Are We Different People in Different Languages?

Amen

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It think you have put your finger on it. We get the opportunity to make changes when we do something like taking on another language or try to grapple with a different culture.

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Iā€™m sure you know I was just being cheeky ā€“ but I take your serious point, too. Oddly, when I speak Catalan people think I have a Roussillon accent (north Catalan, politically part of France). I thought they just werenā€™t used to hearing it with any foreign accent, and couldnā€™t place me, or maybe meant that I spoke with a bit of a French accent, but the last time I said to a Catalan speaker, ā€œI donā€™t know why people say that I have &c.ā€ she turned round and said, ā€œbecause you do.ā€ :slight_smile:

I also feel different when Iā€™m speaking Welsh. Before I started learning, I was very socially isolated - partly a side-effect of being incredibly socially awkward and introverted, and partially a situational problem. But I found that as I started to connect with people through Welsh, I was no longer quite so reserved and I felt that I could express myself without fear of judgement, a bit like what @Novem said. And the best thing is that this seems to have bled through into my English speaking personality too.

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Thanks for sharing, Siaron. I just happened to be reading an article by Deborah Tannen in the International Journal of the Sociology of Language, and I came across these quotes which I think may be relevant:

and

The article basically is about how discourse style, not just a particular language, makes you feel. When learning a new language (and in madness, curiously :wink: ) the normal constraints of discourse (coherence, invention, intentionality, reference, etc.) do not apply or are distorted. So you feel different, is what she is saying.

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I like the part in this article about the Polish girl who said English lacks the unquestioned element of Polish. I think thatā€™s a really important point. How many people have asked ā€œwhy?ā€ About Welsh at one time or the other? I have. I donā€™t really do it anymore because ā€œwhyā€ I found not to be the right question. I was asking people who learnt Welsh without asking that question, and so found it nigh on impossible to answer. Iā€™m not sure I can answer that many whys about English.

The other interesting thing Iā€™ve found is that many here, as so well put by @karengo, have described becoming extroverts in Welsh. Maybe this is why I donā€™t feel different. Iā€™m an extrovert in English and this has carried across to Welsh. It might also explain why after bootcamp I had a massive sense of relief that I am now able to express myself in Welsh. Something I never accomplished in French, which was cripplingly painful for an extrovert. My job is pretty much entirely conversation based. I come from a family of 4 boys and for the first 8 years of my life shared a bedroom with my brothers. I didnā€™t really have a choice but to crave company! Well, at least thatā€™s how I have come to interpret it.

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I know one person who is extremely wonderfully articulate in English, who has been learning Welsh out of a sense of duty to her kids in school. She finds trying to talk in Welsh horribly frustrating and restricting, compared to her English personality. (I on the other hand have never been much good at English, so rather enjoy the chance to have a go at something else!)

Edit after reading @AnthonyCusack - clearly need to send her on bootcamp. (Actually she was rather interested after hearing about Caernarfon!)

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Itā€™s very common for people who use their first language to a very high level, particularly as part of their professional life, to find more frustration in the process of moving towards expressive usage in a new language. Sometimes being aware of this can help a littleā€¦

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Definitely! Sheā€™ll feel like a full conversation is a possibility. I didnā€™t get there with French. I think German is going to be my next venture (family in Munich).

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I find I am a very different person in the languages I speak.

Welsh has opened up a side of me that - not so much wasnā€™t there - but a side of me that was probably sleeping for the last 20 years, if Iā€™m being totally honest. Iā€™m friendlier in Welsh, Iā€™m outgoing and more willing to speak with strangers - which is funny considering I have a smaller vocabulary than in English. Iā€™m guessing this must be the ā€œwanting to try it outā€ side of me.

When I speak French in France, my wife says I become a different person altogether. In English Iā€™m sort of quiet, Iā€™m the kind of guy who will say 1 or 2 really important things in an hour long discussion with friends, rather than blabbering every minute. Yet in French, apparently Iā€™m totally different.

Weirdly, despite only having been to France three times, I have more friends there than I do in Wales! So you can probably work out that French Nicky is really nice! hahaa

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Wow, this thread is interesting!

The first thought that came to my head was regarding how my children play and how I played as a child. Very often when Welsh children play make believe, they will do so through the medium of English - cue the common complaint that when you walk on the to the playground of a Welsh medium school, all the kids are playing in English. I see it as a form of escapism and role playing, almost like putting on a costume. They think itā€™s fun and experimental and it allows them to become different people for the time that theyā€™re playing in that language.

[quote=ā€œY_Ddraig_Las, post:18, topic:8226ā€]
An interesting answer would be to speak to someone who has been bilingual for a long time and ask if they do feel different in another language without it being circumstantial.[/quote]

Iā€™ve confidently spoken both Welsh and English from a very early age. I came from quite a traditional Welsh speaking family with some English speaking branches and had a father who would throw the dictionary at me at the dinner table if I dared to use and English word instead of a Welsh one. I also had English speaking friends at school.

Though I loved the literature, poetry and music, I kind of took Welsh for granted, but was fascinated by English and would love to speak English with my English friends, in order to practice and extend my vocabulary. The language fascinated me and I chose to do English A Level.

