Culture Blends A FEW years ago I was talking t0 a Black colleague at the Univesity of Maryland, a faculty member from another de parament. [was tying to jump-start a program, bat todo so T had to tangle withthe university bureaucracy, and universities ae just ‘a8 bad as governments and corporations. complained because the ‘various offices that were supposed eo help start programs actually rade it more difficult to do so. ‘My colleague looked at me, shook his head, and started talking: “The system ie not your frend." He talked some more, with the “not your friend” chant repeated every so often. The ony is that his life was the mythic American success story. He'd worked his way tp from poverty t0 a PhD., bu, as far as he was concerned, he'd done it inspite of the walls American institutions had built eather than with dei help His journey out of an Afro-American urban neighborhood had convinced him that insitutions—the "system!"—took cae of them= selves and nobody else. My journey out of a White small rown had. Ted me to expect institutions ro do their job and help you out; if they didn’t, you had aright ro compl "These diferene ways of looking at things had come life in our4 LANGUAGE SHOCK common language, and they tied in with who we were, with our Afferent social identities. The difernces happened inside the same language, ost a differences do between languages a distinc as Jap anese and English One Friday afternoon, not long afterward, 1 went to a faculty reception. I meta colleague whom "d corresponded and talked on the phone with but never met in person. She'd helped me out, oe, by sending me some bibliographies and course outlines from het field. She'd handed me a shortcut into the way things of mutual imerest looked fcom a diferent disspline's point of view. ‘When I finally met her, I thanked her and sad something like “The least I can dois buy you a drink. She snapped to attention and said, rather sharply, “I can pay for ny own drink.” explained that I'd have made she same offer to any college who'd helped me out, male or femae or any other variation on the theme. I guess you could say that ss just didn’ understand. But, in this case, we both did. She'd read my invitation asa come-on, con verting her from colleague to pickup; Pd meant it as thanks. Something happened, in our common language, somthing that had to do with who we were. Something came up, jolted us with 3 diference, made us aware thatthe “natural” way of doing things ‘wasn’t “natural” at all. And, once again, it happened inside the same Tanguage, not berween two different ones. Differences like these—the sort of misunderstandings that we usualy associate with a foreign language—appen inside a language all the time, Ie happens when a eravelr stops in a small southern town during his drive from New York City to Atlanta and realizes ‘that his impatience with slow servie in a store is deeply rooted in how New Yorkers expect a custome to be treated. T-happens when a doctor sees that what a patient is trying t0 tell her won’ fr the tried and erue diagnostic categoris, so if she wants to figure out the patent's illness, she's going to have eo learn more about the patent's world Ic happens when a gradate of a Black university lands his frst job in an all-White office, finds that some of his humor doesn't work, and sets our to learn wha it chat people in the office think is fanny. Differences happen within languages as well s across them. The Calere Blends ss ‘way of seeing I'm trying to bring to life inthis book works inside ‘your oven language as well as when you learn a second language. In the course of the book, stories about American English will come ‘up frequently By the end ofthe book, the moral of these stories will Ihave been brought into focus more sharply—learing a second lan- ‘guage and learning more about your own language are in principle, the same thing. m Usually when the subject of language differences comes up in the United States, images of ethnic groups come to mind, And usually the subject carves a message that the differences are a problem [A wiile aga The Washington Post reported 2 riot in the Mount Pleasant neighborhood downtown. A police offices had shor a His: panic man, Some said the latter had pulled a knife. Others said he was already in handel ‘At several points in the story the Post mentioned that comm nication had been a problem, that che offices didn’t speak Spanish fnd many of the neighborhood residents didn’t speak English. Sus picions of bad intentions, with no chance of communicating to the ‘contrary fueled both sides uni the situation exploded lke lighter fluid poured over smoldering wood. “The Post pointed out that Spanish-speaking officers are conspic ‘vous by thee absence on the D.C. police force. The Post mentioned ‘the obvious slation—hire more Hispanic ofcrs and teach the oth ‘ers Spanish. Another solution, not mentioned in the paper—provide feee English instruction forall new immigrants. The Post, and most everybody ese, assumes cha language in- struction would solve the problem. The Post, and most everybody tise, is wrong. The majority think that language is mostly gramma “Teach poople the grammar, give them a dictionary, and they'll com- rmuniate. But anyone who's studied a second language inthe elass- room and then tried to us it in the real world knows better than that. A friend's main memory of his Spanish course was the sentence El oso ni baila ni canta—"The bear either dances nor sings." The ‘min use for this timeless passage was to show his Hispanic col- leagues how litle he'd learned. Popular ideas about “language” squeeze the concept much £006 LANGUAGE SHOCK tightly. The tendency isto draw a circle around language, to herd neat sentences into the corral and wrangle out the parts of speech But most problems with language, the problems that come up when you try t0 wie i to communicate, arent about sentences and pacts ‘of speech. They have todo with wil! herds of sentence, out om the ‘open range. Don's get me wrong. Had there been a shared grammar and dlictonary in the midst of that pasionate confrontation between Hispanics and police in Mount Pasar, it couldn't have hurt. But, as the meetings and arguments and newspaper articles since the riot make clear, the confrontation in Mount Pleasant was an encounter between different worlds of meaning, meaning that travels well be- yond the dictionary, meaning that tells you who you are, whom ‘you're desling with, the kind of situation you're in, how life works land what's importane in it—meaning that ties language inside the circle, grammar aid the dictionary, to the world outside. If you want to use language, if you want to communicate, lan- guage inside the circle isn't enough. The circle is ie. e's like saying ‘tha if you can put rings on a pisto, you can drive in taf "To understand language, you have to understand that differences in language go well beyond what you find inthe grammar and the dictionary. Otherwise, why would my Black and female colleagues and T have had trouble, eventhough we all spoke the “same” lan uae? m Infact, che world outside the cele may be even more important than the grammar and dictionary. Consider immigrant workers in Germany—mostly Turks and Slavs and Greeks. Ie tuns out that ‘many never master al the fine points of German grammar. But chen who could? Not Mark Twain. An Austrian once told me 2 story. During “Twain's visi to Heidelberg, he attended splay with a frend, During the intermission the bored fend ssid he was leaving and asked if “Twain wanted to leave with him ‘No," said Twain, “I think Pl stick around and wait forthe verb." Tn many constructions in German, the main verb doesn't appear atre Blends ” until the end of the sentence. Immigrant German speakers break ules like that one all the time. Bur breaking the grammatical rule doesn't mean they can’t communicate. The immigrant workers can Communicate even without a fine-tuned grammar and vocabulary, [because they've put together a theory of how Germans think and what thee world is ike. They ft what they do know how to say ino thote assumptions. “Knowing. who the Germans are, knowing, what the situation ‘they're involved in is all bout, packs more power than the gram maf, as far as real communication goes. Such facts offend grammar teachers, and an impoverished grammat holds che new immigrants back in their social aspirations. On the other hand, some commu- ricate better than grammar mavens fresh out ofthe university, be- Cause they know more about their boss and their workplace than recently minted Ph.D. would, m Recently an Austrian friend of mine came to Washington to ceach and study at Georgetown University. She could rack through English fgrammar with the best of them and had a better vocabulary than ‘most ofthe nacve-born undergraduates in my lecture class. ‘Altera couple of months L met her for dinner and asked hes how ‘everything was going “Fine,” she said and then, afer a moment’ hesitation, "But what isa ‘date? ‘She