#NaBloPoMo May 2: Your Passion

Does everyone have a passion? It feels like I have spent a lifetime seeking a passion, without finding one. Does that make me abnormal? Dear Reader, what is your passion? On my journey I have found loads of things that interest me: learning languages, travelling, learning in general, reading, working out. But there is no flame burning within me. There is nothing I could not live without. 

Taking a photograph of my passion seemed to be a task of the tougher kind. Until it hit me - a word. No thing would reflect my passions - or object of interest, but a word would.

So, ladies and gentlemen - the word that sums it all up:

Aiming.

Dear fellow language-learners. 

As you may have noticed, this month is all about habits and promises and resolutions and whatnot. Let's make a short summary of how to say these things in the languages spoken at the Playground.

• English: Habit. Goal/aim. Motivation. Success. Failure. 
• Finnish: Tapa. Päämäärä. Motivaatio. Onnistuminen. Epäonnistuminen. 
• Swedish: Vana. Mål. Motivation. Framgång. Misslyckande. 
• Spanish: Costumbre. Meta. Motivación. Éxito. Fracaso. 
• Polish: Obyczaj. Cel. Motywacja. Sukces. Porażka.
• Russian: привычка. цель. мотивация. успех. неуспех.
• Slovak: Zvyk. Cieľ. Motivácia. Úspech. Zlyhanie. 
• Hungarian: Szokás. Cél. Motiváció. Siker. Kudarc. 

Second-hand Time (Время секонд хенд)

There are all sorts of books in this world. The best ones are those that teach us something, or leave a trace in our heart. They shock us, shake us, but do not leave us feeling indifferent. 

I have read quite a bit about Russia and the Soviet Union in my time. I have spoken to people, who have given me their first- or second hand accounts about their lives during the Soviet times. Svetlana Alexievich's collection of stories - those stories lived by former Soviet citizens - does shake me. It raises questions about the good, the bad, and the fact that it is sometimes very different to draw a line between those two. The same goes for love and hatred, empathy and indifference. These narratives paint the picture of a very complex society, where little was as it seemed. A society, whose fall was harsh indeed. 

The narratives, and the way they are told, are humane, cruel, beautiful, all at once. They are the stories about a society that was built - and destroyed - at a great cost. 

Скажите мне.. .

Вижу, что у меня здесь много посетителей из России.  Это очень интересно. Вы здесь, но ничего не говорите :) Иногда я пишу что-то о русским языке, но это не случается так часто. О чем я могу писать? Что вас интересует? 

The Multiple Language Experiment - Summer 2014

A while back I wrote about picking up some of my old languages.  I have given this some thought and have decided to do a little language project as I finally have the time to do so. I spend a total of 80 minutes on a train each working day, so why not spend the time efficiently.

3 languages. 5 days a week. 5 weeks for each language. 15 weeks.

The languages are Slovak, Polish and Russian. And this is how I'm going to do it:

• Day 1: Read from a book or other text
• Day 2: Read an article on current affairs
• Day 3: Translate the article into English
• Day 4: Translate a poem into English
• Day 5: Write a short story

I will be starting with Slovak because it is the weakest of the three languages. The goal is to be able to produce something in the language, a written text.  We will see how it goes.

Dissertation: the Topic

Natalie wanted me to write a little bit more about my dissertation, so I have decided to dedicate a few posts to it.

I will start by introducing my topic.

Law and Society in Post-Communist Central Eastern Europe: Poland, Slovakia and Russia .

As you know, I’m studying sociology of law at the University of Lund in Sweden. Sociology of law deals with the relationship between law and other institutions and actors in society. I’m personally mostly interested in the interaction between people, law and politics.

When reading an article* written by one of my professors, I stumbled upon the following paragraph;

”The transition from a communist to a capitalist oriented industrial society in Eastern Europe and in the former Soviet Republic represents the same kind of tensions between the old rules of the game and a new play with a new script. These countries might face a situation where the society, the horizontal dimension, has shifted while the legal logic in the vertical dimension has not undergone the same changes.” (p. 20).

