Saturday, May 17, 2025
ESSAY - UNDERSTANDING LANGUAGE VS. COMPREHENDING LANGUAGE
BY DONOVAN BALDWIN
I had three years of Latin in high school, and was trained by the U.S. Army in German and Polish (most of which I have forgotten due to lack of use). I've encountered some lessons which went beyond the language.
A story...
One German instructor, Herr Trautman, told us a story,
When he came to America, he had learned a lot of English from books... mystery stories of the Mickey Spillane, tough guy detective type. Wanting to seem conversant in English, and the language of shooting, he entered a gun shop and asked to buy a "gat". The clerk looked at him in confusion, so he asked for a "roscoe", a "heater".
Eventually he got the message and just said, "gun".
He was surprised the clerk didn't call the police.
While a lot of the human condition and its interactions are the same from culture to culture, often encapsulated as language to language, there are both large and small differences which will never quite "translate" completely.
Even when we speak the "same language", can I truly understand the significance of Guy Fawkes day, or be as stirred by the skirl of bagpipes as a patriotic Scot is... people of my ancestral heritage?
How much harder is it to understand, "get into" the mind, and heart, of someone from India, Russia,
A story...
One German instructor, Herr Trautman, told us a story,
When he came to America, he had learned a lot of English from books... mystery stories of the Mickey Spillane, tough guy detective type. Wanting to seem conversant in English, and the language of shooting, he entered a gun shop and asked to buy a "gat". The clerk looked at him in confusion, so he asked for a "roscoe", a "heater".
Eventually he got the message and just said, "gun".
He was surprised the clerk didn't call the police.
While a lot of the human condition and its interactions are the same from culture to culture, often encapsulated as language to language, there are both large and small differences which will never quite "translate" completely.
Even when we speak the "same language", can I truly understand the significance of Guy Fawkes day, or be as stirred by the skirl of bagpipes as a patriotic Scot is... people of my ancestral heritage?
How much harder is it to understand, "get into" the mind, and heart, of someone from India, Russia,
Afghanistan, or Iraq?
It's something that can only be done with effort, practice, and a will to understand more than just words... because word to word translations don't always convey thought to thought.
It's something that can only be done with effort, practice, and a will to understand more than just words... because word to word translations don't always convey thought to thought.
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Labels: comprehension, donovan baldwin, essay, language, understanding
# posted by Donovan Baldwin @ 9:52 AM 
