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Linguistics Quotes

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Linguistics Quotes

“Language is Highway to A Culture (Diary of A Polyglot Neuroscientist, S.2392) Languages are not ornaments, languages are organs, channeling spirit from the heart. Language is highway to a culture, language requires a vessel, not translator. Soon earbuds will feature instant translation, which will render crosscultural conversation seamless, but at the same time, lifeless, hollow and cold. Until we develop the brain technology to communicate meaning telepathically without talking, no amount of translation can carry the warmth, nuances and sentiment of a lived language. As added perk, speaking more than one language delays age-related cognitive decline. Therefore no matter how you look at it, one broken second language is far more valuable than all the mass-produced subtitles.”

LanguageLinguisticsTranslationLanguage LearningPolyglotLanguage BarrierMultilingualismBilingualLanguage Studies
Book:Kral Fakir: When Calls The Kainat
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“This whole idea of a bilingual brain is still, from my opinion, coming from a monolingual perspective in the sense that most of the world is bi- or multilingual. Why are we exceptionalizing the, quote, “bilingual” brain instead of the quote, “monolingual” brain to begin with? Why aren’t we saying, “What are the unique cognitive traits of monolingual people who are the minority of the population?” Maybe a bilingual brain is just a brain and it’s the monolingual brain that’s actually this weird thing that we need to study. Of course, I don’t actually believe that, but I feel like some of the discourse exceptionalizing bilingualism, when we reverse it and really think about, well, if we describe monolingualism in that way, that would be really strange. Yet, “bilingual” describes more of the world’s population than “monolingual.” What exactly are we doing there?”

LanguageLinguisticsBilingualMonolingual
Author:Nelson Flores
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“Pilgrim of Language (Sonnet) How will you know if you can speak another language? If you can curse someone on impulse without memorizing, you got the language in your gut. If you can console someone in pain, the language nestles in your heart. No es necessario que hablar guapisimo, solamente necessario que hablar amable. All those pedestals of language levels, a, b, z, and what not, are elitist garbage. Chase after form, and you'll miss the soul - throw yourself into the soul, and neurons will regrow. Forget grammar, forget vocabulary, let the language seep into your bloodstream. In a world infested with medal-seeking mules, stand odd, stand ablaze, a drunken pilgrim.”

LinguisticsLanguage LearningPolyglotLanguage BarrierMultilingualismNeuroplasticityBilingualLanguage AcquisitionLanguage StudiesLanguage Proficiency
Book:Hazrat-e Humanity: The Uncultured Polyglot
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“Linguistics," Alice said in her one-word style... "interesting," Alice said, still looking at her book, "how many different ways there are of communicating." Nancy nodded..."For example, one can start a seemingly irrelevant topic," Alice said, fingering the pages of her book, "and still communicate a specific message from what one is discussing." Still silent, Nancy listened as Alice added, "The purpose of which is to keep the speaker safe.”

LinguisticsCommunicationsIllustrationsHigh Context
Book:Sisters in Crime
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“Falitz began running seminars for the group, but she never understood why Terrace was hiring people who did not know ASL for an ASL project. Wambach's criticism went further. She thought that Nim should have been raised in a deaf family from infancy. Giving him to the LaFarges was like putting a child in an Italian family to learn German.”

LinguisticsSign LanguageAslChimpanzeeNim
Book:Nim Chimpsky: The Chimp Who Would Be Human
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“Palmolive wrote the lyrics to ‘Newtown’ too. The song was originally called ‘Drugtown’, but I changed it to ‘Newtown’, thinking about all the new towns that are springing up around the edges of London, like Milton Keynes and Crawley. The young people growing up there are so bored, they take loads of drugs and drive around really fast or beat each other up at football matches, then they get up and commute to their dull jobs on Monday morning. Palmolive made up these great words like ‘televisina’ and ‘footballina’ as drug names, I think only a foreigner could do that.”

PunkLyricsLinguisticsSlitsLyrics In A SongPunksLinguistic Beauty
Book:Clothes, Clothes, Clothes. Music, Music, Music. Boys, Boys, Boys
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“As far as the language instinct is concerned, the correlation between genes and languages is a coincidence. People store genes in their gonads and pass them to their children through their genitals; they store grammars in their brains and pass them to their children through their mouths. Gonads and brains are attached to each other in bodies, so when bodies move, genes and grammars move together. That is the only reason that geneticists find any correlation between the two.”