And the little nerd in my head rejoiced. Eastern Europe – yay. Former Soviet Republic – yay. This was a way for me to combine the study of the societies I like the most with a nice mix of sociology, some law and some politics. Why keep it simple?

This is a complex topic because on the one hand I need to find out what the people think and on the one hand, I need to know what the law says. And none of these two is simple. But it is very, very fascinating.  Basically – what I want to find out is whether the law fulfills the expectations that society places upon it. The reason I picked these specific countries is that they all share a piece of common history even though they are very different.

Stay tuned for more

 

* Contributions in Sociology of Law: remarks from a Swedish Horizon. Lund Studies in Sociology of Law; 29. Lund: Sociology of Law, Lund University. 2008 – available here https://lup.lub.lu.se/search/publication/1177637

Dnes. Je sobota.

Today I have spent the afternoon reading constitutions. It is actually rather fascinating. I finally decided on a topic for my thesis (Law and Society in Post-Communist Central Eastern Europe: Poland, Slovakia and Russia) so now I’m conducting surveys and reading legal acts and constitutions and what not. In case you live in one of the countries in question and would like to respond to the survey, please let me know (susankaaa at yahoo dot co uk) and I’ll send you the link.

Apart from that we (the boyfriend) have been packing and tonight we are having a farewell party. So sad.

Wishing you all a cheerful Saturday!

jar sa blíži [the spring is approaching]

The Slovak word for spring, jar, is quite interesting as it reminds of few other Slavic languages. In Polish spring is wiosna, in Russian and in Ukrainian it is весна. In the Balkans the word for spring are quite similar: in Bulgaria one speaks of пролет, in Serbia it is пролеће and in Croatia – proljeće. The only version being close to the Slovak version is – not so surprisingly - the Czech jaro.
My point? There is none – except that it is a lot of fun comparing languages.

One thing I’m often thinking about is the mutual understanding between languages and where to draw the line. Say, I am fluent in Swedish – does that mean that I’m capable to function in Norwegian? My initial reaction is no! Even though I might understand some of the things the other person is saying - I might be able to read a book even – the risk of being misunderstood or to misunderstand is too great! It is very often, however, that I find myself alone with this view. In general I think that the limits of languages knowledge are too fluffy. It is often the case that a long list of languages on the CV looks great, the higher the level the better. Insight into one’s own skills is often forgotten. Countless are the times people have claimed to be fluent in English – until they had to write a piece in advanced English or talk to someone from Ireland. Fluency – to me – means that one is able to communicate fluently no matter the context.

What I’m trying to say here is that one’s language skills are often judged based on what a subjectively written piece of paper says. Sometimes there are such things as language testing, but if these tests are not carried out by professionals, then what kind of a result do you expect?
And then there are those who have worked hard to acquire a foreign language and speak it like a native. That should be the goal and you who have done it, you are a great inspiration!

(this post was supposed to be about the wonders of wearing a leather jacket after a long winter, but oh well – I got a bit carried away)

Ночь, улица, фонарь, аптека, Бессмысленный и тусклый свет.

Look what I found on Wikipedia: one of my favourite poems by Aleksandr Blok!

***

Night, street, lantern, drugstore.

Meaningless and dull light.

Live another quarter of a century -

Everything will be the same. There is no way out.

 

You will die – then start again from the beginning.

And everything will be repeated like before:

Night, the channel’s icy ripples,

Drugstore, street, lantern. 

****

blizkie ,'the close ones'

This week I have entertained myself with reading reports on poverty in Russia and Bulgaria. The perception of poverty in these country makes an interesting read, but it will not be the main topic of discussion today. Instead, it will be the words близкий – near, close.

This word appeared in the Russian report and there was something similar in the Bulgarian one, so of course I needed to do a little comparison between my main three: Russian, Polish and Slovak to look for similarities.

	Russian	Polish	Slovak
	близкий	blizki	blízky

 

While we are at it. Say hello to my new friend - привет моему новому другу:

Russian	Polish	Slovak
сова	sowa	sova

“You’re Crazy”

…that’s what my friend J told me today when I was getting *slightly* too excited about Czech writers and their ability to write beautifully.

I believe it was said with affection.

So I took it as a compliment.

