Questions We Can Help You To Answer

Michelle Kluss 
Words are a simple enough concept, yes? Language communicates emotions and thoughts into simple devices called words. There are many languages and anybody who learns languages ends up in the phase of not knowing all of words. After all, few people know of all of the words contained in a dictionary, a book of words. Those rare people, a miniscule fraction of society, have long surpassed the aforementioned phase, in that particular language. Everybody else though, would fall under the phase better described as the phase of ignorance. In regards to language, this is the tale of my phase of ignorance. Many people use other’s phase of ignorance for their personal gain and one sided pleasure. Language is a powerful tool. It is not the fact that people do not realize that, it is that they do. The fact that this can occur so prevalently is a detriment that exists in society. Concepts exist where language allows one person to have an upper hand over somebody else, I’ve seen it happen before so this is beyond mere, abstract concepts, and in the end this phase of ignorance is inevitable but something can only be stopped by knowing the true nature of it.
            First and foremost, I’ve heard of concepts where two parties leave the same conversation, but one person craftily uses their words to mislead the opposing party. This act in itself is wrong, lying or not. My tale starts in a philosophy class, one sunny day at the University of California Irvine (UCI). The professor strolls into the massive lecture hall ten minutes late, proposing two scenarios to us. One of which dealt with a concept called paltering. This concept tells only part of the truth to a person, making the opposing party assume something that is untrue, then believe it. Then, he pointed to a stick figure on the dusty chalkboard and said for us to imagine that we were walking by this masterpiece second only to that of Leonardo da Vinci. The class laughs, as he explains further. He says to pretend that we winked, told him the drawing was extraordinary, and that he replied with, “I know.” After such, he explains how this makes us assume that he drew it. However, the professor before him did. Note the fact that one party knows a fact that the other party does not, in this case misleading them. The second concept he mentioned was conventional arguments, an example of such being a promise. This is because people needed a convention to bind people to their words and what they say. A promise, is but a word. Then he gives the example that we should pretend we were a little boy and he was a little girl. He says that we say we’ll make a promise with him, he replies that he “fromises” and does not follow through with the promise. Explaining further, he says that we assume he says “fromise” because he can’t pronounce the word. When asked why they did not follow through, he simply replies that a “fromise” means that he does not have to follow through with a promise. In this case, the professor was one step ahead. Conventional arguments exist if all parties know of the convention. The professor noted that if he went to Mexico, making promises with non-English speakers, even if they agreed, they should not be held to the promise. One day, I would understand this to be true from experience.
            Additionally, I have had the chance to see the difficulties of language from an outside party’s view. When I attended UCI, I fenced foil. Allen and Vladislav both fall under my endless phase of ignorance, both were in the fencing club. Allen and I went to a tournament where fencers were trying to earn their “A” rank in fencing. I was volunteering and Allen was competing. Allen is Chinese and somebody pronounced his last name wrong. He complained to me, as the translation translated of how they pronounced it meant spit. The referee never even realized though. Again, one party realizes something that the other party does not. Vladislav is Russian. He walks over to me and says, “You are fat, dumb, idiot.” I stand there emotionless saying, “Thank you?” He then asks why people always gave him weird looks when he tells them that. A Russian boy beside me translates what he had said, repeating it in his language verbatim. He then asks Vladislav why he would call people that. Apparently, Vladislav had asked a bilingual American with Russian heritage how to get girls to like you. The bilingual American had told him the exact opposite meanings as a prank. Exemplified once more is a person saying one thing, but the opposing party does not understand.
            Furthermore, to stop problems like a phase of ignorance, one needs to find the root. The pieces are here, one only needs to put them together to see the big picture. People use language to gain advantages over others because, as mentioned earlier, the phase of ignorance is rampant and only spreads with the population count. This means, to certain people, that everybody can be their target. For example, paltering and deceiving people gives them thoughts that untrue. Everybody should have the right to the truth though. Ultimately, there is also a case of people innocently and accidentally hurting others with their language. In Allen’s case, somebody accidentally offended him by simply mispronouncing his last name. The perpetrator’s actions fell under the concept of the phase of ignorance. The man did not speak Chinese and the act was not deliberate, yet it still resulted in hurt, a hurt that the perpetrator is entirely unaware of.
