tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2960170143854280520.post253076244416061975..comments2011-05-09T09:24:28.348-07:00Comments on carrying the fire: CheesyJibbajabbahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04050244879285398827noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2960170143854280520.post-21424422556903369532011-03-30T06:01:56.968-07:002011-03-30T06:01:56.968-07:00Aaron,
Thanks for your comment! I feel like you ...Aaron, <br /><br />Thanks for your comment! I feel like you finished a sentence that I started but could not complete.. <br /><br />"Each language is its own ecosystem"<br /><br />Of course! That's it! What a picture.. I become more and more convinced of this as I talk to more and more Japanese people. Just the other day I was talking to a young woman who was a Christian, as she explained to me the difficulties of expressing herself in her own language.<br /><br />For instance, an American might say "I love Jesus," and that would be fine and well understood. However, in Japanese this would translate into romantic love--an awkward proposition, at best. Western culture has built a large reservoir of words with which to express love to God, but Japan has no such structure. Ecosystems are everything...<br /><br />Really appreciate your comment.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08324353794002156172noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2960170143854280520.post-24576514436132297032011-03-26T09:08:07.320-07:002011-03-26T09:08:07.320-07:00so i actually clicked on the link at the bottom of...so i actually clicked on the link at the bottom of your post after typing that out and "saudade" is on the list! ha!aaron wkhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02252850096222037717noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2960170143854280520.post-13538372645517077182011-03-26T08:56:18.655-07:002011-03-26T08:56:18.655-07:00"The way we frame our language must tie in wi..."The way we frame our language must tie in with the way we express and see it." <br /><br />Exactly. For the same reason Inuits have more than a dozen words for 'snow'. I would also add: "...must tie in with the way we experience life through our language." I always tell my Spanish students that, yes, "voy" means "i go." But in the same breath, no it doesn't! It means "voy" and nothing else. It is equivalent to "I go," but it means "voy," only "voy." The words are different not just in spelling, but in the thousands of years they spent being used in different countries by people who never knew there was another way of saying "voy" in another language. Each language is its own ecosystem, and we borrow what we please from other languages just like the horse was brought to the new world by Spaniards, but that doesn't mean we are using them the same way. We are simply adopting them into our way of life, our expressions of life.<br /><br />A friend that I made in Spain who was Brazilian wrote me after she returned to Brazil and I to the USA, explaining that she felt "saudade," which she had to take the entire email to define - and even then, Spanish was our common language so I can't imagine that she gave me the entire picture. It means nostalgia, basically. You can find it in any dictionary, but it wasn't "nostalgia" or "longing" that she was meant entirely. If you look it up, it says "a feeling of longing, melancholy or nostalgia that is supposedly characteristic of the Portuguese or Brazilian temperament," which is kind of a way of the dictionary itself saying: "we're not quite sure what this word means, but *these* people are because they feel it." (Side note: "supposedly"?? Really, dictionary?? You're going to speculate on what the Brazilians feel deep inside instead of just defining the word for me? hahahaa.) It was something closer to love that she was trying to communicate, not just a missing, melancholic feeling, but one that made her feel warm and full at the same time - not sad.<br /><br />Obviously, as this comment is a testament to, I could talk about words til the "vacas" come home. Great entry.aaron wkhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02252850096222037717noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2960170143854280520.post-25900206142854362272011-03-24T21:20:21.199-07:002011-03-24T21:20:21.199-07:00Lekker would be one word. during my travels this ...Lekker would be one word. during my travels this past year I was trying to keep track of all the words that I came across which I wanted to make a world dictionary from. unfortunately I have a bad memory and did not write down all these words. but Lekker is one word I will not forget. it means cool...but not just cool. It is like the ultimate coolness... like bomb digity. and it is not just a fad word that comes in like tight or neato or cool beans or stuupid (? which I will never understand that). but it is Lekker...it is a word that will ALWAYS be in the Affrikaans language.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com