GeneticsLinguisticsLanguage Acquisition
Book:The Language Instinct: How the Mind Creates Language
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“আন্ধার আর সুমসাম কুঠুরিতে একলা থাকলেই আমার খালি খালি নরক আর শয়তানের কথা মনে আহে। নরক যাওনের রাস্তাঘাটগুলা চিনা নাই, চিনাজানা থাকলে মাঝেমধ্যি আওন-যাওন যাইতো। পূজা-পাইলের দিনে তেহার-পরবে ঐহানে গিয়ে দুই একদিনের লাইগ্যা ঘুইর্যা আওন যাইতো। ... হয়তানের কথা হগল সময়ে মনে আহে, অর কথা ভাইব্যা-ভাইব্যা শরীল নিপাত করি, অথচো কোন কুলকিনারা পাই না। ক্যান জানি মনে হয়, হয়তানে আমার কাছে পিঠেই আছে। ...যারে দেহি তারেই জিগাই, ‘এখানে শ্রীযুক্ত বাবু শয়তান নামে কেউ থাকেন কি?”

LoveFunLinguisticsDhakalifeSubaltern
Book:Subimal Basak Sankalan
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“Words and terms are born out of a need to describe the world. But because the victors, who get to write the history, had little need to describe the fate of the conquered, the words did not exist soon enough to describe and ultimately prevent the wholesale destruction of black communities in America.”

LanguageRaceHistoryRacismLinguisticsAntiracismCritical Race Theory
Book:Buried in the Bitter Waters: The Hidden History of Racial Cleansing in America
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“• Should we reclaim an Indigenous language in a natural Indigenous setting, to replicate the original ambience of heritage, culture, laws, and lores? • Should we reclaim an Indigenous language in a modern building that has Indigenous characteristics such as Aboriginal colours and shapes? • Should we reclaim an Aboriginal language in a western governmental building—to give an empowering signal that the tribe has full support of contemporary mainstream society?”

LanguageAustraliaLinguisticsIndigenous RightsBuildingsArchitectsLanguage Revival
Book:Revivalistics : From the Genesis of Israeli to Language Reclamation in Australia and Beyond
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“Why do we say razzle-dazzle instead of dazzle-razzle? Why super-duper, helter-skelter, harum-scarum, hocus-pocus, willy-nilly, hully-gully, roly-poly, holy moly, herky-jerky, walkie-talkie, namby-pamby, mumbo-jumbo, loosey-goosey, wing-ding, wham-bam, hobnob, razza-matazz, and rub-a-dub-dub? I thought you'd never ask. Consonants differ in "obstruency"—the degree to which they impede the flow of air, ranging from merely making it resonate, to forcing it noisily past an obstruction, to stopping it up altogether. The word beginning with the less obstruent consonant always comes before the word beginning with the more obstruent consonant. Why ask why?”

LanguageLinguisticsPhonetics
Book:The Language Instinct: How the Mind Creates Language
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“AI can translate info, not inkling, AI can translate facts, not poetry. Till a tongue transcends lips to soul, Translations are but soulless forgery. Each language leaves a distinct mental imprint, Inaccessible by the fanciest of translator. Translation gives a glimpse into the head, Language is highway to the soul of a culture.”

MulticulturalismLinguisticsInterpreterPolyglotLanguages And CultureMultilingualLost In TranslationLanguage StudiesLinguistic DiversityLinguistic Differences
Book:Rowdy Scientist: Handbook of Humanitarian Science
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“The Whirling Linguist (Naskaristana 2670-2671) Language is a paradox, by ambition it is expansive, but by neurology it is restrictive, and language tied to ideology, is downright decrepit. I live in six languages, and occasionally dabble in a few more, and I learnt none inside classrooms, I just outgrew the jungle memberships. What makes a language native is not flawless syntax or grammar, but a shameless flow of passion. For example, yo soy humano, por que humano? cunku benim icin bi tek insanlik onemli - sesangi sarang, sarangi sesang - and to hell with armchair linguists and grammar nazis, who can't tell day from night without consulting textbooks - I'm the center that the dervish whirls around, I'm the flame that syllables dance around, I'm the immeasurable that your complex-obsessed psychology books patronize with analysis, and philosophy books desecrate with ivory-tower, lifeless logic disconnected from soil, most of whom are more interested in calculation and condescension than the elevation of human condition. You think Naskar writes me, Naskar is an idiot, I'm beyond Naskar, beyond every single puny mortal brain, I'm the original sentience that occasionally seeks out fitting vessels, with a dominant tendency of expansion and a tinge of naivety, and makes them whirl at my whim, so that your little toddler species doesn't crawl back into jungle slime.”

GrammarLinguisticsLanguage LearningPolyglotLanguages And CultureMultilingualismMultilingualLinguistic DiversityPolyglot Poet
Book:With Love From A Blue Rock
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