            In closing, it is fair to say that most people are and will remain in a phase of ignorance. This is not a bad thing though. Regardless of the language, words are not simple, nor are the various ways people use them. However, since a phase of ignorance is prominent, we should help one another with the trek. Together we can surpass the detriments of this phase. Until then, ignorance will remain to be blissful. That is, until that ignorance turns into knowledge.



Alejandra Henao
Language is a Global Power
I think this has been one of the central topics in my entire life. Language for me is the way to communicate through words, body language or even through art: the beautiful expressions of heart, mind, and soul[u1] . It has helped me to define myself and accept who I am.
During my childhood I found very hard to express who I was, the things that I wanted, because my social environment. Eventually, situations at school caused me even more difficulties with this. Few years later, at the beginning of my adolescence, I found it easier to interact with others. I surrounded myself with people who appreciated me and supported me, since as a teenager this was very important. It was so positive that even my way of speak changed in a great measure, thus I was able to know little by little the potential that I have in communicating with others. I joined groups where I was assigned with leaderships roles, and off course this forced me to develop my public speaking skills a little bit more. Having an artistic oriented family, influenced me in finding ways of expressing myself, such as writing and drawing in my everyday journal. Nevertheless, I had a dramatic life change event. My family and I moved to this country. I was tremendously afraid of meeting new people, new culture and learning a new language! – I thought, if for me it was so hard to express myself in my own, how much more it would be to express in a completely different one. I was fearful the people would mocked me up, because speaking with accent, indeed some people did it and belittled me because of this. Jamila Lyiscott “tri-tongued orator;” in her powerful spoken-word essay “Broken English,” celebrates the three “distinct flavors” of speaking in English with her friends, family and school. She mentioned that many people might think that is ignorant to speak broken English, but she asked the questions and responded with her views: “who can articulate well this language? When even the very articulate Americans sound foolish to the British”. She also added: “You cannot expect me to speak your history wholly, when mine is broken”. She is not promoting ignorance, but on the contrary, in her words: “This is a linguistic celebration”. Therefore, my reflections is: How much is worth a person that speaks more than one language? Is the person who can communicate with two completely different groups of people, ignorant? Off course not, has a great value. Jamila with her strength and courage have inspired me. Even more, I wish I could see the things in that same way when I needed it the most back when I was a teenager, when I had many goals, many dreams; but my inconformity and lack of self-assurance, made many of this opportunities faded away.
When I decided to reach a longing of my heart, I went to school for an artistic career, feeling that through the art, it was my only way to express myself, after all, this was something that I was doing since I was little, and I really loved it. But something was continuing missing. In order for me to advance and provide a more positive impact to my family and society, I would need to improve the language from the country that opened the arms to adopt me. Since, as I am getting more mature, I have been able to understand how many blessings I have by living here, in a place with so many opportunities and diversity of cultures, and most of all, having a great treasure inside of being bilingual.  
Consequently, planning in my future goals, and writing in my journal the steps that I needed to grow intellectually, I decided to come back to school and I got into a new field of study. With my artistic background, more specifically in Graphic Design, I have been able to see the opportunities in the worldwide market, and in this approach, I wish to merge what I know, with what I can learn, taking into account the global power. Biologist Mark Pagel said, “We are in a world, that is demanding more than ever collaboration and exchange”, therefore it is important to confront the language is transforming humanity. The more languages you learn, the more things you can exchange in different areas, hence one of the enrichment of the human being is be able to go outside the box and learn about what the world has to offer. It is important to understand that when we are capable to connect with others, the world opens up to more social-economic opportunities.
After all the experiences, I came to the conclusion: we placed our own limitations. When I accepted the language was a powerful tool and a fundamental part of the expression of the being, I recognized how fortunate I am to have two mothers; the one who saw me born and the one that have seen me grow as a woman and as a professional. Definitely, it is better to understand late than never.