knew how to use the word in a sentence—"T'm going on a date”; “How about a date” She wasnt confused because the word flso means a number on a calendar or a sweet piece of fruit. But ‘none of tht explained what a “date” was T started to answer, and the more I talked the more lost I became in how Americans see men and women, how they see relationships, incimacy—a host of connected assumptions that I'd never put into swords before. And I was only trying 0 handle straight dates. It was ‘tite different from her Austrian understanding of men and women find what they are (0 each other. For a while she looked at meas if Pd just stepped out ofa ying saucer, uni she finally decided I was gave up trying ro explain date. told her I'd just try to do one. But whae with wisecracks and shifts between Austrian German and1" LANGUAGE SHOCK [American English, the scene turned ito a Marx Brothers move. She never did learn what a dae was all zbout, t least not from me. But ‘we found out that whatever date meant, it went far beyond what the grammar and the dictionary could handle m Ie hadn't been easy moving inthe ther direction, either. I've lived in Austria Several times, and even afterall hese years I'm stil pu aled by Du and Sie. Du is “you,” the informal second person singular pronoun, and Sie is “you,” only it's the formal version. English hasn't made the distinction since we lost show, but many of the world’s languages ‘dot and vous in French, tt and usted in Spanish, to mention a ‘couple of other European examples, “The grammar books ae clear as freshly washed crystal. Du, the informal version, is for relatives, finds, and kids. Seis for every: body else. However, the rule doesnt carry you very fat, Twas at a professional meeting in Vienna. A female colleague, about my age talked with me in the ball between sessions, We called tach othe Sc. At midday I was walking down the street, alone, and ‘she passed me, alone. As she passed, she chatted fora Second and used Du. Thats nice I thought, she's promoted me toa friend. Later in the afternoon, back in the hall, she called me Sie. 1 turned to a male friend, with whom I was aleeady per Du, as they say in Austria, and asked him just what was going on. He stared back, amazed at how stupid che haman species could be when it tried “She's iting with you. Obviously” More embarrassing silat a perty «few months later, an Aus trian man, about my age, one ofthe few other people informally dressed, walked up and started a conversation. [used Sie, and 50 tid he, After a while, his gefriend walked up, sai hello, rarned to se, and said, “What do you do ia Vienna?" using the Dw form. smiled and asked her what it was that made her choose Dit instead of Siz. 1 meant it asa pure ‘search question She stiffened, looked annoyed, end said, “Entshudigen Sie"— “Yow excuse” using the formal pronoun. You'd have to tanslate that as “Excuse me” to ge the righ effect in English altre Blends » [Alter some social acrobatics on the part of everybody, we straightened out the misunderstanding, Since her boyfriend and 1 ‘were talking in friendly way, she assumed we were already fiends, tnd a friend of her boyfriend got an automatic Du. The rule was hers, nota general one you could rey on. Trumed to the amused boyfriend and asked how he figured out what to eal people. He shrugged his shoulders and said the Austrian ‘quivalene of “Hell iF know, [just listen to the other person and fake it from there.” still cant spell out che cules. And I've barely touched all the ‘generational, poical, and lifestyle issues that move Du and Sie round, Pronouns, something you'd think would be classic gram- mar-book material, tured out to be one of the worst problems Thad, “There's no escape, citer. Every time you talk you have to wse pronouns, though I leaned that some tortured German is produced just to avoid the issue. Litle wonder that people try t0 avoid it. Everytime you use the pronouns you have to look at who you are, whom you'e talking with, and the circumstances, and then make 3 choice, rapid choice that won't disrupe the low of tlk. And you have to doit using rules that not everyone will agree are correct. ‘A coupe of years ago, my frend and colleague Ruth Wodak and taught a seminar in Vienna. We decided to take on Du and Sic “The fist day we asked the students to tell one or two stories that showed how the eules werent cleat. These, remember, were Austrian German speakers talking about cheir native language ix their native language. Each of the students had scverl stores. They told them with passion. Ie cured into linguistic therapy group. Timagined—it ‘ever happened, but wasn’ difficult picture—that at any mo- ment they were going to fll fom their chars, crying and pounding the floor with thie fst, and scream, “God, pleas fee us from this pronominal system that causes so many traumas and crises in our livst™ m ‘On the one hand, you might be speaking the same language—Hke my American colleagues and me, oF the Germans and the foreign2 LANGUAGE SHOCK workers. On the other hand, you might be learning a differen lan ‘guage—ike Spanish or German. Grammar and the dictionary, lan- ‘age inside the circle, are imponsnt, no doubt about it But ‘grammar iss enough © communicate, and commnication can o¢- ‘cor without all the gamma, Language as to include more than just language inside the cit- le, To use a language, to live ini all those meanings that go be- yond grammar and the dictionary have to fi in somewhere. The circle thar people—and some linguits—draw around langvage has 1 be erased, Culture is the erase. Usually people think of “cukure” as something that a pariculae aroup of people have, Calures rll around the planet like so many biliaed balls, selcontined object that might collide or bounce off the cushion bue stl retain their pevect round shape, People use “culture” this way ll he time just gave an example cof Austrian culture using, Du and Si, Before that, the example had todo with American culture surrounding the word dat. The news- paper story deal with Hispanic culture, and che rwo anecdotes the book opened with were about Black culture and women's culture. ‘The labels are way too general, becuse a lot of variations on the theme live under those names, but thit’s& problem that will ll 3 later chapter. CClture i something those people “have,” but i's more than that. I's also something chat happens to you when you encounter them. As ong as they're jst out thers, just diferent group of folks, you won't have to deal wth them. When you dea with chem, culture tums personal. Calture is no longer just what some group has i's what happens to you when you encounter differences, become aware of something in yourselt, and work to figure out why the diferences appeared. Culture isan awatenes, a consciousness, one that reveals the hidden self and opens paths to cther ways of being. Culure happens when you lesen to wse a second language, It happened to my Austrian friend when she tried to figure out what 4 date was, and it happened to me when I stumbled over Du and Sie in Austrian German, Buti also happens inside your ow lan- ‘guage, as it did with my colleagues and me. Culture stars when you realize that you've got a problem swith language, andthe problem bast do with who you are. Culture Cale Blends a happens in language but the consciousness i inspires goes well be yond i. ‘Meanings usually float ar the edge of awareness. Even when meanings make a selective appearance in the mind's eye, they'ce somehow “natural” or “right.” They're not only the water in which you swim; they're the water in which you fst learned to swim seal Clare changes al that. The “narural” or “right” meanings, the cones tht el you who you are and bow the world works, turn at= bierary, one of a number of possibilities. Your “natural” language shines under che light of anew awareness; it blossoms ino a fas nating complexity; you se possibilities you never imagined existed CGalture changes you into 4 person who can navigate che modem multicultural word. Galtre is an elusive beast. Differene cultures color the landscape ‘of modern life. But a long as they stay out there, objects of con- templation, problems won't get solved and minds will chug along, as they did when we all ved in isolated villages. In this book, cul> ture i about to change from a distant object into a personal expe rience, Culture may be something they have, all well and good, but personal contact makes culture your own. Until it's your own, cule ture won't make a damn be of difference, w Americans carry an unfortunate stereotype. Theyre known world- ‘wide for holding culture at bay. Several yeaes ago, L went to live on 4 Greck island for the summer. A friend of mine, a Swiss architect ‘who owned a home there, invited me up for dinner. After dinner T chatted with him and his wife in English. He hated to speak High German, he explained, because ofits associations with Nazi Ger ‘many. He was old enough to remember the wat. ‘Galture has to do with who you