But I was bullied badly in secondary school, was generally unhappy for the time I was there and felt I didnā€™t fit in. I was also criticised and belittled by Welsh speaking friends for speaking English to English pupils - they felt I was betraying my own culture and language.

Wales wasnā€™t my friend any longer and part of me felt that I wasnā€™t supposed to be a shy, quiet, frightened Welsh girl, that there was something more to me than this. So when the opportunity came to flee to college, I went from Pwllheli to Chichester!

That was the start of a new me. I spoke English all the time and grabbed the chance to reinvent myself. I went from shy to extrovert. I became brave and daring. Then when I was done with Chichester I moved to London, lived life to the brim there for 4 years, spending a little time in Boston Mass now and again.

But it fizzled out and I got bored of being a young, free and single English girl in London - just like all the millions of others. It no longer felt exciting and certainly didnā€™t feel different any more. In fact I longed to feel different and unique again.

I moved back to Wales when I was 27 and went to Bangor Uni to do a teaching degree through the medium of Welsh, although I (frighteningly) hadnā€™t written or spoken much Welsh for a long time! But chose English as my main subject, because I still enjoyed the language and felt that I had the ability to teach it to Welsh children in an interesting and stimulating way, because of the experiences Iā€™d had.

I slowly became Welsh again and fell in love with my culture and language. But I became a different Welsh person to the one I used to be. I had life experiences and travel under my belt and a new found energy. I was certainly more confident.

By now I feel I have a greater appreciation of both languages and cultures. When I see my old London friends, the old English me comes out and remember what it feels like to be her. But my roots are now firm. What you see is what you get with me, now. Iā€™m passionate about my language and culture and feel completely happy with who I am and where I am.

Cat (as I used to be called when I lived in London) is still inside me somewhere and will sometimes come out when Iā€™m feeling frivolous (or a little tipsy), but Catrin Lliar is who I really am.

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I had replied to this thread before, utterly certain that I donā€™t change because Iā€™m too much of an old dragon to do so. Then, last night, I suddenly realised I do. If I am really, really pleased - happy - joyous about something - I go into Welsh, even in totally inappropriate situations like thanking a young Scottish medic who had found my records which meant I could have my cataract op that day! ā€œO, diolch yn fawr iawn!ā€ I cry!
Why this occurs, I am unsure, unless it is an association between singing joyfully at the Armā€™s Park (as it was then) when we were winning (which in the 70s was a pretty regular occurrence!).
ps I still do this at the TV now, but it is on a less frequent basis sadly.

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I think Emma will be able to empathise with your school self. She wasnā€™t horrendously bullied, in fact she had a very large group of friends, but sheā€™s always been seen as one of the people you speak English to. Being the youngest of three she had to learn both languages when her siblings were more confident and her cousins were older. So, reading between the lines, sheā€™s developed a bit of a complex about her Welsh.

Sheā€™s really really proud that she speaks Welsh but has a bit of an anti-ā€œCymraeg go iawnā€ because I think she felt less confident around them.

Interestingly for Emma the change between home and uni wasnā€™t matched with a change in language (English to English) except her educational language did change. She did become more confident away from the group of friends. So I wonder, is a lot of whatā€™s described less to do with language and more to do with any opportunity to be different? (Thatā€™s not a criticism, just looking at the foundation of the feelings).

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Re: the release from shyness when speaking Welshā€“changing my name had a similar effect; I could be a different person.

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So I might be the big exception here ā€¦ Iā€™m always me, no matter which language I speak. I listen to myself carefully when talking, especially to sound of my voice in different languages and what I hear is only an interesting effect of how one language sounds spoken by meā€¦ (not neccesserily a good one though. :slight_smile: )

Yah, too talkative person as I am, Iā€™d probably say something even if one would seal my lips and tight my tongue. There are happenings, experiences and scent of different energies in different places what can alter me and make me shut up for a long time if not even forever at particular places and circumstances.

Itā€™s maybe because I enjoy speaking all languages regardless how little of them I know - if only ā€œmerciā€ in French (which is the only thing I know in this language actually). :slight_smile:

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I think because we as individuals often find we use different languages in different parts of our lives we do feel different in each arena. Not merely Welsh, English or Slovenian, but business language, social language, football language: ā€˜The lad did brilliantā€™ is terrible English, but has become acceptable when discussing football. So it is just very hard to separate these different aspects of ourselves from any possible difference in Welsh or English. Sometimes i relish escaping from a certain language style to use another one.
I was listening to this weekā€™s Georgia Ruth radio show in the office this afternoon and I do now understand most of what she says in between the records, and did this whilst having to sort out a big data set at the same time and I just suddenly felt very Welsh, as in immersed in the language. I really noticed the difference between Georgiaā€™s Aberystwyth Welsh and the full Gogledd Cymraeg of the gentleman she was talking with. I just do think there the language has a different personality and many variants, how we respond to that affects how we feel about the language when we are in the language.
Very annoyingly it is even harder to examine this phenomena in Wales because of all this language politics that we all have to deal with at school and beyond, whatever our childhood language background.

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I think youā€™ll find that ā€˜The lad done brilliantā€™ is the correct phraseology. :wink:

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