Dear Organlearners,
Diego Betancourt sent me a copy of his reply LO19376 to "The deemster
problem" as well as all the learnful replies which developed from it
under the thread "Language Barriers", namely LO19381 (Doc Holloway),
LO19387 (Miguel Maldonado), LO19389 (Winfried Deijmann), LO19390 (Eugene
Taurman) and LO19391 (Artur Silva). I wish to reply on all of them at
once.
Diego, you write
>I declare myself a Lurker, for not having the easiness of write
>my mail In English Language. English is not my mother tongue
>and I speak it seldom. Thus it is so difficult for me write my
>thougths in this language.
I have much empathy with this situation. Firstly, when I began to
partcipate on Internet 8 years ago, it was also still difficult for me. I
had a serious need for a teacher in English who would go with me through
my mail once before I send it, pointing out my errors WITHOUT changing my
style. A couple of years before 1990, when I began to write my papers in
English rather than my own mother tongue Afrikaans, I expressed this need
to our faculty, suggesting that we appoint someone for the whole faculty.
They laughed at me because I dared to mention my incompetency and do
something about it. Thus I had to find me a teacher and pay her from my
own pocket when she had time to help me out.
Secondly, there is also another problem we must think of, namely emergent
learning. My emergent learning involves a progession of emergences, first
experential knowledge, then tacit knowledge from it, afterwards formal
knowledge from the latter and finally sapient knowledge upon the formal
level. Languages begin to play their role when the formal level has to
emerge form the tacit level and the sapient level from the formal level.
My mother tongue plays the primordial role in this articulation. When I
use my mother tongue in these emergences, I only have to think about these
emergences and not about my mother tongue to. But when I use another
language to articulate the formal and sapient levels, I have to think of
both. It is very difficult to do both simultaneously like in my own mother
tongue.. So I first focus on letting the tacit thought emerge using, say
English, the result being very pidgen or creolic like. Then I go over the
whole process again, but now focussing on the English to get that
acceptable. Then I go over the whole process once more, making sure that
the imbettered English does articulate my original tacit thought.
Some of you might argue that my original tacit thoughts were merely
thoughts in my mother tongue Afrikaans. If I were not a scientist, I would
have agreed. But hard core science is one of my major faculties. One
learns to express one's tacit thoughts in various artificial languages
(symbolics of mathematics, physics and chemistry) without using any
language, even the morher tongue. One way to demonstrate this, is to force
oneself to translate any formula (say a mathematical one) in a natural
language (say the mother tongue) without using technical terms or making
an interlinear translation.
For example, for Y=2xX+3 the phrase "the dependant variable is equal to
two multiplied by the independant variable plus three" will not do. But
the phrase "a simple object (named 3) develops into a complex object
(named Y) by connecting in a simple manner (named +) to another complex
object (named X) which first had to be changed in a simple manner (named
x) by using another simple object (named 2)" will do. Note that this
"natural phrase" is much longer than the former "interlinear, technical
phrase" which itself is much longer than "artificial, symbolical phrase"
Y=2xX+3. It is because of the economics involved that we use formulae such
as Y=2xX+3. (This formula uses 7 characters while the "natural phrase"
uses 166 characters.)
As to how we can partcipate in this forum (LOlist) with different
language, I do not know. But one thing I do know from my sapient level
of knowledge, is:
It is the business of reality (nature and culture)
to produce more diversity by using its diversity.
Any activity intended to reverse this business
of reality causes an immense web of hurt.
I now ought to use dialogue to reply to LO19387, LO19389, LO19390 and
LO19391. This is the way in which Rick organises this forum. But as I have
written before, dialogue is one of five elementary sustainers of creating
and thus its emergents like learning (1st order) and believing (2nd
order).
But let us just for once try to make use of another sustainer, namely
"exemplar studying". I know that Rick does not allow private email TO
DEVELOP on this list and I fully ascribe to it in the LO sense. But the
following exemplar refers to private email (between Artur Silva and me)
which HAD DEVELOPED and now belongs to the past. I have Artur's permision
to make it public. Study it. It is, among other things, hillarious. Note,
by preventing judgement to enter the dialogue, how the picture gets richer
until all possible conflicts get resolved.
All lines beginning with (even numbered) >>>> (older) and >> (younger)
refer to Artur's messages and all lines begining with (uneven numbered)
>>> (older) and > (younger) refer to my replies to his messages.
***** EXEMPLAR BEGINS*****
>Dear Arthur
>
>Thank you very much for your kind reply. I will save
>it as one of my treasures. It shows beautifully how,
>what appears to be straightforward and positive in
>one paradigm (language), seems to be confusing
>and negative when translated into another paradigm
>(language).
>
>>No, no, no! Translation is really a DIFFICULT job.
>>I will use Capitals in the correction.
>>
>>At 08:07 21-10-1998 +0200, you wrote:
>>>Dear Artur,
>>>
>>>Using my bad Spanish and rusty Latin, when I try
>>>to make out the Potugese, it goes like this:
>
>-----------------------------------------------
>>>>Esta vai ser a minha maior mensagem de sempre;
>>>THIS Is my [major] BIGGER message [of lately] EVER.
>
>>>>mas acho que se justifica.
>>>but I [take which] THINK THAT is justified.
