neurolinguistic concerns

i have been detecting some phonological flaws in my speech lately. and i am not sure why. i have been detecting slur and syntax condensation especially at the end of sentences. completely unintentional. i have also been detecting some auxiliary construction errors which is kinda irritating because my grammar is perfect.

the problem is speech and not written. motor functions are okay. the linguist in me has this gut feeling that it may be neurological. i am a little worried.

i love talking about nothing. it is the only thing i know anything about. – oscar wilde

W is one of those guys who simply revels in using what the more ignorant among us – of come on, i for one am proud to vouch for the utter bliss that smiles upon embracing ignorance – would call ’sophisticated’ language. ie, complex language. naturally, not many people talk to him because of this complication. and in that light, he does not like to talk to a lot of people either because well, people just cannot keep up. it is not that he uses bad language, or wrong language for that matter. it is just that he has a complicated way of talking the right way.

you see, he likes to talk about complicated ideas, which is quite fascinating to a linguist. complicated ideas equals complicated language – and that makes me as gleeful as a schoolgirl on cotton candy.

so while the academic side of me turns into a squealing linguist, the more refined side of me – and yes my good lads, if does exist – sits here, utterly amused. W likes to talk to me. i am one of those who can actually keep up with what he has to say, and he appreciates that. i guess so do i. you see, some people don’t mean to make things so complicated. it is just in their nature to see strange and unique dimensions like that.

see, some people don’t mean to use big words and complex sentence structures. it is just how they talk.

in the past four days, i have had to don my blazer, make sure every strand of hair is perfectly in place, load up on that hoity toity diva persona that i oh so relish in, and surround myself in an entire convention of people like W. i was a delegate in a major international conference in town. not that i was complaining. it was a tremendously exciting experience attended by some royally senior members of the industry.

and so there i was listening to hours long speeches with words such as ‘notwithstanding,’ ‘geopolitics,’ ‘commercial liberalisation,’ interdependency,’ ’stakeholder engagement,’ ‘working in silos,’ ‘resource mobilisation,’ ’sustainability insufficiency,’ – you get the idea la. it might appear like a load of stiff upper lip, hoity toity, but to me, it is incredibly sexy. oh, and more than one delegate had described the industry i am in as sexy. *wide grin*

thing is, the forums i attended were paneled by not just a bunch of energizer bunnies. there were some real intelligent thinkers and analysts, and we deliberated on a range of sustainability topics – finance, economics, law, geopolitics – ya, aku pun dah nak pakai big words in my sentences tau! – climate change, engagements, etc. current issues. histories. theories. dimensions, forecasts. operations. ideologies. big ideas and i do mean BIG IDEAS. and big ideas and big language just goes so so SO well together.

i will have my dose of mindless, perverted comedy now, please – before my head gets too full of itself.

language shapes the way we think, and determines what we can think about. – benjamin lee whorf

last night, i met someone who have decided to raise her seven months old baby completely monolingual. when i asked her if anyone was talking to the baby in the malay language, she replied that she wants the child to have a complete mastery of the english language and believes that introducing another language to the baby will affect the perfection of her english.

she cites examples of her friends’ children, who grow up multilingual but a ‘master of none.’ in her opinion, people who know more than one language only grasp a ’smattering’ of the languages and are unable to perfect any. and she’s not just talking about spoken language – she gives me that look – also written.

english is the most important language, she tells me, and that she will only allow the kid to be exposed to another language when she can speak and write well in english.

i began to her that a baby is actually able to handle more than one language – at which point she cuts me off saying that it will confuse the child and the child will not be able to concentrate in mastering english. look at her husband, she tells me. he has malay, english and a little bit of chinese, but struggles with each one – according to her. unlike her – according to her – where she corrects his english.

people nowadays – she looks straight at me – some can manage to speak english well, but their writing is out!

i’m a writer, i tell her.

hmph.

oh-kay. but i am also a scholar of linguistics – i told her – and plenty of scientific research all point to the super absorbtion abilities of a child’s brain, especially its language faculties.

*she gets up* and you are qualified to claim all of this hah? where did you learn all of this?!

i got a masters in linguistics.

and people did studies on this kind of subjects? on babies like this? *she points at her drooling baby*

yes.

*she walks over and picks up her baby* well, she is my daughter, not yours!