ae. ‘We got around to the image of Americans asthe world’s worst second-language leamers. Theres an old linguistics joke: What do you call a person who speaks three languages? A trilingual. Two languages? A bilingual. One language? You guessed it, an American. ‘My frend wasnt an America-hatr. Far from it. But he was gen= uinely puzzled. I's not, he said, that Americans aren’t capable ofa LANGUAGE SHOCK learning grammar as well as anyone else. Maybe even better. The problem, he thought, i that they heve trouble understanding a dif ferent mentality thought about how America bad never understood Vietnam, how it was shocked when the Ayatllah Khomeini took over Iran { hought about Mexican friends and acquaintances who told stories fof how Americans hada’ shown them any “respect.” I recalled a partyin Austria, where rwo Americens who knew German grammar ‘uch better than I did spoke in Arserican ways thatthe Austrians found abrasive. “Americans have trouble understanding another mentality, sug seated my Swiss friend. They have trouble entering into another ‘world chat goes with another langvage, another point of view, an ‘other way of doing things. Americans have trouble with culture ‘That’ a stereotype I've heard all over the world T don’t know how ere the stereotype i, and God knows Pe set plenty of people from other ards who showed litle awareness that anything other than their way of seing things ever existed or even deserved to, But the fact remains: You can't use anew language tunless you change the consciousness tha sted 10 the old one, un= Jess you stech beyond the circle of gammmar and dictionary, ot of the old world and into a new one. And Americans are famous for thinking they've got the best consciousness around, “Americans are the best, number one, free and rch and capable ‘of doing anything. Where did such a stereotype come from? Is easy to think of reasons. A nation of immigrants who broke with tad tion and improved thir economic stuation. A melting-poc ideology that cried out, “Hurry and become one of us." The insecurity of a colony vis-a-vis the former masters. An exploitable frontier chat called out that the sky wa the im. The anti-immigrant mentality that grew up at the tur ofthe cenury. A global savior role in ro ‘world wars, followed bya righteousstance against he Stains state. ‘Do all Americans run around with the number-one mentality, looking at other languages only through their own? No, of course not. Don’ people from other places besides America lve locked into 41 one-dimensional consciousness? OF cours they do But, for a while anyway, Pm going to ler the stereotype stand Americans without the experience of culture are number-one Amer icans. ve met plenty of them. Some of them run the most important ature Blends 3 institations in the country. They hold America back from singin the new winds of history. The mentality dha the number-one ypes fepresent-in America of anywhere else—must change m “There are two ways of looking at diferences between you and some: body else. One way isto figure out that the differences are the tip of the iceberg, the signal that two diferent systems are at work. ‘Another way is to notice all the things thatthe other person lacks ‘when compared to you, the so-called defi theory approach. "Numberone typer—American or any other—use the deft she cory. Tye the best, anything ese less than the best, and anyone ‘who would all into question who they are when they're already the Ips is fool or a masochist or even, a they used to say in America before perestroika, a Communist, Ronald Reagan was elected, in putt of a wave of number-one sentiment. The deficit theory does have its advantages. Bu its a prison. te Jocks you into closed room in an old building with no windows Ttinocolaes you against culture. You might tinker with the gram- mar and dictionary of a language, but you never communicate— taceptin terms ofthe world that shaped your attitudes, the language designed to ft your assumptions about what the word is and how jt works, the native language you lened when you fist stumbled around the house in diapers. “The situation has to change, I's cliché of the nineties to observe tha we live in a multicultural world, whether we want f0 oF no. Revolutions in information and transportation have pulled us all together. Wars and the economy move us physically all over the ‘lobe. es hard to think of many jobs in which contact with “dif- ferent people” isn't normal. Enteainment—film, food, and fe- tion—often involves the product of “foreigners.” Communication in today's world regres culrre. Problems in communication are rooted in who you are, in encounters with 2 diferent mentality, different meanings, a different tie between lan ‘guage and consciousness, Solving the problems inspired by such en- ‘counters inspires culture. For number-one types, it means changing from “best” to “dif ferent.” If they take culture seriously, they embark on a lifelong4 LANGUAGE SHOCK process of transformation that only ends when they do. It opens up ‘ew possibilities and stokes the Stes of creativity, It subvers the amiable naivete that Americans are famous forthe world over. ‘Those wedded tothe number-one identity, the identity that holds them captive in the monolingual prison, see culture asa threat. They are right, Personally, think dhe eal teat isthe way the aumber- ‘one identity holds culture at bay. Without it, such a person stands hanished from the growing global conversation. m ‘When people leen culture, when they burst out oftheir forme un- conscious ways and gaze atthe new landscape of possibilities, they change in postive ways. I've seen i happen mote times chan I can remember, Jost after I'd retumed from a year in Austria, I talked with a ‘businessman in that great purgatory that brings ws together, an it~ ‘ort waiting lounge. He was an “Ameria is number one” man who complained about how “foreigners” did busines. Told him a story. told him how Austrian businessmen I'd mee who worked with Americans knew our language, watched our TV shows and movies, read our novel, looked at the Herald Tribune and our weekly newsmagazines. They had come up with theories of what we were like. They knew about us, about our ties berween language and consciousness, but we knew nothing about them. In business negoiation where X knows a great deal about Y, and Y knows almost nothing about X, who has the advantage? T ‘asked, The businessman bought me a ber. In an interview with Felipe Gomile, the socialist prime minister ‘of Spain a reporter asked what it was like dealing withthe Amer- jeans. At frst, he sd, he'd had the usual streorype-—who do these world colonizers chink they are, anvway? Bu after a few meetings, he changed his mind, I's kind of touching, he said. In walle the representatives ofthis world power, and the main thing they care about is whether you lke them of not In the corridor of a wain, a German woman and I stuck up a conversation while we sated out the window atthe passing fam Tand. She'd just retuned from a menth-long trip around the United States, [asked her how she liked Americans, She launched into an Culture Blends a enthusiastic story about how she'd Ieared from them, how they looked a chemselves and the situations they faced a8 something you could change, something you could transform in a favorable direc- Tn her world, she'd leened that you are what you are, you do what you have ro, and tha’ it. No more. Now her world as fll ‘of new possibilities that, she said, sometimes shocked her family and friends. “The stores ofthe businessman in the aieport, the prime minister ‘of Spain, andthe German woman on the tsi show what happens ‘when you “catch” culture. They all noticed a difference in language tied to who they were, realized other tes were posible, set out 0 figure them out, and dhen changed themselves as a result CCltuee lights che darkened countryside into a landscape of new choices. I changes the way you look a things. w Culture has its downside as well Ie can wash you avay into a sea Cf anomie. Some lose the certainty of the world that tied them to ‘heir original language and never recover, Tn Vienna, an older Kurdish stadent attending one of my classes ‘had trouble with the Final paper. Toward the end of the semester, Ihe came in to talk with me, His German was confused and confus ing. T' attributed i 10 what was probably his recent immigration to Austria Twas wrong, He spoke ofa childhood with one Kurdish parent and one lagi ‘of migration to Vienna years ago when he was sill a child of his study of English, since he really wanted to goto the United States for Canada and thought and read about litle ese. He'd taken my course, he explained, because he thought 'd be teaching about ‘American language in English. He dida’t know who he was anymore, he said. He couldn't speak any of his four languages well enough to give voice to what was inside of him, and what was inside of him was a contradictory mess anvvay, He had ur, bur for him twas cancer ht