Introduction to Psych 17

I am a fluent english speaker, who has dabbled (unsuccessfully) in learning French, can read some Latin and just this year started learning Xhosa. IsiXhosa is a South African language that is closely related to isiZulu, isiNdebele and siSwati (the Nguni family of languages). At the beginning of this year, I did not even know what Xhosa was, where it was spoken or even who would speak it. When asked what classes I was taking, I would always just say I'm in Chemistry, IHUM, Art History and an african language class whose name I can't really pronounce. The clicks and tonal switches that are common in Xhosa are completely alien to an isilungu (white person) like me. However, learning this new language has broadened and challenged my intellectual horizons. I have a new appreciation for the role of language in everyday life. Hopefully some native speakers will be able to decipher some of my broken Xhosa this summer!

For my foreseeable future, I want to continue to learn more African languages. I see my future in Africa post Stanford and I think that it is critical that I am able to communicate with the local people. Language and culture are completely intertwined therefore I would be lacking vast knowledge if I did not try my best to speak the native languages. I'm hoping to take Swahili at Stanford and maybe even dabble in Amharic. I think that learning more about language itself will aid my future endeavors in speaking different languages. I know that I have to re teach myself how to pick out distinctions that I was not trained to notice. However, by examining the cognitive aspects of language, I will hopefully be able to apply my new knowledge to better learn these languages.

I first became interested in this subject because last quarter I took a cognitive psychology course and it was by far my favorite class at Stanford. For some time now I have been fascinated by the interworkings of the brain - how the brain truly creates the mind. Understanding the different processes of language is incredibly fundamental to this study of cognition. I am very enthusiastic about this class and can't wait to get started!

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