For this task we are to watch Lera Borditsky’s SAR lecture from May 2017. The following 6 timestamps are what stick out to me from the lecture.

20:14 – “All nouns are of a particular grammatical gender.”

When I was taking French, this was the hardest concept for me to understand and, to be honest, I never really did. Making masculine and feminine words just makes no sense to me and knowing now that there are other countries with similar rules but different ‘gender’ classifications, I can see it being much more difficult to learn a new language that directly goes against what you know.

26:04 – “Language can construe and construct events.”

It is not difficult to imagine ways that language changed the context of a piece of text. Let’s take where a comma is for an example, it changes the way sentences are percieved. Let’s take Wicked for an example. The context of “No One Mourns The Wicked” and “No, One Mourns The Wicked” is completely different. The first is very negative and is attacking the wicked, whereas the comma after ‘no’ in the second sentence is a lot more like Glinda is sticking up for the wicked saying that people do mourn them, despite their wickedness. This one, very small, difference really changes how an audience perceives not only Elphaba, but Glinda and the Munchkins as well. If a comma in the above sentence makes such a big difference, think about other sentences.

40:37 – “Importance of what a thing is called.” “Often there are dire consequences to what you call someone or something.”

While this is a bit of a stretch, classrooms are now being called “Learning Pods” or “Instructional Spaces”. While these words all mean a room for learning, there is an attitude associated with LP and IS.  When someone says LP, it just makes me angry because it seems too casual to be a classroom space and it also makes it seem like learning doesn’t happen outside this ‘pod’. However, I am sure that there are negative connotations associated with the word “classroom” as well due to past experiences or even just the knowledge of the space.

41:53 – “The word ‘prune’ lives in a bad linguistic neighbourhood.”

While this is a strange thing to capitalize on, I think understanding how a word is percieved is very important. Just like above, ‘prune’ makes me think of my fingers after washing dishes, old ladies with a lot of wrinkles, and just gross things. However, ‘dried plumbs’ just doesn’t seem as gross or wrinkly. When you think of a plumb, they may be sour but they are plump and juicy and while plums are not like that when they are dried, the brain goes to the positive elements and therefore, are more likely to purchase, which did happen.

45:46 – Change what something is called due to its desired effect – Associated with country origins or names/words that sound like they are representative of a country.

This concept came to my attention because like how words were changed to not sound German or French, my uncle’s name changed when he was born due to its connotations. In my mom’s family, there are four kids. Kim, Kevin, Kelly, and Carl. Now you probably are wondering why his name isn’t Karl. The answer is quite simple, it sounded too German. My grandfather did not want his son to go through hardship and their family didn’t want to have hardship based on what a name like Karl could mean.

50:08 – How can translators translate among many languages and be accurate with what they are saying?

This question was asked from the audience and I liked that question because translation really has me questioning a lot. When someone translates for someone else, to what level can you trust it, especially when it’s an oral language and there is no real record of what is being said. Additionally, some translators wait until someone’s done talking to say what they mean in English. This can not be totally reliable, which makes you question the world’s need for translators, especially as mentioned in the United Nations.

So all in all, does language change the way we think? 100%

Let’s even look at language barriers when someone can’t think of a word or a word doesn’t make any sense to someone else. When I was in Montreal with my mom, we went to a restaurant and the waitress asked us how we were doing, I responded with “Fine, thank you”. The waitress responded with, “Wow, what a way to kill a conversation.” Poured our water then left. This showed that something so small in language can make someone else who doesn’t understand the language fully to misinterpret what we say. Is there anything we can do to help this? Probably not, but we can realize that these barriers and differences exist and to be patient and understanding.