*she walks away*

i was dumbfounded. and even disheartened, believe it or not. languages and linguistics is something i am so passionate about and i have spent over ten years of my life studying its science. child language acquisition – children don’t learn language, see? they acquire language (how awesome is that!) – is something every first year general linguistics students learns. things like chomsky’s universal grammar has been the subject of debates in any elementary linguistics classroom.

the very idea of multilingualism is what gave birth to things such as language relativity and linguistic determinism – ideas that has allowed us to study about how the human brain works. and further from that – sociolinguistics, structuralism etc – ideas that shows us how language shapes cultural and societal perceptions. oh my dear god in heaven – this has been my love for the past decade! studying and researching how language penetrates the most mundane facades of our lives. how the miracle of multilingualism has created layers in our imagined society, influencing our worldviews, histories, ambitions and dreams.

sigh.

it disheartens me when people brush the science – and art, damn, i have not even started on the art of language yet ni – of linguistics aside. the idea that a child’s brain will be confused when more than one language is introduced has been dispelled over a hundred years ago. from my point of view, intentionally depriving a child from exposure to a second language equals abuse to me. my god, the brain of a baby is such a wonderful thing! oh for the brain of a baby – i would expose myself to ten languages if i had such a brain!

language is not just a means for expression, see. it is a means for perception. and this is what ultimately, ultimately fascinates me. to gain a language is to gain an insight and an understanding of a whole different way of viewing the world.

and yes, english is an important language. but english is not the most important language. every linguistics student gets this drilled into their cranium in their first year. all languages are equal. some are more sophisticated. but none are inferior. each language fulfills the expressive needs of their respective cultures and that makes it important enough.

i can honestly go on and on about this. i really can. which is why it peeves me when people disregard linguistics like that.

you’re right. she’s not my daughter. she’s yours. and with trained authority, i am so sorry for her.

you are free and that is why you are lost. ~ franz kafka

oh of all things – no seriously, we’re SO living in weird times right about now – of all things, it totally sucks to be me right about now. and you know the worst part about all of this? the speechlessness. the i-don’t-know-what-to-say-anymore crap about the circumstances i find myself in. i don’t like it. i don’t like being put in these kinda situations. i don’t like what these situations is turning me into.

a coupla years ago i did some research – and i do mean genuine, academic based, documented linguistics research – with regards to the intensity of situations whereby expletives – curse words – operate it. some of you may be familiar with the study as it did stir quite substantial interest back on campus back then. well, one of the findings of my research shows that when a situation gets impossibly – well – bad, as in there is no logical solution in sight at all, there is a dramatic drop in the use of these expletives. this actually concludes that all the bitching and swearing is really a positive indication that something is difficult but still logically possible. however, when things just get insanely impossible, there is nothing. no more complains. no more nitpicks. just silence.

that is where i am right about now.

and the silence is deafening.

this afternoon, i was unwittingly dragged into a conversation which drove down violently into my throat, the harsh reality of fake people. and as i am reluctantly inclined to accept as a fact of life, there are a damn lot of plastic people out there. well, i have always known of people who are not true to themselves, but corporate world has just redefined those boundaries by oceans.

you see, i’ve always thought that the media is the dog-eat-dog kinda world what with all the ruthless datelines and anal editors. but no man, not in the corporate universe. at least the media people are for real. well most of them la. at least in the niche specialised area that i am in. ini pulak in the corporate world, people are genuinely NOT INTERESTED in being friends and i personally have a problem with that. i mean, what kind of people come and spend eight hours (plus plus) in an enclosed space, day after day after day, with no intention at all in learning about the people around them and the stories that they have to tell?

the icing, my dears, if i may – then come the fakies. those who put on that ear-to-ear smiles and tell you that the whole world will drop to their knees at the snap of your fingers – the same bastards who would squeeze you silly just because they can. you know where i am coming at? all of a sudden, i find myself faced against a brick wall, whereby i don’t know how to navigate anymore. i am, by nature, a strategist and a linguist and by logic of both these instincts, i simply cannot accept just how flabbergasting this game is going. if you please, i just don’t know who to trust in that sense. anyone then is a possible plastic and i’m better off being one of those people who just cannot care less about that dark realm.

and i thought the media was the dark realm.

now you see where i am getting when i said that i really don’t like who i am turning into. i am trying very, very hard to focus on life outside of work, but the exhaustion of trying to stay afloat in those eight long hours gets to me and i tend to sleep a lot. OMG, i must’ve hit the ‘off’ button instead of ’snooze’ this morning and was almost late for work this morning. that is tip of the iceberg where my blur fever is concerned today.

now, how long have i been screaming about this already?

for once, i think i’m actually on the same chapter as rais.

