot-phrase car il ne renvoie pas seulement à un objet, mais à une action ou une situation.
Exemple : « Maman » peut signifier « elle arrive », « cet objet lui appartient » ou « c'est sa voix que j'entends ».
In translation:
[The] first word has more meaning for a child than it does for an adult, which is why it is qualified as a 'phrase-word,' as it does not only address an object but an action or a situation.
For example: 'Mommy' can mean 'she is coming,' 'this object belongs to her,' or 'I can hear her voice.'
This struck me as interesting because it resonated with something that I've experienced thus far, early on in my "Yellow Experiment." Nowadays, I'm watching an anime series called Card Captor Sakura... it's quite childish, but it's cute, and it gives me the advantage of working in a context I'm already familiar with. In one of the episodes early on, after two of the characters (Sakura and Kero) do a bunch of chores and Kero puts up some laundry to dry, a Clow Card (fantasy beast thing... long story) messes up the house, including the laundry. Upon noticing this, Kero cries out "wai no sentaku~!" ("my 'sentaku'!").
Now, sentaku could have meant several things. Washing, laundry... even clothing; spoken Japanese is very vague. Then I heard the same word again several episodes later in a context where the characters were talking about chores, so I could safely rule out that sentaku means either laundry or washing, but probably not 'clothing' (it may mean BOTH washing and laundry - Japanese words tend to have vaguer, wider definitions than their English counterparts).
What's interesting about this whole sentaku thing, and how it relates to the 'mommy' thing from the French wikipedia article, is that it really goes to show how (multiple) context(s) are needed for an acquirer of a language to fully comprehend a concept (word). If you've ever thought about the definition of a word, or flipped through a dictionary, you might have noticed that many words have unusually specific definitions - how is it that every native speaker of a language, even a very widespread one like English, is able to have a very specific connotation/definition attached to each and every single word?
It seems, based on my 'sentaku' deal and from the French wiki article, that it is context (more than one) that teaches us narrow, specific definitions of words. In the case of the baby, their entire vocabulary consists of only a few words - they haven't been exposed to their first language enough (yet) to be able to have specific definitions/connotations for each word. So 'mama/mommy' covers a wide range of meanings because with the baby's barely existent grasp of language, expressing themselves more concisely is impossible. Likewise with me and sentaku... it took (is taking) me several context to narrow down the word. Until context has narrowed it down for me as much as it has for a native Japanese speaker, the connotation behind 'sentaku' is more vague in my mind than it is in the mind of a Japanese person.
I'm not sure where exactly I intended to go with this... I just thought it was a cool observation. Btw, if you know what sentaku means concretely, please do not leave a comment telling me. Honestly, I don't care. Context will teach me whatever's left to be taught of this word/concept.
The Yellow Experiment - Intro & Rationale
Hey there! :)
Allow me to introduce myself: I'm Maya. I'm 17 years old (going on 18!), and I'm about the same as everyone else; I like watching movies, procrastinating, and eating ;)
I also enjoy learning about foreign languages and cultures. I come from what you can call a multi-lingual background; I was raised with English and Russian (although English has become my stronger language, as it's the language in which I've been educated). Throughout the years I have also learned French to fluency and learned enough Spanish to be able to understand it quite well. Last but not least, I have been fascinated by Japanese culture (Shinto, geisha, chopsticks, kanji, etc) since around the age of 10. I began "learning" the Japanese language at the age of 12, however, there have been two problems:
Firstly, my methods have not been very good ones. I've wasted too much time trying to analyze the language grammatically and sticking to romaji (Japanese words sounded out with English letters), while ignoring kanji (characters/ideographs imported to Japan from China - the backbone of the Japanese language). Not enough time was spent interacting with the real language via anime, doramas, J-pop, manga, etc.
Secondly, my learning has been extremely fragmented. I have made very long (several-year-long) pauses various times to study French, Spanish, and to flirt with various other languages (German, Hebrew). This means that even when I was studying the language (again, with innefficient methods), a lot of time was wasted reviewing things that I had already learned.
Recently, I decided to take up the language again, because anything worth starting is worth finishing, and because Japan still fascinates me just as much as it did way back when :) But what was I to do? I sucked (still do suck) at Japanese and a part of me knew that this was due to crappy learning methods, but it didn't occur to me how to fix the problem. Until AJATT came along and saved me.