consumed is coherence His sory was a sad one and i's not the only ime Pve head it Stories ike his are sometimes used by proponents of the number:26 LANGUAGE SHOCK ‘one theory to explain the dangers of going outside the circle, of ‘venturing into culture. From their poine of view, i's dangerous, no matter what, because i always knocks you out of the “our way is the only way" mentality, which the number-one types fight to pre= Cases like the Kurd’s show that culture is powerful, and power unrecognized and uncontrolled can destroy rather than create. The answer in’ to ight if 0 banish it, co legislate i away. The answer isto understand it, to keep an eye on it to lear how to use it to shift into gea for lifelong travel in the contemporary multicultural world, o CGlure has come out of the American closet. America was built— ‘0 goes the old story, which conreniendly ignores Indians, slaves, and the Chinese—on waves of European immigration, waves made up of people committed to melting into the pot. Nowadays, the waves of immigration are neither Anglo nor European, and a lot of them don't want ro melt. They wart tobe Americans, but they don't want t0 be Anglo-Exropeans ‘Malticuleralsn” is the new ache of our times, a call v0 eec- conve a new American phenomenon on the part of our instcu- ‘ions-—edueation, health cat, the workplace, law enforcement, and the rest. Bur ao one quite knows what to make of itor what fo do about it. The results are tragic. Rich differences are converted into ‘hreatening deficits. The old myth is dead, but the new realty still baffles, confuses, and sometimes explodes into violence. ‘America hasan opportunity a chance to change a breaking point into a turning point, a chance te make a global contribution, a chance to make multiculturalism work. One taditional strength of ‘Ameria is the ability to innovate, to look at a problem and figure ‘outa solution without holding hands with centuries of tradition. Remember the story of the German woman on the train, the one who learned during her American travels that she could change? Even Abbie Hoffman, former sates radical and cultural rite until, his death, said he couldn't imagine working anywhere else because ‘of America’s “can do” atitude ‘Culture and language aren't jus; sues her, ether. Recent events Gale Blends ” in the former Yugoslavia and Czechoslovakia and the old Soviet Union, in lag and Ethiopia, in Kenya and South Afia, in Mexico and Nicaragua in India and Tadonesia to name just few examples, testify tthe global concern with multiculturalism, the feling that its a situation to be feared rather than a historic possibilty to be celebrated, Besides, the world economy, the speed of information and trans portation, tourism and war, the intenationaization of husiness and polities and academics, not to mention music, have taught growing, ‘numbers of people that multiculturalism isn’t just a feature of home: isa feature of anyone's life, anywhere, when that life expands be yond national boundaries And the number of lives 30 expanded Increases each ye “There ae alternatives to citling the wagons, alternatives to foe bodings of fea or agaresive threats to bring those “different” peor ple into ine. Bur v0 figure out alternatives, we've got to figure out ‘what chose differences ate all about and how to handle them. Con- versions and newspapers often hang the problems on “culture” and “language,” but the concepts are more complicated, more in teresting, than what those conversations and newspapers would lad you to believe “Language,” goes the frst mistake, lies inside the circle. People n't speak the same language; if they'd only learn the other one ‘everything would be fine. But the stores I've told show that gram- mar and the dictionary—what we usually think of as “leaening a Ianguage"—aren': enough. People who speak the same language bling child, Different worlds call for the kind of courage that les you handle mistakes Bat lessons leamed in encounters with radically diferent worlds apply at home as wel, At home those other kinds of people, those bother ways of using the “same” larguage, aren’ as distant. You and they, whoever the “they” of the moment happens to be, already share some common grammar and some common experience, Dif ferences close to home are less diferent, more immediately accesi- ble, but fascinating and complex al the same, "What want to do is show you how interesting and important language and cultural diferences really are how encouncees with them disrupe buried routines and open up possiblities previously Cult Blends 2» unimagined. Differences aren't a threat; they're an opportunity. ‘When you finish che book, what you will have, if 've done my job, is a way of secing, one you'll never lose, one that will change the way you move through daily life. [ano try to reveal language and cultre in a new way, because I want to help make a multicul- tural world work, This book is aimed at peopl, no instittions or countries, beause the secret—the one chat Tom Paine knew—is chat if enough people change the way they see things, institutions and countries have to follow suit. sa vison through rose-colored glasses, know to tink apiece of wriking could have such an effect. With ll the conflict around us based on language and cultural differences, why even try? When an independent eracker I once interviewed talked about his second mar- riage he called it “the triumph of hope over experience." I'd like to ‘wis that litle and ty co show that experience, some of t anyway, might tum out to be a source of hope. Hope, of couse, isn't enough. While I was writing this book, 1 presented some of the idess in it to a conference on incercularal ‘communication in Germany. ARerward, a colleague from Bulgaria came up to talk. Interesting, he sad, and optimistic, hereby aeib- tng to me one common stereotype of Americans. But what do you do, he asked, with hatred of the Moslem minority in Christan Bul ‘aria, a hatred grounded in the accupation of Bulgaria by the Or tomans centuries ago? Language and culture savey won't wave a magic wand over deep-seated historical hatreds and make them disappear. Ie won't dissolve che gross social inequities that often drive conflicts atrib- ured to Language and culture. What it will dois open lines of com- ‘munication based on what people ae rather than on what they are ot. When the ime comes for talking instead of shooting, such ines of communication can only help. With any luc, a lil talking be fore the shooting might met the bullets. Tha's where the hope part w (Culture erases the circle around language that people usually draw. ‘You can master grammar and the dictionary, hut without culture You won't communicate. With culture, you can communicate withxe LANGUAGE SHOCK rocky grammar and a limited vocabulary. Ths statement seems pa ‘doxieal because ofthe circle around language, the ctcle that exists in most people’ imagination. Without the citcle, che paradox die appears. “The circle has to go. For the next few chapters present some history to help erase the cic. The history won't range seros all the great ideas about language. Instead, TI lift out one theme that runs through it, a theme aimed a¢ understanding how fragile che narrow circle really is, Contained inthe story of the cce are the ways to eliminate it ‘The story ofthe founding father of modern linguistics isa fine place to start. Though he did se up one version of a circle around Tanguage himsel, che ideas he developed have traveled well beyond it, Once the fundamentals he established are under contol, erasing that czcle won't seem like such a vadical move ater ll The Circle ole ‘creation myth for modern linguistics uswally begins with Ferdinand de Saussure, a Swiss linguist who taught a the Uni versity of Geneva around the tum ofthe century. 