>
>>>>E', mais uma vez, um Fw
>>>[And more one] IT IS, ONCE more, one Fw
>
>>>> da lo-list; por acaso e' uma resposta a um post meu,
>>>[of the lo-list, through luck one reply to one post mine,]
>>>FROM THE LO-LIST. IT IS, BY THE WAY, A REPLY TO
>>>ONE POST FROM ME;
>
>>>>mas isso e' pouco importante:
>>>but THAT [(is] HAS little importanCE[t]:
>
>>>>o meu mail foi so' um
>>>]my mail [was so one] HAS BEEN MAINLY A
>
>>>>"pretexto" para a analise do "PODFYS" e uma
>>>[pretence] PRETEXT for a analysis of PODFYS and one
>
>>>>experiencia vivida (e que eu considero notavel)
>>>experience vivid (and which I consider [noted] REMARKABLE)
>
>>>>para o ultrapassar. Admito que parte disto seja
>>>to [it succeed] BYPASS IT. I admit that part OF this is
>
>>>>dificil para Vs de ler, porque
>>>difficult for [us] YOU to read, because
>
>>>>nao conhecem o pensamento
>>>[no comprehend it thoughts] TOU DON'T KNOW THE IDEIAS of THE
author,
>
>>>>do autor, e poderao achar "presumido"
>>>of THE author and [make to] MAY find presumptions
>
>>>>o que e' so' uma descricao "vivida".
>>>[and what and one] WHAT IS INDEED A VIVID description [vivid].
>
>>>>Mas ultrapassem isso e vao ate' ao fim.
>>>But overpass it and [the vain ties in] GO/READ UNTIL THE end.
>
>>>>Acho que se justifica.
>>>I find that is justified
>-----------------------------------------------
>
>>>It seems that what you have written, has the following meaning
>>>(which appears to be quite negative because of my inferior
>>>translation):
>>>
>>>I (At) indulged with a major reply to a comment by you (Artur)
>>>on the LO-list. I was fortunate to hook an analysis of the PODFYS
>>>to it. My reply is diffiult to read because my thoughts are
>>>incomprehensive and written presumptuously. But in the end this
>>>vanity is justified.
>>>
>>NO, no, no! It is almost the contrary ! From now on I will send you
>>a translation :-)
>>
>>PS : This is a remakable case of "the language barrier", isn't it?
>
>Yes, it is a remarkable case. Maybe we can send this
>correspondence to the LO-list to serve as an example. With your
>permission I will send it to Rick. Maybe he will find it fit for
>distributing, otherwise he will have pleasure in reading it.
>
>I still believe all barriers can be overcome, even if it entails
>hardship. Here is an example. See if it speaks to your heart.
>In [...] is the interlinear translation and in (...) is the
>grammatically and semantically correct translation
>(as far as my Englsih goes ;-) )
>
>Nogtans vind ek tussenlynige vertalings waardevol.
>[Yet find I interlinear translations useful.]
>(I still find interlinear translations useful.)
>
>Dit word as volg gemaak. In die bronskrif word
>[It is as follows made. In the source-text are]
>(It is done as follows.) (The words in the source text)
>
>die woorde effens verder van mekaar geskuif.
>[the words slightly further from each-other shifted]
>(are written slightly further apart.)
>
>Die naaste woord in die teikentaal word onder
>[The closest word in the target-language is under]
>(The closest word in the target language is written directly)
>
>elke woord in die brontaal geskryf. Omdat die
>[each word in the source-language written. Because the]
>(under each word in the source langauge.) (Because the)
>
>sinbou die betekenis van 'n woord help
>[sentence-construction the meaning of a word help]
>(construction of a sentence helps determining the meaning)
>
>bepaal, werk 'n outomatiese vertaling nie. Dus
>[determine, work an automatic translation not. Thus]
>(of a word, an automatic translation will not work.) (Thus the)
>
>moet die sender die tussenlynige vertaling maak eerder
>[must the sender the interlinear translation makes rather
>(sender rather than the receiver has to make the interlinear)
>as die ontvanger.
>[than the receiver.]
>(translation.)
>
>The implications for Team Learning is immense. The sender
>has to know more than one language. I am reminded of a
>saying, I think it is a German one, which says that a person
>who has learnt four languages has become four people. In
>other words, when the dialogue concerns a paradigm, the
>sender has to know more than paradigm in order for the
>message to become more meaningful to others.
>
>The big advantage of an interlinear translation (I prefer to call
>it an "elementary" translation), is that it helps the sender and
>receiver to observe the the differences and correspondences
>in the workings of different minds from different cultures.
>Sometimes it even helps us to understand how difficult it is
>to make a perfect translation and to discover minute
>differences with important consequences.
>
>Thank you very much for a delightful dialogue in English
>between you (Portugese speaking) and me (Afrikaans
>speaking). It reminds me of my visit to Brazil and Paraguy
>about ten years ago. The environmental shock was
>beginning to have an effect on me, including all the
>Portugese and Spanish with which I was bombarded.
>Then I met a Chinese speaking tourist in a small town
>in Paraguay with whom it was exactly the same. We
>discovered that we had both one language in common --
>German. The next five hours we had a marvelous
>dialogue in German, even though a genuine German
>would have frowned upon the "german" which we used!
>
>Best wishes
>--
>At
>
***** EXEMPLAR ENDS*****
Enjoy it
Best wishes
--At de Lange <amdelange@gold.up.ac.za> Snailmail: A M de Lange Gold Fields Computer Centre Faculty of Science - University of Pretoria Pretoria 0001 - Rep of South Africa
Learning-org -- Hosted by Rick Karash <rkarash@karash.com> Public Dialog on Learning Organizations -- <http://www.learning-org.com>