And in order not to let such a great compliment go to waste, let’s train our language skills.

 

Finnish: olet hullu.

Swedish: du är galen.

Spanish: estás loco/loca.

Slovak: si blázon.

Polish: jesteś szalony/szalona.

Hungarian: te őrült.

Russian: Ты сошел с ума/ Ты сошла с ума

French: tu es fou

Ты и вы, ja i ty, teba a vás

Пустое вы сердечным ты
Она, обмолвясь, заменила,
И все счастливые мечты
В душе влюблённой возбудила. 
Пред ней задумчиво стою,
Свести очей с неё нет силы;
И говорю ей: как вы милы!
И мыслю: как тебя люблю.

- A.S. Pushkin -

Today I had an interesting discussion with a Slovak colleague of mine (who also speaks Swedish really well) about how to address people. 

In Finland and in Sweden, we tend to be very informal. I would never address anyone formally in Finnish or Swedish, unless it were an elderly, grumpy lady. 

In Slovakia – as in most of Europe – people are a lot more formal. No stranger would say “ty” to me (resulting in me feeling like that old grumpy lady). 

This topic led my thoughts to Slovak declension of personal pronouns. I copied the table from Wikipedia (yes, shame on me). 

As you can see (you Slavic speakers), there are similarities with both Russian and Polish. Also note that Slovak, very much like Polish, has a locative case.  

Personal pronouns

Nominative
ja
ty
on, ona, ono
my
vy
oni, ony

Genitive
ma (mňa)
ťa (teba)
ho (jeho, neho,-ňho, -ň), ju, ho (jeho, neho, -ňho, -ň)
nás
vás
ich (nich), ich (ne)

Dative
mne (mi)
tebe (ti)
mu (jemu, nemu,-ňmu), jej (nej), mu (jemu, nemu,-ňmu)
nám
vám
im (nim), im (nim)

Accusative
ma (mňa)
ťa (teba)
ho (jeho, neho, -ňho, -ň, -eň), ju, ho (-ň, -eň)
nás,
vás
ich (nich), ich (ne)

Locative
mne
tebe
ňom, nej, ňom
nás
vás
nich, nich

Instrumental
mnou
tebou
ním, ňou, ním
nami
vami
nimi, nimi

There is also the reflexive pronoun sa, which is declined as follows: N: -, G: seba, D: sebe /si, A: seba/sa, L: sebe, I: sebou

You know where this will be leading us, right? To the exciting world of… tadadda… cases. You have been warned

úžasný vs. ужасный

Definition of false friends according to Wikipedia: False friends are pairs of words or phrases in two languages or dialects (or letters in two alphabets)^[1] that look or sound similar, but differ significantly in meaning.

As you know, in my Slovak studies, I have been focusing on comparing Slovak with Russian and Polish. One of the funniest pair of false friends I’ve come across this far is úžasný vs. ужасный.

Don’t let the letters fool you, these two words are very similar in pronunciation, not, however, in meaning. The Slovak word úžasný means wonderful or amazing, whereas Russian ужасный means terrible.

The Most Entertaining Thing A Language Learner Could Possibly Think Of: Irregular Verbs

Yay, such fun.

I was recommended a good website for learning Slovak (in Finnish), so I have spent a couple of hours investigating the grammar and making observations. Making observations is easy because comparison as a method really seems to work (for the time being). I decided to start with verbs because they are essential for understanding a language and expressing oneself.

Hands up anyone who hates irregular verbs!! (and why oh why do they always have to be the most common ones? )

Here we’ve got three irregular verbs in the present tense. Again in table-form

English	Slovak	Polish	Russian
To be	byt’	być	быть
	som	jestem	N/A
	si	jesteś	N/A
	je	jest	N/A
	sme	jesteśmy	N/A
	ste	jesteście	N/A
	sú	są	N/A

 

English	Slovak	Polish	Russian
To eat	jest’	jeść	есть
	jem	jem	ем
	ješ	jesz	ешь
	je	je	ест
	jeme	jemy	едим
	jete	jecie	едите
	jedia	jedzą	едят

 

English	Slovak	Polish	Russian
To know	vedieť	wiedzieć	знать
	viem	wiem	знаю
	vieš	wiesz	знаешь
	vie	wie	знает
	vieme	wiemy	знаем
	viete	wiecie	знаете
	vedia	wiedzą	знают

 

Also attempted some verb conjugation. All in all, there seems to be a pattern, especially when comparing Slovak to the Polish language.