1's not hard to imagine why a Swiss would be fascinated with language, since the ‘country has thee offal languages, a fourth national language, and ‘countless dialects tucked away inthe mountains. ‘There's an old linguistics joke: Wha's the difference berween a language and a dialect? The “language” speakers are the ones with an army. Saussure created a way of looking at language, a way that guides you to the right questions to recognize problems when you com ‘municate with others. He didn’ quite make iro culture, though his ideas aim in tha direction. But what he did do was magnificent. He grew up in the tradition of historical linguistics, the main stream of the late ninetenth century. To understand what he di, ‘o understand the genus chat he was, the historical approach has to be sketched fis. In the English-speaking world, historical ingistics started in the eighteenth century with Sic William Jone, a friend of Benjamin Franklin who tied to help convince King George It dha, trouble was brewing in the American colonies,Sailors and Immigrants TI. |AGINE a three-step process on the way to culture. Step one is festa acne eee ae Suors and Imoigrats Ms to. Mistakes happen in language—the rich points—but cheir ree Dunivion happens Because of frames. Mistakes are things that people do that don't match frame expectation. Number-one types might recognize a mistake and be aware of in but then they just note the deficiency inthe other. The other is ie fault use because they aren acting according to the expectations in the mumber-one eype’s frames. That kind of awareness isn't ‘enough to make it on the MAR. "A beter version runs lke this: A mistake happens, you become aware of it and then you begin t build alist of differences between {Jou and them, “Yes, well you see, I've lived here along time, and the X aten’s like us, The X do things this way.” You hea this sort Of thing from foreign “old hands” in another country, old hands (who aren't eeally connected, who spend most of theit rime with ‘cher foreigners and use thee local country language mostly t0 shop and order in restaurants “The awareness in MAR means more than ths. When a mistake happens, a motor kicks in, « motor that, allowed to accelerate, stars tap 2 program of change that continues forever. A mistake means that other frames ave operating, frames you are’t using, frames you may never bave imagined existed. Avwareness means that buried frames are brought to consciousness and changed, maybe with just 4 litle tinkering, maybe with elaborate new additions. ‘Changing frames is what repair is all about. Repair Keeps the procens underway once it gets started. Repair caries you further tie farther into a new languaculcure, further outro sea. Frames that Always seemed ike the “natural” way of doing things uen out, on Conscious eefleton, to have an abitary structure. Other ways are possible. “The way those “other people do things has is own coherence, a differene coherence from yours. As you repair your frames, Your find and heart and soul Become more complicated, because you have new ways of secing and doing. You build a bridge berween the taro ways so you can get back and forth. The bridge keeps changing ts you make new repairs. You step above the two languacultures, sour native one and the new one you're reaching toward, and forge 2 higher-level idenity that contains chem both an shows ther con~ fewtions. What you were—a person in an unconscious “natural”Me LANGUAGE SHOCK languaculture—changes ro what you are now becoming—a person who can understand in terms of ferent frame systems and tack back and forth between them. Repair stretches consciousness in two directions: sideways, t0 accommodate new frames for the new languaculture, and upward, {o grow a biographical self thar includes what you used ro be and conganizes what you've become. Biogtaphy thickens with new klen- tities and stretches to accommodate them. ” [MAR—mistake, awarenes, and repaie—puts you out f0 sein the ‘est sense ofthe word, at home between lands, able to change course and reach any of them. You talk as much withthe other sailors as you do withthe landlocked denizens of your home port. (Once you set sail on the MAR, rou've a le in common with those other sailors. You're all from somewhere, but you've all be ‘come something other than just where you're from. And when you do go home, you live in a port city, metaphorically speaking, like [New Orleans, San Francisco, or New York. You've all built an iden- tity that stretches beyond the unconscious shapes your home poured igo you. You're all used to being a¢ sea and find ita facinating place. Two people who know the MAR can talk about diferences Without guarding their own frames lke threatened lands chat others want to conquer. 1 think that sailors on the MAR ae about an evolutionary hus ‘man development, 2 shift in the humen ecology that selects for the ability to take growing up ina particule languaculture as a resource rather than a conclusion. The number-one Americans-—or Austrians, ‘or Mexicans, or anyone else—can't make it. They can’t stand at [MAR. They suffer from terminal seaickness, They build dikes to hold back the MAR, fortress walls to defend their coasts, The sailors, che ones who live om land or at sea, the ones who row comfortable with languacultur, ate the guides into the next ‘century. They're from somewhere, burthey can deal with differences anywhere else, Their biography outgrows their home terrcory and takes them int a regio that nobody grew up in one tha the sailors all know, namely, the MAR. Slr and Immigrants as ” |When sailors go ashore in anew land and stay awhile, they change thie names. They become immigrants. ‘Some years ago Salman Rushdie wrote an article in a magazine called American Film. Ths was before he was forced ito exile be- ‘cause of The Satanic Verses. He wrote of films made with directors, ast, and crew from diferent counties, in a location naive to none fof them, based on a story by an author from yet another place This kind of situation inspired him to wete of an “immigrant sensibility,” a sensibility based on the fact chat no one deals with the simple world that they grew up in anymore, Everyone forges thei way through a world of different kinds of people engaged in ‘common tasks, a world sch in mokiple perspectives. Think there's something ro Rushdie’ immigrant idea on more than just esthetic grounds. When I went ro live in Vienna in 1989, Twas one tired linguistic ntheopologist. was tired, partly, because the gap between what I knew how to do and my goal of learning ‘Viennese languacutute had grown so great that I coulda’ figure out hhow to get there 1 decided to let go of my ideas about ethnography, about infor. imal interviews and feld nots, abou file folders full of newspaper clippings. had plenty of insde-the-icle German language material to work with, Pd already started on several speech acts and their ties 10 historical and social frames, like the Waldheim work. I had ‘job to-do atthe University of Vienna, [had an apartment ro set “ap people to talk with, moves to see and music to hear. decided the hell withthe old research identity. Vd just make sure [kept learning things in whatever way seemed right, and then Tater figure out what Fd boon doing. I wouldn't study some group. ‘of people; just ey to figure out how to lve in Vienna. My “new” ‘way of thinking about things was obvious in retrospect. I was an Jmnmigrant to Vienna, a new azsval from a foreign land with a job to do and life ro organize landed with my native languacolture and ran into rich points allover the place as I started ro try to function in the new one. From the basics of living to the details of my job to what I did for fan, T146 LANGUAGE SHOCK had to build and rebuild frames and hook them together into a coherent wiole. I had to build a self within the new word, master new social identities, and tie my biography to them At the end ofthe yea, [had new denies and my biography had changed. I didn’t have an Austrian identity. I never could, because ‘Austria had shaped Austrians’ development from childhood and ‘America had shaped mine. But leaned atleast pare ofa new l= auaculture, new ways of using language, and who I became in that nev languacultre was diferent from who P'd been in the old one. The strange thing about the two mecaphors I've used—the im: migrant and the sea—is that people tsully go to sea and then land 5 immigrants. In Austria it reversed | learned to be an immigrant and the experience put me out to sea, out into the MAR. But there's ro doute in my mind where I came from-—i's clearer to me than its ever been before—and I still know right from wrong. w Margaret Mead wrote something about immigrants without a des- ‘ination back in the sixties. Iesstrange. When I started this book, I never would have guessed that Pd mention Margaret Mead so much. Pve mentioned her sev- cal times, in part, I admit, Because sx's a known figure to readers TThope to reach; namely, people who have never read an anthropol- ‘gy oF linguistics book in hei ives. The irony i, U never leaned anvthing about her in graduate school. I remember when she ded, curing the anthropology meet- ings in 1978. I thought che timing was prety cosmic and wondered why people did’ talk about her much Later that year, atthe mec ings ofthe Society for Applied Anthropology, people sat around in 4 oom and told stores about her, in the tadiion of an Irish wake, which appealed to me, since I'm gencically pogsammed for them ‘They talked about her, about how unappreciated she ws, about how one American unvesity wanted to give her an honorary Ph.D. and the anthropology depactment weuldn’t sponsor it, I remember that as Isat and listened to the stoves, I thought abou Gregory Bateson at Hawaii, how one faculty member said he didn't have ‘much ro do withthe depactment, how he ony had an M.A, Margaret Mead and Geegory Bateson were married for a while Slors and Inomgrts ar “They had thee own child the anthropologist Mary Katherine Bate= son, but stil, | hope P've been possessed by their ancestral spirits. Anyway, Margaret Mead wrote a book about the sisties called Culture and Commitment. The book talked about how the