Leisa Michelle

Nerdy Monologues of an Autodidact

Diversity: The Thing I Love Most About Language Learning

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This post is a part of my Personal Development Project for May 2016.

I’m a polyglot. That is, I speak a couple foreign languages. I’m not perfect, but I speak Russian, Portuguese, and a livable amount of Polish in addition to English. I’ve spent lots of hours studying other languages like Japanese, Esperanto, Ukrainian, Bulgarian, Turkish, and Nigerian Pidgin too just for fun.

My goal in my personal language learning is just puzzle solving. Plain and simple. Languages are like puzzles to me. I choose a language to learn with the intent to pick it apart and see how it works. If I remember enough to order dinner when I go to a Thai restaurant or if I solidify my knowledge enough to maintain a discussion on the Ukrainian civil war with a stranger on the train, that’s cool. If not, I don’t really care.

Truth be told, the thing I love about language learning the most isn’t even the language learning itself. Most of all, I love the diversity of the language learning and polyglot community that exists because so many people happen to share my weird hobby. The diversity of the community has made language learning invaluable for me.

I’ll bet that when I say the word “diversity”, you think of race or ethnicity or nationality or maybe socio-economic class. This is usually the context in which we hear this word. But I think that it’s hard to really understand what diversity is when we always look at it in these contexts. The word loses its power (if it has any) because it’s vague and impersonal and charged.

So I’m actually not going to talk about diversity in any of these contexts at all. I’m going to talk about it in a way that’s more real and meaningful to me in my life. I’m going to share five polyglots who I think represent the diversity of the language learning community. They’re diverse in their skills, their depth of knowledge, their breadth of knowledge, their approach to learning, their field of learning, and their goals. And these areas of diversity are what has made language learning so meaningful to me.

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On the Unconscious and Empathy

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The following stream-of-consciousness style essay is inspired by The Charisma Myth by Olivia Cabane. You can read my summary and review of the book on Goodreads.

The point of The Charisma Myth was to help the reader adjust their body language to reflect their interests and desires. And it was interesting for me to read not just as a means of self-development, but also as a means of self-awareness and interpersonal awareness.

Obviously, people don’t always mean what they say. But the opposite is true too. Sometimes people do mean what they say, and if you read too deep into the language used or body language exhibited (even if the assessment is completely subconscious), then you can easily misunderstand people.

To use an example from the book: You scrunch your face after I say how important personal privacy is in the context of government surveillance. I can assume that you reacted that way because you don’t like what I said. But maybe the sun is just in your eyes. Another example: Someone asks you how long you’re going to be “stuck” in your current job. You can assume that they think you’re powerless over your situation, or that they disapprove of the work you’re doing. But maybe they’re just trying to be funny, or maybe they didn’t give their word choice much thought. It’s easy to misunderstand people when we delve too deep into things.

And it can be hard to say exactly what you mean. You don’t think in words or language, so speaking involves several encoding and decoding processes. Things quickly get lost in translation. And everything gets more complicated when you yourself don’t even know what you mean.

Unconscious Processes

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Pleasure, Motivation, Assessment, and More: A Conversation on Education

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The other day, I posted a link to this TED Talk by Seth Godin along with some of my personal comments on Facebook. I’m a fan of Mr. Godin’s work, and also an avid reader of books on alternative and progressive education. I wasn’t expecting anyone to raise any eyebrows at the share. We all have a funny habit of assuming that other people think just like us, and I’m not an exception. So I was surprised when a family friend and educator commented on my status update and raised some questions. There was no judgment in his reaction, just, “Hey, I’m not sure this provides the whole picture. Here’s what my experience is.”

I really respect this man and his long-withstanding dedication to both his students and his field of expertise. And so the things that he said in response had a lot of weight. They made me stop and think. And think and think. And so presented below are the points that this teacher brought up and my responses to them.

Students don’t want to learn things because it’s not preferred – they’d rather do things that bring pleasure.

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Teachers, get out of the way!

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Without a doubt, every student has his own learning style. We’re all unique. So the ways we acquire new skills and knowledge are often unique. Some people learn better from reading about a task, others learn better from watching others do the task, and others still learn better from tinkering solely on their own.

But there’s one thing that’s universal. At some point, the guide needs to step out of view of the jungle behind him so his tour group can see the animals for themselves.

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You just have to want what you Want!

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“You’ve lost your humanity, friend. Really, truly, you are no longer human.”

It was my turn to laugh. “So what? I should be more like you? You’re human?” I scoffed, gesturing at Pan’s furry hide.

“No, I’m not human. To be human is to search, to reach, to dream. And it seems to me that your purpose now, Atilius, is to connect what you want with what you Want.”

“What does that even mean?”

“Dearest Atilius,” Pan hopped off of his resting place and waved the forest nymphs away, “it’s quite simple. There are things that fulfill you in your life, things that give you meaning and a sense of purpose. These are your Waaaants,” he said with a dramatic flourish of his hand. After a pause he continued. “On the other hand, your wants are what you do to try to make your true Wants a reality. Your wants are the physical realizations of your true Wants. For example, you Want love. Love will fulfill you, love will make you whole. You want to be a general because you Want love. But the problem is that you don’t get love from being a general. Your wants aren’t aligned with your Wants. So the solution is simple. You just have to want what you Want!”

-Excerpt from Atilius and Pan by Leisa Michelle

Why is wanting what you Want so hard?

The problem is that we get fixated on the physical. Our Wants aren’t physical, they’re… something else. Something deeper. They’re connected with our essence, our feelings, our spirit, our intuition. And it’s easy to ignore our feelings, spirit, and intuition because they aren’t concrete. And as if that doesn’t make it hard enough, society in general degrades feelings, the spirit, and intuition.

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