Rais tells DBP to stop borrowing foreign words
source: the star

KUALA KLAWANG: Dewan Bahasa dan Pustaka (DBP) has been told not take the easy way out by borrowing words from foreign languages to be added into the Malay vocabulary.

Culture, Arts and Heritage Minister Datuk Seri Dr Rais Yatim said such a regressive attitude would not benefit the Malays, who have a rich heritage.

“What I don’t understand is why should we borrow words from other languages when we have our own. A fine example is the word iklan (advertisement). I have been made to understand that the DBP dictionary no longer uses the word iklan and has changed it to advertansi,” he said.

Dr Rais said there were many other examples and the DBP had to stop this.

He was responding to a comment by Grik MP Datuk Dr Wan Hashim Wan Teh who claimed that DBP had run out of ideas and failed to do proper research on Malay words.

Wan Hashim said DBP also used words such as bajet (budget) and konsultansi (consultation), although there were words in Malay that denoted the same meaning.

“DBP should borrow foreign words only after it has exhausted all options in looking for a suitable word in Malay,” said Dr Rais at the opening of a RM3.5mil public library by Mentri Besar Datuk Seri Mohamad Hasan.

the history of mankind is the instant between two strides taken by a traveler. ~ franz kafka

amidst all the mess of massacred trees this evening i experienced a strange sorta enlightenment. and i am quite proud to say that i take a lot of pride in the sculptural arts of language be it for artistic or expressive purposes. this evening however, i worked on this incredibly complex document which everyone else had chucked as hopelessly incomprehensible. from my point of view, it is a linguistic obstacle. i believe the others concur. lingos and jargons aren’t usually very high on people’s “what’s fun” list, let alone stylistics.

well you see, these are exactly the kind of things that make my toes tingle and excites my medula oblogata. it’s like a sweet romantic relationship to me. i approach the new genre carefully. gingerly. almost fearfully. i am delicate to get to know it. legal jargon. oh! some contractual terms. provisions of whereby. fascinating. circumstantial analysis. correspondence and consequences. give me more syllables, my darling!

and i extract its essence. in time and patience, it reveals it secret to me. it shows me its heart. and i discover its blueprint and how it works.

lovingly, i put the words back together. same same. but different. for language has revealed itself to me and i now reconstruct it to my advantage. its now under my control. and these words now work for me. you have no idea what a joy sentence construction is to me. especially very difficult ones. one with all the terms charged with all the whereby provisions.

no my dears, my language is not perfect. i don’t think anyone’s is. but i understand language. and if i am patient enough, language understands me too.

oh but strictly for that starved linguist in me, it was a happy evening. could you call this a superpower? to love the art of language with a passion. no, i have no such ambitions to save the world. just to write a story or a document or whatever… just to write something that will capture the awe in the most anal of critics and make them go, “wow!” in the hushest of tones.

yea man. just that. a heap of tired out policy papers and documents rest on my office desk from a spree this afternoon. sigh!

its a little rainy over here this merdeka eve morning

photo taken at jeram besu, pahang

for those in the know, the presentation yesterday was among the freakiest i have ever had to do on campus. i hardly ate anything for two days preparing for this presentation. didn’t feel like it. i was mostly too occupied freezing my poor fingers on campus, my faculty, the library, my lab – all the time being very careful not to ter-piss off anyone just in case they might be my presentation examiner. they don’t tell you who would be the examiners because of rasuah and all of that.

the presentation lasted four hours and by the end of it, i have been officially conferred my postgraduate status – with minor corrections. so there you are, a new structural sociolinguistic theory for the geek world to get all excited about. i should know. for i am truly and very proudly so, one of them.

casual small talk with a friend i bumped into in the afternoon yesterday left me with a most annoying contemplation about chocolates. see, i went over to the hypermarket – yep, this generation goes to hypermarkets, not supermarkets – to get some buah tangan for some friends i will be meeting up later in the day. i bought chocolate bars. minis. excellent, i thought. chocolates are universal. fool-proof. who does not like chocolate?

and then it had to be at right about that moment when he would skim right over, say hello, and rad about how terrible chocolates are and how some people prefer healthier options. healthier? healthier than chocolate minis? i do not understand. it appears however, that he was not the only strange being with a vendetta against chocolates. i have a colleague who was once in the F&B business who story-ed me of how he was part of the chocolate-making industry and that if i ever knew how chocolate – any chocolate in the world – is made, i’d be turned off chocolates too.