kids of the sntes wore’ ust bel, Rebels were easy to understands rebels jst took the languaculture and did things to oppose it. They defined ‘themselves i terms of the languacultre “The kids ofthe sintes, some of them anyway, of all different colors, protesters and soldier, did't jus rebel. They called the lan- sguacultureinco question. They cast off and sailed the MAR. They ssid 'm not interested in just acting in opposition to the frames, rm interested in questioning the frames and imagining new ones that don't yet exist Kids ofthe sisties were lke immigrants to a new country. That's the metaphor Mead used. They were in a place where thee parents coulda’ give them any instructions, because the parents were hound ‘up ina languaculrure and the old frames didn’ apply anymore ‘The problem for the kids ofthe sixties was different from the usual immigrant story. They werent just tying t0 move from the languacultre of the parents to the langaacultre of the new land [No one knew what the langsacultre ofthe new land looked like. “The job of the kids of the sixties wasnt jus co lear a new langu- culture; chey had to dvent it, Most of them gave up. They had to. ‘You can't invene a new languacultute from scratch ‘Mead and the sites were a litle off the mark, The problem Jan’ to invent a brand new languaculeure; the problem isto live famong several of them all at once, and create an identity that les you participate in the symthess. Anyway, the sixties are long gone, ‘hough the conditions that gave ese to them aren't w [Now I want to tum to the example of one coherent nationstate languacultue, ike American English, and a second one in which you want to un communicatively competent, ike Austrian German ‘or Mexican Spanish [want ro ignore problems of variation and less ‘dense social identities. In other words, I want to get as cose to the ‘old idea of “leaning a second language” as 1 can ia languacultralas LANGUAGE SHOCK ‘The thing I wonder about i: What do you learn, what is it relationship to what you already knov, and who are you after you've learned it? “There are some differences beeween languaculkure one, LCx from hereon out, and languacultare ewo, or LC that just aren't very interesting. A “fork” is Gabel in German is a tenedor in Spanish, and tha’s about it. Hardly a rch point. A “dog” is a. Hind is a perro, though here it ges richer, since you've got to watch what you're doing if you call person 3 dog. “With” is mits con, though Til tell you, prepositions in every language I've visited slide around more than the grammar books let on Bus, on the whole these points arent all that rich. You learn new pieces inside the circle, make a few minimum frame changes, and you're ready to communicate. True for ome ofthe new la sguaculture, but nor forall of as you've seen over and over again in this book. Yet this isthe idea of how second-language learning works, in general, in much of the popular and professional imagi- Bar give this view its due. Part, na all, bus pare of the trip fom Cr co LC2 isa piece of cake. There's an easy correspondence be tween the two, because the frames con't change much, Just those laseminute bite of sound do, But what about the Austrian examples of Schmah and the Wald- heim affair, or my fist run atthe Mexican concepts of “truth” and “le.” These involve more than a last minute sound switch, They're the rch-poin ip of a frame iceberg, one chat connect the moment ‘of use co speech ats and fames for hstory and society that, in turn, ‘connect with other frames and other “ich points. When you need £0 write an aril just to start translating a teem like Schm, you're sealing with LCs and LCa frames that are very diferent indeed. In cases lke these, going from LCx and LC2 isa lot of work “The rich point call for heavy frame construction compared so what you arrived with, and communicative competence requis you 10 move ino those new ions and way thre whe ou alk and ‘Thete are several possiblities between simple and dificult, too. Much of the eelation between the old LCx and the new LC wil be somewhere in berween—not a simple surface jump, but not a move ito a brand new frame system, ethe: Sailors and miro a 1 keep trying to visualize this and I keep coming up with clay “The reason is, sometimes I write fiction, or try to, and T noticed ‘one day in Vienna that fiction writing was easier there, Ie was eas jer because T was stumbling ever decper into Austrian German, and fiction tured into a way to play with my native languacul- ture, something I missed, I realized that I could stand apart and Took at it in a way I hadn't before as something distant, some= thing hac wasnt the same thing as "me" I stared to chink of it as clay, raw material chat I could chrow onto the wheel and mold and shape. ‘So I'm stuck with clay, Say LC is represented by a cone-shaped mass of red clay, the lower end i the tlk, and as you go up, you ascend through speech acts and the frames chat represent fanda- rental premises about life and the nature of society and history ‘Say LC2 is a similar chunk of clay, only this time i's blue. The easy part of LCs learing looks ike lite flecks of blue at the bottom ofthe red cone, The hardest part of LC2 is flecks of blue at the bortom that connect with new chunks of blue molded ino the red cone you brought in with you. Mose things you learn in LC, though are changes here and there, fom the bottom of the cone 0 the top Infact, as you become communicatively competent in LC2, ‘the eed and blue stat to lend together, so that some clay will mix ted and blue and tern purple “This isn't avery attractive metaphor, an original single color cone gone lumpy ad multicolored through the addivon of new clay But che point of the metaphor int anesthetic one. The point is to break away from the idea that LCx and LC are separate entities afloat in some objective dish. The point is to stare thinking about ‘what happens inside the person who sails the MAR, who has the experience of culture who turns into an immigrant, who learns a few languacultore and acquires the ability to fonction in both the ‘old and the new one ‘What happens fo the immigrant? What happens to the person who blends LCr and LCa inside the same mind? IF Rushdie’ in migrant sensibility i the wave ofthe future, what kind of eeature are we breeding here? m250 LANGUAGE SHOCK ‘The clay, the metaphor I used to describe the blend of LCr and Ce, describes the immigrant, and immigrant i what we al have become. Even if you never move fom the house you were bora in, the structure of the world has changed so that different languacul- tures land at your door ‘The frst thing that happens to immigrants is they become aware ‘that there is, infact, clay. The next thing that happens, they seart patching on those litle Necks of blte atthe bottom and noticing diferences. Nothing in the red cone changes much, The new pieces ‘of language from inside the circle, the flecks of blue, are patched- ‘over spots for language forms that ate already ther. The diferences they notice are made sense of in terms of frames already inthe cone. Some immigrants stop there. Most popula images of what “Ian: ‘guage is all about stop there too. The immigrant can probably ‘communicate to survive, but thal be about it, He r she wil know, ina particular situation, chat this naan means that thing, and this verb means that action, so che two together mean that action on this thing. That's not so different—no surprise—from what inside- ‘thecircle linguistics offers—word mecnings inthe sense of reference, and sentence meanings in terms of propositional seracture, ‘What che immigrant won't havea this stage is how those words and sentences shimmer with associatians, connotations. What he ot she won't have is a sense of how to sonvers, argue, and tll le. ‘What he or she won't have isthe sense of who theyre talking with and how they see them, of how that specific moment tes in with all the others that go into the flow of dai life, of how the talk ts nto the society and the currents of history that lie behind it ‘What he or she wll have is langue without the culture. What he ‘or she will have isan ability to tal, but not £0 communicate, To ‘et to thae point, the immigrant has o tinker with the orignal ed cone, New clay has tobe stuck onto the side and molded into the original, with all those added lumps of blue and new steaks of purple ‘The ewo languacultures, LCr and LCs, wil stand in several dif ferent relationships. Sometimes they'll overlap without much tro ble, sometimes they'll blend together into something new that handles both, sometimes the’ remain distinc, because they'e just. $0 differen thar they cane be fi together. Some would argue thar the clay metaphor isnt just about LCr Sailor and tomigants as and LCi’ about modem life, or, more appropriately, postmodern life, The problem of postmadem life, the story would go, is the problem of unconnected languacultures, social identities that have Tost their mucual coherence, The problem isto live with all