AJATT is a website/blog written by a certain Khatzumoto - a young man who, at the age of 23, well past the age of alleged linguistic prime, learned Japanese to full fluency without ever taking any classes or learning any grammar. How did he do it? By exposing himself to the language for thousands of hours - movies, music, books, you name it. Immersion, in short - I knew this guy was at least partially right in his rationale because his method in learning Japanese was almost identical to how I learned French (yet somehow it never occured to me to do what I did in French with Japanese? maybe I'm just slow :) ).
Whence, the Yellow Experiment. This experiment is based on my experiences in learning French combined with advice and reasoning from AJATT. The details are described below:
What, you might ask, is the point of all of this? To "figure out" the Japanese language the natural way - the same way that babies do it. With this experiment I am hoping to prove that teens/adults are capable of "figuring out" language just like children - that children do not have any special, magical abilities that are lost as they grow older. My goal is to eventually be able to speak Japanese so well that it is 100% indistinguishable from the Japanese of a native speaker who has lived in Japan their entire life.
Currently, I understand about a third of spoken Japanese - so I am not starting entirely from scratch. But no one can deny that I still have a long way to go... long enough to learn and observe many things about the process of language acquisition. This blog will keep track of my thoughts, experiences, and findings as I go along.
Wish me luck :)
Allow me to introduce myself: I'm Maya. I'm 17 years old (going on 18!), and I'm about the same as everyone else; I like watching movies, procrastinating, and eating ;)
I also enjoy learning about foreign languages and cultures. I come from what you can call a multi-lingual background; I was raised with English and Russian (although English has become my stronger language, as it's the language in which I've been educated). Throughout the years I have also learned French to fluency and learned enough Spanish to be able to understand it quite well. Last but not least, I have been fascinated by Japanese culture (Shinto, geisha, chopsticks, kanji, etc) since around the age of 10. I began "learning" the Japanese language at the age of 12, however, there have been two problems:
Firstly, my methods have not been very good ones. I've wasted too much time trying to analyze the language grammatically and sticking to romaji (Japanese words sounded out with English letters), while ignoring kanji (characters/ideographs imported to Japan from China - the backbone of the Japanese language). Not enough time was spent interacting with the real language via anime, doramas, J-pop, manga, etc.
Secondly, my learning has been extremely fragmented. I have made very long (several-year-long) pauses various times to study French, Spanish, and to flirt with various other languages (German, Hebrew). This means that even when I was studying the language (again, with innefficient methods), a lot of time was wasted reviewing things that I had already learned.
Recently, I decided to take up the language again, because anything worth starting is worth finishing, and because Japan still fascinates me just as much as it did way back when :) But what was I to do? I sucked (still do suck) at Japanese and a part of me knew that this was due to crappy learning methods, but it didn't occur to me how to fix the problem. Until AJATT came along and saved me.
AJATT is a website/blog written by a certain Khatzumoto - a young man who, at the age of 23, well past the age of alleged linguistic prime, learned Japanese to full fluency without ever taking any classes or learning any grammar. How did he do it? By exposing himself to the language for thousands of hours - movies, music, books, you name it. Immersion, in short - I knew this guy was at least partially right in his rationale because his method in learning Japanese was almost identical to how I learned French (yet somehow it never occured to me to do what I did in French with Japanese? maybe I'm just slow :) ).
Whence, the Yellow Experiment. This experiment is based on my experiences in learning French combined with advice and reasoning from AJATT. The details are described below:
- Everyday I am going to watch 2-5 hours of anime, dorama, random Japanese TV - anything that's in Japanese and has a context.
- I am not going to write anything down. Everything will be learned orally and kept in my head.
- I am not going to learn any grammar.
- I am only going to use a monolingual (Japanese-Japanese) dictionary, and even then only occasionally.
- I am not going to repeat or re-watch anything, unless I find a series that I love so much that I feel the need to re-watch it.
- No subtitles ;) that would be cheating.
What, you might ask, is the point of all of this? To "figure out" the Japanese language the natural way - the same way that babies do it. With this experiment I am hoping to prove that teens/adults are capable of "figuring out" language just like children - that children do not have any special, magical abilities that are lost as they grow older. My goal is to eventually be able to speak Japanese so well that it is 100% indistinguishable from the Japanese of a native speaker who has lived in Japan their entire life.
Currently, I understand about a third of spoken Japanese - so I am not starting entirely from scratch. But no one can deny that I still have a long way to go... long enough to learn and observe many things about the process of language acquisition. This blog will keep track of my thoughts, experiences, and findings as I go along.
Wish me luck :)
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