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What languages I speak:
I grew up speaking English, living only with my American mother. In middle school I began learning Spanish, and continued studying it through high school, completing the equivalent of 5 years of high school Spanish. During visits to Spain I am proficient enough at the language to ask where the nearest Laundromat is or to ask for directions when I am lost (I get lost a lot).
Before my freshman year of high school I moved to an international boarding school in Kobe, Japan. Classes were taught in English, however I was constantly exposed to the Japanese language through friends who are fluent Japanese speakers. Eventually, I learned Japanese, mostly outside of the classroom, and now, although I am weak at writing and reading, I can understand very informal conversational Japanese. It would be immediately obvious to any Japanese speaker that I am not a fluent speaker and tend to speak with very poor grammar, often confusing similar words, etc. however, I do have a basic understanding of the language.
Why I was interested:
After living in Japan for four years, I have gathered a small understanding of the subtleties of Japanese and the way it works. I experienced first hand how similar thoughts are often expressed using completely different combinations of words in Japanese than in English, started to understand the difference between the Japanese and American sense of humor, and even was able to witness some "Engrish" (the awkward English used on everything from translations of menus, to T shirts) in everyday life. I believe it would be very interesting to understand this phenomenon from a more academic perspective with some basis in psychology.
Lastly, I'd like to share some of my culture with you:
I'm not sure how relevant this is to the focus of this course, but I thought it would be appropriate to share these eloquent words that I found on the window of a wine shop in Sannomiya, a city close by my high school in Japan.