he frag- ments and find some way of putting them together ino a lif. I chink ‘that’s te, and think i's more and more true the younger you ae. ‘But then tha’ why the immigrant metaphor fees right. That's why Rushdie wrote of an immigrant sensibility to characterize us ally why Mead ealked about the kids of the sities as immigeans, ‘why Twas so caken with the metaphor when I lived in Vienna in 1989, Immigrants is what we ll need tobe to rll into the next century. “The number-one response is and always will bea possibilty. But in 1 world gone from disane to local through information and trans portation, the number-one philosophy will poduce conflicts that can't be resolved, ver Immigrants may not resolve the conflicts either, bur they'll at least be able ro recognize them, understand chem, and discuss them Ibfore the shooting starts. With any luck, recognition, understand ing, discussion, and action will make the shooting ieelevane, With ‘uti, the shooting is inevitable Immigrants won't salve problems of fundamental economic and political inequities, Languaculture isn't & magic wand that'll make historically rooted distrust and hatred disappear. Ie won't neutralize basic differences in moral judgments about right action and the na- ture ofthe just society. It won't make unjust and just plain wrong behavior disappear. ‘What i will do is cas languaculeual differences in a sympathetic light, ler the viewer see them as something other than a deficiency, show them in ll their rich interconnections wieh a way of living in 2 different word Languacultuce by itself won't eliminate problems. What it wll do is ler people see them for what they are. With al the tragedies in human history bred by powerful rections to problems defined in ‘number-one tems, a look atthe world through the eyes of sailors and immigrants coulda’ hur wase LANGUAGE SHOCK ‘The other evening I was talking to my kid brother about this book. Kid brother—he’s chiey years old. call him that to hold off the approaching horizon of time ‘At any rate, Tom, the medical technology sales rep and rock and roll drummer, is seriously interested in languaculure, He lives ite He and his French-Canadian wife Helme are bringing up my nephew bilingual and cultural, bilanguacsltural. He's also traveled—and will travel some more as che global markets continue t9 shrink to other lands to represent his compasy ‘Tom moves fast, ata business ace to a rock beat. He wants to know if this book will help him out. And it occurs to me that an answer to him isan answer to several readers. Yep, i wll help out He wants to know if i'l give him quick results, Depends on what you mean by “quik Earlier Iealled che book a “language appreciation course.” It's 4 tragic waste all the conflict and fear around differences in our ver more complicated, multicultural world. What I wanted to do in this book was show that there's nothing mysterious about ln sguacultural differences. They're located out there in the spaces between people, They can be found and handled, in terms of both structure and content, andthe snefs tothe handlers are mag> nificent. Dealing with languacultre stretches and extends them, toms daily life more interesting. Languaculturalditferences are fas- inating But—here comes the problem with “quick” —the book also shows that languaculeures are complicated things. Grammar andthe dictionary and speech acts ae just the frontend. When you startin ‘with a new languaculeure, when you start tangling with all those rich poins and fames, a life's work unfolds before you Le’s say Tom is heading for Japan. Would this book help him set ready fr che wip? Sure it would. Remember the rp I took to the art museum after the introduction to art course? Afer the course, I saw things in paintings Pd never seen befor. They were richer, more interesting, and I could articulate why. On his eip to Japan, Tom would notice things and have @ way of thinking about them. He'd look for rich points and cinker with frames. He’ alk 0 people—in English, of course—abour those things, Hed mturn having taken a fist step ‘oward Japanese languaculture, or a: last one version of i, but the a, Sars and Iomigrats ass step would be a short one along a path that stretched well Beyond the horizon. That's the good news. “The bad news is that this book would lead him to shake his head in despair atthe wsual way we think of preparing for an encounter ‘with Japan, An intensive course in Japanese? A week-long workshop in Japanese culture? If you think of it as a slow start on a long, journey, fine If you think of ita all you need to do, forget it. In fact, considering the business of variation, such short-term traning could well do more harm than good. “There's no fastfood approach to languacuture, none, ze0, nul, nada nichts, Worse yet person can use such quick fixes to think the languaculural problem is solved when in fact i’ intact. This ‘would change one, in the eyes ofthe work from genuinely naive to nave and self-deluded. No improvement there. ‘Languaculture is rch and complicated. But I don’t mean to be destructive of arrogant about this. Infact, chree specific recommen dations come to mind, all consistent with this book, all aimed at ‘smoothing the process of languaculture contact, none of them “quick” fixes, bu all of them aimed at quality. 1f Tom were heading of to Japan, here's three things he'd thik ‘of doing, after he tead this book 1. Hed know hat the space between him and the people he ‘was about to encounter made the Gand Canyoa Took ikea kane Crack, and he'd know why So, i he wanted ro handle tha pace, he woulda thinkin terms ofa iensivecoure ora one-week seminar, He'd look for a person ro doit fr hin. se, mentioned translators ad interpreters, o othe bila suscltural people. I said thir pet peve was the way the mono Enguacultural world looked at them as advanced clerks. Tom ‘would't make that mistake. He'd appreciate and respec the ex Temi lif cxperience and unique aiities they brought othe ask {eT ook on eins sh ok, Td poe or people wo deal with refuge mental heh. They gave me 4 bo {o read. One chaps in parole caught my terion. The write talked about how there are people brid away in the progam ‘reanizational char, usualy in low-level posions with nes that ave nothing to-do with the important role they pay. They are tilanguaculual mong the best educated of the refuge popua4 LANGUAGE SHOCK ion. What do they do? They do tansaton and interpretation, ommunity outreach, recruitment inervewsllow-ap and more fen than noe, therapy ax well, They athe ung lnguseltral heroes who make the program possible tall. Pepl ike ther are the quay “quick Sx," but they need to be recognized andre ‘warded for ther work TETom had read this book, fhe needed languaculurl el, he'd find someone who knew the spices beween, could navigate the distance from one ro another. He'd respect thir ard-von abi ites sen to thei advie, and pay them for thee hlp. Sch fob description isa cea ising ingent ia most organizations, ‘ronclly enough, Because many oranzatons already have the ‘people acked away in some othe jo. I's a terible waste t on derstand 3 problem, know tht thee are people who can elp fx it and gle the obvious next se, 12. Lets say Tom pote langasclural expert on the team, Bat stl e's ners in Japan. Maybe hfigtes el take a few ore trips He'd like wo sear leaning someting about the place without investing years of seudy in grammar and diconary, ever sind speech act before he sto content From reading this book, he'd thik of Lnguscuture instead of “language” and “culture.” He'd renembers with any Tock the many stoves tha elke about how, a ecoming communicatively competent, the clure half of langiaculur, the “frames” pare of “rich point plus fame,” i as imporant at, and ofen more im- porant thn, insdethe-cile ingusre detail ‘Tom would wonder about accessing some of the frames using his own grammar and dictionary. Though i's an imperetsluon, ‘he could aces quite lo, He could sad Japanese novels trans Javon and watch fle with subs, He could read books by Americans who have dediated thi list apaneie anguacatare and made a carer of developing frame bridges between the two Worlds. He could have conversations lod with lnguscultral {opis with EagishspeakngJapane: colleagues. Though he'd be hemmed in by his own language, he could il encounter sme eh Points and work o build new frames 3. Finally e's say Tom is fascined with Japanese languacl- ture, and he decides ota i oon fs on Fist ofall om this book he'd havea reali idea of the jb aead of him, Hed know he was setting out on a leon projet that he'd never ish Maybe tha’ par of what would ate hi othe idea inthe fst place a i Salone and Inmaigrats ass Hed have a fesime hobby, one that would organize much of his leur time, one that would pay off chy in erms of his personal development, hr profesional work, and maybe even hs Hd star in onthe Japanese language and keep working away tt As he go othe point rere the sie and the signified "tated coming tpsther where the