Dear
Reader,
This
is a post about the Sapir-Worf hypothesis and its relation to
learning kanji.
I
went to see the movie, "Arrival" recently. It got me
thinking about how one's perspective of the world is changed by
language learning. One of the major themes in the movie concerns the
strong form of the Sapir-Wof hypothesis; linguistic determinism - our
thoughts are constrained by language.
This
strong form has largely been disproven, yet researching this topic
lead to some interesting topics of discourse. For example; not all
languages are egocentric. When expressing direction, Aboriginal
languages use external landmarks to express direction. So, instead of
saying, "My left ear hurts", they say, "My ear to the
northeast hurts".
The
weak form of the hypothesis relates to linguistic relativity. Our
perception of the world is influenced by the languages we speak.
Having listened to a few talks by Steve Pinker, I can't argue with
the fact that babies are thinking about the world, yet lack the
linguistic ability to express their thoughts. So in a nutshell; you
could say there is a non-vocalized internal neurological code called
"mentalese" which we externalize through a mechanism called
language.
So,
taking the strong form of the hypothesis; in the movie (spoiler
warning!) our hero learns an alien language in which time is
thought of as non-linear. As a result, she can see into the future. I
love the way the written language is circular - in a language where
time is not thought of as linear; why would a language go from left
to right, top to bottom?
 |
| The Heptapods Writing System - "Life" Created by Martine Bertrand |
Okay,
so what has this got to do with learning kanji? It's been about
a year and a half since I got serious about learning kanji. On this
journey to literacy, I've been noticing how this jigsaw puzzle of
literacy seems to take shape; and just perhaps my perception of the
language ... of the world ... is gradually shifting into new
perspectives.
It's not so much that I'm thinking in Japanese; after all, I'm still a westerner with my perception of the world seen through western eyes in a fishtank of western culture. Yet, living in Japan, learning Japanese; perhaps the lens that gives me the clearest insight into the Japanese mindset seems to be the kanji.
The Japan around me slowly begins to make more sense. It's a bit like when you buy a new car; suddenly you start seeing other people driving the same car as you. Same thing with kanji ... walking around these neon lit streets of kanji, suddenly, the characters you can read emerge from the intangible squiggles of yesterday.
As
the friend who told me at the start of this journey, "Learning
kanji unlocks the language". Certainly, these internal linguistic
algorithms are yet to be optimized to fluency. And perhaps fluency is really all about how quickly the mentalese gets
translated?
So
many words I've acquired seem to have been deposited into the passive
memory space inside my head. Words like "election" (選挙 -
senkyo) for example, float somewhere between my ears, yet during
a conversation today I couldn't recall it instantly. That word has not been
deemed important enough to my daily conversation to earn its rightful place in active memory.
So I have to think about the kanji characters ... how is election thought of in kanji? ... and suddenly I'll think ... choose ... raise ... election ... and I'll be thinking in another perspective ... "choose how society will be raised" ... and I'll see the kanji for choosing ... 選 ... sen .. and I'll see the kanji for raise ... 挙 ... kyo ... oh yes ... put them together ... "選挙" - senkyo.
What
I'm doing in order to recall that word seems to be quieting the
English voice and thinking, "How do Japanese people perceive
this thing?" It's not that my brain is rewired to think in
Japanese, after all, native and non-native alike, we all think in
"mentalese" ... but the processing of passive vocabulary
has something of a detour through the less trampled path of a foreign
language. Over time, those paths get trampled more and more
until the neural connections have strengthened to the point where I
think election and instantly think - 選挙.
However,
what interests me is the fact that, by virtue of thinking in kanji,
I'm kind of re-enforcing a Japanese perspective of words. I guess
that's linguistic relativity - the way we think about things is
influenced by the way they're seen through the lens of another
language.
So
today, I filled out my postal voting form today and instead of
thinking of an election as something where we just tick a box for the
person we hope does the least amount of harm to society, I was
thinking that I would choose the person I believe might do the best
job in raising the standard of life in society.
Woah ... what just happened ... my perception
changed. Is it time for me to do that speech at the end of Rocky 4?
