مرحبًا
*Before embarking on this post, I want to state a full apology to anyone fluent in (Arabic, Russian, Irish, or Turkish). I am well aware that writing is barely intelligible. I am trying though : )
Language learning is a popular hobby for obvious reasons, travel, work, communicating with loved ones, and for the sake of the hobby itself. I want to talk about another piece that can be a benefit of learning a new language, especially a language that is very different in structure than the one you currently speak. This is the mental gymnastics of language learning.
Some foreign languages from a native English perspective will require more mental gymnastics than others.
For background, let’s review some key features of English often not pondered by your average native speaker. English is usually a strictly Subject Verb Object (SVO) word order language. In other words, we say in English: Tim hit the ball (SVO).
We don’t say:
“Tim the ball hit.” (SOV: See Turkish)
“Hit Tim the ball.” (VSO: See Arabic and Irish)
or “Tim-sub hit ball-obj.” (Well, get to this… see Russian)
English is also a primarily analytical language with very little conjugation. English speakers often overstress this aspect of difference as a difficulty in learning new languages. English, unlike true analytical languages like Mandarin, still performs some conjugation for factors such as time and still uses plural forms instead of counting words.
See: Tim runs vs Tim ran. / This is Tim’s book vs These are Tim’s and Jill’s books.
When we practice this mental stretching, we are learning new ways to shape the world, both external and internal, into concepts, the necessary behind-the-scenes step of using a language. We start to realize that ideas can be squeezed and shaped in ways we never really felt possible. I use the verb felt here to indicate the unconscious effects of this stretching. There are many examples of research regarding the modern interpretations of the Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linguistic_relativity), but that research can be done on your own time with a quick Google search. I’d rather geek out about some languages that I enjoy learning because of the unique mental gymnastics they require. I will also be providing an English re-interpreation of what I was trying to write in the paragraph above the text.
1. Arabic:
Often VSO word order (aka: Hit Tim the ball), non indo-european language family, Arabic uses an impure Abjad script vs an alphabetical script. This means that vowels can sometimes be of a more optional nature (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abjad) Arabic plurals can also be quite the trip to an english speaker imo.
انا اتقعيد ان متى نوريد لليصبح الى الاشاخس افضل نحن يجب جربنا للتعلم الغة جديدة. اتقعيد هذا بسبب افكر ان عندما نحن جربنا للتعلم اللغه جديده نحن ساعدنا عقلنا يصبح افضل مع القوي للفكر. لا فقط لا الذي سيساعدنا مع للتعلم عن ثقافة أخرى من نفسنا لكن ايضا بناء عقلنا. اتقعيد ان الذي صحي جدا وأنه سيكون ساعدنا الفكر عن الكثيراً من شيئين بطورق جديد.
When we want to improve ourselves, we should try to learn a new language. I believe this because when we try to learn a new language, we help ourselves become better and stronger thinkers and conceptualizers. Not only will learning a new language help us learn about a culture different from our own it also helps us build up our minds and conceptual processes. This is healthy and will work to assist us in thinking about many things from new perspectives.
2. Russian:
There is a reason that Russian is an Indo-european language that has the same level of complexity from english as Chinese. You spend a little time around Spanish, French, even Arabic you get used to the importance and tricky-ness of new verb forms. But Russian verbs are simpler than their nouns. Russian grammar is unique although Russian is normally an SVO word order language like most European languages the 5 cases for nouns allow you to arrange a sentence however you want, provided the cases Dative, Genitive, Nominative, etcetera are in place, And yes before you ask! It is required in Russian. Hence why I am pretty sure my attempt at Russian below is terrible.
Мы нет можем быть очень хороший. Зато я знаю что много люди в станей другой они ценят наши попытки. Я тоже думаю это помогает нам будет лучшие мыслитовый. Я думаю что силь из изучать новый язык что он дал нам новый взгляд на вещи. Я думаю что эта очень важная и эта помогает нам будет лучшие люди.
I know my notes here in these languages can’t be good. But I know that a lot of people that I have met in other countries appreciate an effort at trying to learn their language. I also think that learning like this helps us improve pur thought processes. I think the power of learning new languages is that they give us new ways of seeing the world. I think that this is very important and it helps us to be more well rounded people.
3. Irish:
Underrated along with its fellow Celtic language counterparts (Breton, Scottish, Welsh) for its uniqueness in the Indo-European family. Unlike Russian the gymnastics with Irish is that it obeys a strict (VSO) like arabic word order, Also who could that Saoi is pronounced Seeh or Naomh like Nave it takes some getting used to as an english speaker. Also the concept of softenting and hardening verbs in specific circumstance can throw you as well when does club become gclub or fhoghlaim to D’fhoghlaim.
Smaoiním fhoghlaim le teanga sin difrúil an iad siúd a bhuille aithne agat orthu tá mhaithe. Cuidíonn sé seo leat smaoineamh na bealaí nua. Tá mé a fhios sin sinn nílimid ag iarraidh teip agam. Ach smaoiním mé ba chór dúinn bród as iarracht a dhéanamh againn. Agus tá mé fhios sin má theipeann orainn d’fhoghlaimíomar rud éigin fós agam.
I believe that learning languages that are very different from the ones we already know is the best way to learn if our goal is expanding our minds as a whole. I know learning a foreign language is is hard and nobody wants to fail, but I think we should have pride in trying regardless. I know even if we fail we will still have gained something.
4. Turkish:
Last but not least Turkish. Non Indo-European and if agglutanation (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agglutination), was Classical music Turkish would be Beethoven. Turkish obeys a (SOV, Tim the ball hit) verb order, with some of the flexibility of Russian. Turkish is also capable of wonderful strange seeming to the english speaker feats like:
Hill – Tepe
On the hill – Tepe + Da = Tepeda
From the Hill – Tepe + Dan = Tepedan
Hills – TepelarFrom the Hills – Tepelardan
Yeni şekillerde düşünmeyi öğrenmek hayatın her alanında faydalıdır. Bu, zihnimizi sağlıklı tutarak bize yardım olur. Korkunç yazdığım biliyorum, bu garip biliyorum. Ama bence düşük not hiç not alamamaktan iyidir. Kolay veya mükemmel değil ama bir başlangıç.
We will have learned to think in new ways, and being able to think in new ways is useful for many different things, it helps our minds stay healthy and flexible. I know this writing is terrible, I know its weird, but i think that a bad Turkish/Russian/Irish/Arabic score is better than no score at all. It’s not easy or perfect, but it is a start.