Sch points and she fame could ‘be handled in Japanese, hed dive ino Japanese languaular. A ‘st o the Japanese section of Los Angles woud shimmer with ‘ventures and posites, Lunch wih Japanese oleago would prodace new pis of consciousness, Business ripe to Kyoto would havea depth that woald forever sence the TV in his room. Vix ‘avons ould be engi ofl hit deeper understanding of Jp Snes languaculce. Andy with time, with an ably to ve i the Space Berween languaclres, it ges without saying that his eo fesional opportunies would skyrocket So, my answer to Tom, and ro readers with his question, is chat this book offers ewo quick solutions. The fis is he'll appreciate how important and complex languaculturaldiferenes ate and enjoy ex plorng them withoue any unrealistic expectations of what he can fecomplish in ashore time, The sesond is that he'll look for @lan- {guacultural expert rather than trying a shoddy quick fx “The les quick solution lets him approach the frames, the cidrure past of languaculture, by working with Japanese material in English ‘And the lifelong project lays outa plan fora slow, high-quality tip inco the new languaculture, one thal ake time, But one that, with patience, will enrich and change him personally and professionally in ways he'd never imagined. w “Tom's specific question isan important one, one worth answering, ‘one I ask about things myself, bu i's very American. The psycho ‘fist Jan Piaget talked about what he called “the American ques- tion.” After he presented his theory of child development, talked bout how children go through diferent stages, a hand always shor up in his U.S. audience “sthere any way we can speed that up?” No, no elly, he'd explain. His theory had to do with biological36 LANGUAGE SHOCK stages, development that had ro take is course. Maybe you could posh the edges alte, but not much “Massive languaculturalditfeencr, ike those between Japan and the United States, can't be quickly bridged. But once you're inside a languaculture, your own ora new oe you've warked on for a while, ‘the task i'r quite so massive, The American examples I've used in ‘the book, the eak of variation andthe density of socal identities, make that case ‘One thing you can do, if you'e caught the languacultural bu, {is go 10 work, right now, within your own world. Thre ae plenty of different socal identities out there, differences in gender, in na- sionfethnicty, in occupation and special interest, in generation and lifesyle. Any'sate contains a numberof them. And you can access them, right now, because of an oveiap in grammar and dictionary and an overlap in ames. W's easy. Stat a conversation. you have trouble, you've hit your fist rich point. Once it start talk fora while and listen even harder. Rich points will pop up inno time at all. 1 guarantee it Hundreds of student have done it They leave class confused about the assignment; they return enthusiastic about what they've learned about someone else, about themse ves, about the space between them. Because of your languaculture bent, you'll ee the eich points a8 signals of frame differences thar you doa’t know about yet, differ ‘ences thal teach you about frames that you've never been con scious of, as well a6 nev frames you'll build thar you'd never imagined existed. From a selfish point of view, itl make life a hell of alot more interesting. From a social point of view, you'll help move the world toward an informed understanding of diferences. Languacultaral Aiferences are normal now, in everybody's fe, but so far we haven't handled them very well, Understanding them won't solve all the problems. But even if you don’t ike a new languaculture, even if you find it morally reprehenible—cven if chose things ate true at least you'll understand what it, not what you think it's not. m Soilors and Immigrants 357 | never know how to end a piece of writing. When the problem came up in a fetion workshop run by Mary Lee Settle, she just shrugged her shoulders and said, “You either kil them off oe may ‘them off” I guess my choice would be to mary them off, since this book tries for marriage more than for murder. Maybe i's the Aus trian influence, since the popular historical cliché holds that the Habsburgs buile their empire through the careful selection of & spouse for their children, "Now that I'm at the end of this book, ¥ semember afm dha ly Tomlin made. She was puting together a show, 50 she taveed to several cities 10 ty i out, charged minimal admission in return for the audience's comments and tolerance while they tried cut dif ferent routines, The film documented the tory of hove the show tradually took the shape that tdi ‘ight now I'm remembering a scene. She tied a comedy line bu didn’ ike it. Hee assitane came out, and they talked for a few ‘minutes about how to make some minute changes, ina single word, in the intonation, things like that. After they Finished, Lily Tomlin tured to the audience and smiled. “You thoughe we just came out here and did this didn't you?” Writing a book isthe same, A book i ts own eonclesion finished the final runtheough when Twas in Nevada City, where my kinolks live, and T knew that my mother and her frend were down atthe National Hotel, having a cup of coffe after din fet, $0 I walked down to say helo “The fiends son, Chris, rook off to wander the world afer he sraduated from college. He fell in love with Caeshoslovakia, stayed fnd taught English, and has now become a partner in a business there. “How's Chris doing,” I asked. “His Caech must be prety good by now." “Wel, Slovak, actualy," she said, “e's interesting. He says that the cultures are relly differen, but when he speaks Slovakian to (Czechs they don’ get upset. They've been depending on each other for too long, had lots of intermarriage over the yeas, le says their separation will work out okay, not lke Yugoslavia.” Her comment struck me as a pretty good conclusion, a story bout how deep-seated languacultural differences don't necessarilya8 LANGUAGE SHOCK lead to bloodshed if the connections are there. History and political ‘economics have handed us global vlage litered with socal iden- tives that are tearing each other apast. Hatred nurtured for genet~ ations and economic inequity won’ jst disappear. But the repairs ‘can't start without connections, wihout understanding another Point of view, without languacultare, Besides, the experience of cul: ture, the experience of secing your native lind in a new way and finding your way into another, i callenging, interesting, even— Serious as it might sometimes be—fus, T walked back up the hill after coffe, and another conclusion ‘came to mind. The program that sen: me to Austria when Twas a kid goes by the name ofthe American Field Service, AFS for short. Ir was founded by some ambulance divers who served in World ‘War I men who sranted to prevent sich slaughter fom ever hap- pening again, They hoped tht if students fom diferent lands lived ‘in another country, they'd overcome the number-one mentality and talk over diferences rather than shoot at each other. “They gave the organization a mort. We joked about it when we were AFS kids, and it docs sound a ile corny now, if not aaive, given what I read inthe papers and see around me every day. But 235 [insh this book i keeps coming > mind. Ie goes something like ‘his: “Walk together, talk together, people ofthe earth, for only then shall you know peace.” In the fist chapter of this book, I mentioned an independent trucker and twisted his words a bit © say maybe experience could fenerate a litle hope. I hope the experience of languaculture, the ‘stories T'¥e told inthis book, star afew more walks and ralks as "we guide the planet towards the nex: century. That’ 4 conclusion ‘we could lve with, Notes Nov if ime forte foes, Wriig Langage Sock was 2 please, ms of theta es bur the how of foomee makes he Beak out in sh Le tp inthe cadena of wring, here foros mater fortwo fxs Ft they ct our wk sre ileal foto forthe reader, eon, they pe cred bre rt By showing how te work of tes led YOU tows Theo as ured pole i th caren ef the intormaion explosion, tr sal» wordy eal Th Langage Sock ia a academic book. 1 meat ro convey away of hiking abot langancre ora who, th one; aves pent mis {Gne hegog sound linguist ansbrpoly, but who, onthe ther hand, how th pens a oye of oes ih ter lnguaclues om persona txpersnce, The problem ost paragraphs in ths bok could Be eed with FEnonca lence harsh whe he topic ce fom and emmempray et trent show the compat n what has ast beh ad bse about hits ood del baat care aout compe andthe work of ths bu Taso enoy corms of fda and important lea 0 ‘Caew toon who want a roel tap o he estoy bere they lng no ‘he des end to do both thi Bok: But now tht ma the ors, {be iene between the clea ao th prea ener pss ow ofthe depts We the Lach Nese mone She's wha im ging 1 ds The foundition stone ofthe Bok ave occ nbn ate diese by eam, For ich of them hy example of thr tot ced inthe note aed anyone with more rt at type his ame