Slovak 101

OK. Now that I’ve survived the first week at work, it’s about time to start deciding what to do about the Slovak language. I’m still undecided whether I want to learn it on my own or study it at some school (basically my company pays for some language classes) – having a teacher would undeniably bring some coherence, logic and discipline into the language learning process. What makes me doubt is the fact that I could also keep studying Hungarian (or some other language), which I might be more passionate about.


(Getting up at 6-freaking-am is definitely not my cup of tea)

So, speaking of Slovak, here are some opinions on the language this far (from a completely non-scientific point of view).

The combinations of consonants are quite… well, unpronounceable Learning the alphabet could be a step in the right direction!! Anyway, as mentioned before, Slovak is not that different from other Slavic languages, so knowing them helps a lot. I’ve made a little table below in which I compare some very common phrases in Slovak, Polish and Russian. 

English	Slovak	Polish	Russian
Hi!	Ahoj	Cześć	Привет!
Good morning!	Dobré ráno!	Dobre rano	доброе утро!
Good day!	Dobrý deň!	Dzień dobry	добрый день
Good evening!	Dobrý večer!	Dobry wieczór	добрый вечер
How are you?	Ako sa máš?	Jak się masz?	Как поживаешь?
Thank you	Ďakujem	Dziękuję	спасибо
Good night	Dobrú noc!	Dobranoc	спокойной ночи
Good bye	Do videnia!	Do widzenia!	до свидания
I have to go	Musím ísť	Muszę iść	Я должен/должна идти
Nice to meet you	Teší ma!	Miło mi	очень приятно
I like you	Mám ťa rád	Lubię cię	Я люблю тебя
I’m kidding	Ja žartujem	Żartuję	Я шучу
No problem!	Nie je problém	Nie ma problemu	нет проблем
I don’t understand	Nerozumiem tomu!	Nie rozumiem	Не понимаю
I don’t know	Ja neviem!	Nie wiem	Я не знаю
What is this?	čo je to?	Co to jest?	Что это?
I’m lost	Som sa stratil/a	Zgubilem/zgubilam sie	Я заблудился/Я заблудилась
Do you like it?	Páči sa ti to?	Podoba ci się?	Тебе нравится (это)?

...but it's so difficult...

Each person has a unique learning style. There are several ways to learn a language. The question of language learning is always present in my life - sometimes I'm the one trying to learn a new language, sometimes someone is asking for tips on how to do it.

What works then? In my opinion the ideal situation for learning a language is to be in the country in question. Sheer presence is not enough. When in Rome, the language learner should do as the Romans do, as well as actively attempt to internalize all aspects of the language (and culture) being learnt.

It is also possible to learn a foreign language at home, far from the country where the language is being spoken.

There are two (and a half) methods that I've found especially useful in my own language-learning. These work best when combined.


Grammar translation method

Wikipedia tells us the following: "...is a foreign language teaching method derived from the classical (sometimes called traditional) method of teaching Greek and Latin. The method requires students to translate whole texts word-for-word and memorize numerous grammatical rules and exceptions as well as enormous vocabulary lists. The goal of this method is to be able to read and translate literary masterpieces and classics"

 Yes. This method requires a lot of time and effort, and it also fails to take into account some very relevant aspects of language, such as speaking. The learner does not necessarily learn to use the new language in a flexible way. However, vocabulary, grammar and syntax will be learnt quckly.  For this to work properly, the language learner has a teacher who has the knowledge to explain both grammar and vocabulary. The student should also translate from to the target language from an early stage in order to gain good writing skills. Here the teacher revises and explains, but also supports the language learner so that s/he learns to use the language as freely and flexibly as possible.