fine. i ain’t gonna put my chocolates back on the shelf. but i’d pick up a fruit basket to go along with it. a healthy option and – i insist – a healthy option. to birds. one stone. sambil menyelam minum air. that jazz.

i’m thinking road trip this weekend. happy birthday, malaysia.

no to the culture of hawking

or hawkering anyway. not at the wrong places la. and man, certainly so not to the wrong people.

oops! did someone ter-perasan ke? you know how the malaysian saying goes – siapa yang tergigit cili, dialah akan terasa pedas.

i happen to be unnaturally interested in the cynicism of malaysian sayings these days. as i have found in folk songs and rhymes, there is just so much more to the malaysian language and culture than very many people ever sit to think about. the malaysian language is sensuous and flirtatious and laced rather deliciously with cynicism and quite intelligent humour.

i know that so many people are looking at the english language as the more sophisticated language and i, being a linguist, would actually be the last person to blame them. but i have always believed for each language to be unique, especially in reflecting the culture of a people. and you know what? it really does not matter what anyone says about us malaysians. our language is friendly and casual and intelligent enough.

so no, i don’t believe in the culture of hawking a language. i believe in embracing the realities of a culture, and yea, if language happens to capture that part of our life, then so be it. i have contemplated too long and hard in the idea of language being a living, breathing entity of its own to know that it is something so honest, there really is nothing we can do about it but live our lives and let it be.

we have too many high sounding words, and too few actions that correspond with them. ~ abigail adams

any self respecting and more importantly educated linguist will know the difference between the local and regional variations of a language.

language, as i have discussed over and over again, reflects not only the identity of a community, but perhaps what is more importantly, its history and aspirations. in short, the past, present and future of a country is directly and intimately bonded to its language, for better or for worse.

so i am, as the malay (or is this also going to be considered ‘malaysian’ now?) saying goes, ‘on the fence’ as to the term switching move. again. on one hand, i am unnaturally hopeful that it is a term which prioritises an encompassing attitude on all malaysians and is a move for perhaps social equalisation under this umbrella. on the other hand, i have to admit that i am a tad sad for the loss of the more regional implications of having a nusantara language, conceptually at least.

this descriptive linguist will be observing with very much interest how this dilemma unfolds. how it will seep into our culture. how the media will test its boundaries. how just about every aspect of malaysian life will sub-consciously succumb to its effects. and i will be here – with my notebook, iced lemon tea (and then some).

advanced grammar

copula
- a word used to link the subject of a sentence with a predicate (a subject complement or an adverbial)
- it might not itself express an action or condition, it serves to equate (or associate) the subject with the predicate
- sometimes (though not always) a verb or a verb-like part of speech
- the main copular verb in the language: in the case of English, this is “to be”

adjunct
- a sentence element that establishes the circumstances in which the action or state expressed by the verb take place
- extranuclear: removing an adjunct leaves a grammatically well-formed sentence
- all adjuncts are adverbials
- can be a single word, a phrase, or a clause
- classifications: temporal, locative, modicative, causal, instrumental, agentive, conditional and concessive

dangling modifier
- a word or phrase that ought to modify one element of a sentence, but due to where it is placed, seems to modify another
- commonly an adverbial construction which, rather than modifying the subject of the sentence, seems to modify an unintentional target due to the position it occupies within the sentence

finite verb
- a verb that is inflected for person and for tense according to the rules and categories of the languages in which it occurs
- can form independent clauses, which can stand by their own as complete sentences
- in the english language, only verbs in certain moods are finite. they are the indicative mood (expressing a state of affairs), the imperative mood (giving a command), and the subjunctive mood (expressing something that might or might not be the state of affairs, depending on some other part of the sentence)

non-finite verb
- a verb form that is not limited by a subject
- a verb which is is not fully inflected by categories that are marked inflectionally in language, such as tense, aspect, mood, number, gender, and person
- a non-finite verb cannot generally serve as the main verb in an independent clause; rather, it heads a non-finite clause
- acts simultaneously as a verb and as another part of speech; it can take adverbs and certain kinds of verb arguments, producing a verbal phrase (i.e., non-finite clause)
- the english language has three kinds of non-finite verbs: participles (function as adjectives), gerunds (function as nouns) and infinitives (has noun-like, adjective-like, and adverb-like functions)

reference: wikipedia.com