Introductory Post
Biography
What are your interests? What do you care about?
My interests range from literature, history and keeping up with current events to beach and indoor volleyball and jogging. I also am quite interested in social activism, specifically with feminist topics. I care about social justice in the world, understanding history and its impact on the modern world and
trying to be a well-rounded person.
What role does language have in your life?
I believe language has a deep impact on my life. I am a native Spanish speaker, and it being a Latin language, it is gendered, meaning nouns and adjectives both have a feminine and masculine form. Although this is a more unconscious impact, it definitely has shaped my perception of gender and which attributes are traditionally established for males and females. On a more superficial note, language also impacts my everyday life because depending on the person I am talking to, I make different choices of language. This impacts how I behave around a person and the relationship I have with them. For instance, when talking to a close relative, I address them with informal language which is a distinct sign that I share a warm, trust-built relationship with them. Lastly, and most obviously, language plays a vital communication role in my life. From simple things like having conversation with my friends to retrieving information from the media to reading a book, language can impact the perception I have of the world around me (e.g current events, the purpose an author was pursuing to fulfill in a novel, the mood of a person when addressing me, etc).
Why do you think it is important to study language?
I find that studying language is important because it is a vital communication tool in all aspects of our lives. Language is involved in everyday communication, media, advertising, literature, etc. The choice of language in all of those factors can shape how we interpret the content of what we are reading or listening to, and start to shape our ideas and perceptions. If we don't study language, it becomes very easy to choose the easy path and believe everything we are being told or not be open-minded about the content itself. By analyzing language, we can come to understand why a certain type of language was used and what reaction it was intended to stir up after reading it. Furthermore, it is important to study language because it is a useful tool to understanding culture and how a specific use of language can shape and affect it.
Have you ever felt excluded due to language barriers?
I have felt excluded by language barriers both directly and indirectly. Directly, I have faced that in school due to the prominent internationality of the community. I naturally can not understand the conversation of someone who isn't speaking in Spanish, English or French, and to a certain extent depending on the people who are speaking, I feel excluded. Indirectly, I have felt excluded because there are many articles, literary works and advertisements that I will never come to comprehend because they are in a language I don't understand. There are thousands of books, for instance, I will never read because they have not (and may never) been translated to a language I understand, which leads me to miss out on the literary content of the piece and the impact it could have on my life.
What are your interests? What do you care about?
My interests range from literature, history and keeping up with current events to beach and indoor volleyball and jogging. I also am quite interested in social activism, specifically with feminist topics. I care about social justice in the world, understanding history and its impact on the modern world and
trying to be a well-rounded person.
What role does language have in your life?
I believe language has a deep impact on my life. I am a native Spanish speaker, and it being a Latin language, it is gendered, meaning nouns and adjectives both have a feminine and masculine form. Although this is a more unconscious impact, it definitely has shaped my perception of gender and which attributes are traditionally established for males and females. On a more superficial note, language also impacts my everyday life because depending on the person I am talking to, I make different choices of language. This impacts how I behave around a person and the relationship I have with them. For instance, when talking to a close relative, I address them with informal language which is a distinct sign that I share a warm, trust-built relationship with them. Lastly, and most obviously, language plays a vital communication role in my life. From simple things like having conversation with my friends to retrieving information from the media to reading a book, language can impact the perception I have of the world around me (e.g current events, the purpose an author was pursuing to fulfill in a novel, the mood of a person when addressing me, etc).
Why do you think it is important to study language?
I find that studying language is important because it is a vital communication tool in all aspects of our lives. Language is involved in everyday communication, media, advertising, literature, etc. The choice of language in all of those factors can shape how we interpret the content of what we are reading or listening to, and start to shape our ideas and perceptions. If we don't study language, it becomes very easy to choose the easy path and believe everything we are being told or not be open-minded about the content itself. By analyzing language, we can come to understand why a certain type of language was used and what reaction it was intended to stir up after reading it. Furthermore, it is important to study language because it is a useful tool to understanding culture and how a specific use of language can shape and affect it.
Have you ever felt excluded due to language barriers?
I have felt excluded by language barriers both directly and indirectly. Directly, I have faced that in school due to the prominent internationality of the community. I naturally can not understand the conversation of someone who isn't speaking in Spanish, English or French, and to a certain extent depending on the people who are speaking, I feel excluded. Indirectly, I have felt excluded because there are many articles, literary works and advertisements that I will never come to comprehend because they are in a language I don't understand. There are thousands of books, for instance, I will never read because they have not (and may never) been translated to a language I understand, which leads me to miss out on the literary content of the piece and the impact it could have on my life.
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