"Brainwashing"

Surely someone has created a better (and more official) name for this method, but the aim is really to brainwash oneself into learning a language. In short, the goal is to use the target language as much as possible in one's daily life. This includes watching films, listening to music, writing shopping lists, writing letters, reading newspapers, debating with native speakers etc. And when something new pops up, what shall the language learner do? Well - translate it, of course!!

Comparative language learning

This is something I'm trying now with Croatian*. My idea is that it's possible to learn a language quite easily if it bears some resemblence to one or several languages you already know. By comparing Croatian to Russian and Polish (you should see the vocabulary + grammar lists I've created), I'm quite convinced that the new language will make sense in a broader context. It will also be easier to see the differences between the languages and find a way to explain said differences.


*Croatian and I are currently at a very intial stage of flirting. I have done this before with Czech and Serbian, but didn't really manage to complete the project. Will see how this goes.

Happy Moscow

A dark man with a burning torch was running down the street on a bleak night in late autumn. The little girl saw him through a window of her home as she woke from a bleak dream. Then she heard a powerful shot from a rifle and a poor, sad cry–the man running with the torch had probably been killed. Soon afterwards came the sound of distant, repeated shots and of uproar from the nearby prison. The little girl went back to sleep and everything she saw during the following days got forgotten: she was too small, and the memory and mind of early childhood became overgrown for ever in her body by subsequent life. But until her last years the nameless running man would appear unexpectedly and sadly inside her–in the pale light of memory–and perish once again in the dark of the past, in the heart of a grown-up child. Amid hunger or sleep at a moment of love or some youthful joy–suddenly, the sad cry of the dead man was there again in the distance, deep in her body, and the young woman would immediately change her life: if she was dancing, she would stop dancing; if she was working, she would work more surely, with more concentration; if she was alone, she would cover her face with her hands. On that rainy night in late autumn the October Revolution had begun–in the city where Moscow Ivanovna Chestnova was living.

Happy Moscow by Andrey Platonov, English excerpt from here

На ногах не стоит человек.

There is something special about travelling by train. It’s peaceful, people are quiet. It’s the perfect place to read poetry and think about life and other important things.
Below you can find the first lines from Alexander Blok’s poem двенадцать (The Twelve). The translation is my own.

     Черный вечер.
     Белый снег.
     Ветер, ветер!
     На ногах не стоит человек.
     Ветер, ветер -
     На всем божьем свете!

     Завивает ветер
     Белый снежок.
     Под снежком - ледок.
     Скользко, тяжко,
     Всякий ходок
     Скользит - ах, бедняжка!

Black evening.

White snow. 

Wind, wind!

The man cannot stand on his feet.

Wind, wind!

On all of God’s earth!

The wind is twisting

The white snow.

Under the snow, there is a crust of ice.

Slippery, hard,

Every walker slips – oh, you poor thing!

Languages Are Fun

One of the things I've been doing lately is writing stenographic protocols. Well, as you can probably guess, these days one uses a computer, not a pen.
Anyways, I've had to think a lot about the Swedish language. It's a language I know well but sometimes one bumps into some interesting issues.
Let's take the word "Finnish" - in Finnish, that's suomalainen. Now, in Swedish one can choose between two words - finländsk and finsk - which are very similar but there is a slight but important difference.
Finsk usually refers to Finnish-speaking, while finländsk is something from Finland. So, literature for instance, can be both. Finländsk litteratur = literature from Finland (can be in Swedish, though).
Interestingly enough, this phenomenon exists in Russian too. I think many Russian learners have faced some confusion over the difference between русский and российский.

Среди миров/Among the Worlds

Среди миров, в мерцании светил
Одной Звезды я повторяю имя...
Не потому, чтоб я Её любил,
А потому, что я томлюсь с другими. 
И если мне сомненье тяжело,
Я у Неё одной ищу ответа,
Не потому, что от Неё светло,
А потому, что с Ней не надо света.

(Иннокентий Фёдорович Анненский)
_________________________________

Own (free) translation

Among the worlds, in the hazy glimmer
I repeat the name of one single star...
Not because I love her so intensly,
but because I'm tortured by the others.
And if the doubs exhaust me,
I seek the answer only from her,
Not because she's shining so brightly,
but because with her I need no light.

(Innokenty Annensky)