An Audio-Visual Garden of Weeds

Fun fact: the original title was "an audio-visual weed garden" but that would have raised questions not answered by the post.

Outside my window I have a weird little garden. Two under-pruned and overgrown money trees, a bougainvillea, lemon balm started from a cutting that fell onto my casement from an upstairs neighbor and is now taking over my house. Hipster-approved succulents because I can keep those alive. A snake plant because they're difficult to kill.

And weeds: I'll sometimes leave out pots of unplanted soil and see what blows in. On one side I have a big ol' fern because a fern seed decided to grow there. On the other edge, I have an unruly crown-of-thorns, again just a weary traveling seed that likes my windowsill enough to stick around.

I don't have any specific goal for this window or these weeds, for whom I am now an adoptive plant mom. I figure that if a random plant is going to choose my window as a good place to grow, it's probably going to be very easy to grow. As a black thumb, that works out great for me. 

I'll let you decide what this has to do with language learning, but in my own weedy head, there is a connection. 

Soon after I wrote my last post on learning Armenian and Taiwanese at the same time, I signed up with the Armenian General Benevolent Union (AGBU) free online beginner Armenian class. Brendan joked that I could fuse both languages into some sort of new tongue, and that one language would be more efficient to study, but I thought taking an online course would be easier. 

While imperfect -- there was a lot of Audiolingual style drilling, some of the language and grammar points went by far too quickly with inadequate practice, the tests were far easier than the content, and I hardly had to speak at all -- it was something I had to do every week, which pushed me to commit to studying. It improved my letter recognition quite a bit. It was highly audio-based: pictures, yes, but mostly listening to other people speak Armenian and choosing appropriate words, pictures, or sentence completion items. There were online meetings, but it turns out that Yerevan time is not very convenient for me in Taipei. I still scored 100%, because again, the tests were too easy. 

Հայերեն շատ դժվար է, բայց ես լավ ուսանող էի:

For much of my class, however, I wondered one thing.

Why isn't there a free online Taiwanese course? Why aren't there several at different levels?

I could imagine the descendants of Taiwanese who immigrated abroad might have some interest in that, if they didn't learn the language at home, or didn't learn it very well. Foreigners who live in Taiwan or those around the world married to Taiwanese might also find it of interest. Perhaps not many will go on to seriously study the language to gain high-level proficiency, but perhaps that isn't the point.

It's doubtful that the AGBU expects everyone who takes its free courses to go on and become fluent speakers of Armenian. Most of my cohort were, like me, diaspora with an interest in the language of their ancestors that they did not speak. Will some association that parallels the AGBU in Taiwan ever decide to offer this for anyone who wants to sign up?

It wouldn't result in a cohort of fluent speakers, but it might help with awareness that Mandarin is not the only language in Taiwan, and in fact is the newest language to be introduced (forced) here. It would promote Taiwanese identity as something separate from Chinese identity, and help clarify that Taiwanese is not a "dialect" of Mandarin; it is a language, mutually unintelligible with Mandarin.

This would serve slightly different purposes to the AGBU courses: nobody except perhaps Azerbaijan is going around saying Armenians are not a distinct group of people with their own history and culture. I don't mean that in an ethno-nationalist way; whatever you think about borders, it's just true. AGBU is trying to connect սփյուռքահայ like me with their roots. While anyone is welcome to join, they don't seem to necessarily expect that non-Armenians will do so in great numbers.

A free Taiwanese course could have this goal as well, but also attract non-Taiwanese (like me!), spreading cultural awareness beyond Taiwanese communities here and abroad. Again, to offer a first step for people who are beginning to realize that Mandarin is not the end-all and be-all of language in Taiwan, and is certainly not the only option. And it would probably be more effective than ICRT's We Love Hakka for the Hakka language!

It would be amazing if other languages of Taiwan could start this up too. A free Hakka course? Cool. A free Amis For Beginners course? I would take that, honestly. I'd sign up for Atayal, Paiwan, or any of the others, as well. Language preservation efforts are underfoot in those communities already; I'll let the experts speak about whether or not that would be feasible or useful. 

I suspect most foreigners who come to Taiwan would still learn Mandarin, because it is a lingua franca, at least in Taipei. And many don't quite have the anti-CCP sentiment that I do; they likely figure Mandarin will be more useful globally than Taiwanese. And they're not wrong! But wouldn't it be great to give people more of a choice and get that minority who isn't learning a language purely for its utility? 

Beyond that, I just think Taiwanese sounds better. Goa khòa* Tâi-gí bō sim-míh ho-kóng, m-ku chīn ho-thia*! Words like koai* (to close) and cha-hng (yesterday) are fun to say because they're almost entirely pronounced in the nose. It's also much better than Mandarin at short replies. I don't know how to write these, but the ho, heh and hei-a are much more fun than “是的” and "好"! And I'd much rather say chhong-sía than 幹嘛. It packs more of a punch.

Honestly, for Taiwanese, the hardest part was finding a teacher. I started when I did because that was when a freelance teacher was recommended to me. Some of the Mandarin centers offer Taiwanese -- a friend of mine took a course at TMI, but they aren't widely advertised and I can't vouch for their methods.

In fact, a big problem with both Armenian and Taiwanese is that teaching methods are quite outdated. TESOL has been going on for years about communicative approaches -- this is a broad set of methodological principles that can involve Natural Approach, immersion, lexis-based or task-based methods -- and Mandarin seems to have just now figured out that communicative approaches work better over time than drills and tests. You may remember (?) that I quit Shi-da's Mandarin Training Center many years ago, mostly for this reason. I simply could not with those old Practical Audio-visual Chinese textbooks, lack of authentic speaking practice and demented over-testing. Nevermind their blue bent, and  that I got sick of the heavy lean towards standard PRC Mandarin. 

But my Armenian textbook, which I'm working through now that my course is over, is still a fully grammar-based notional syllabus that only hints at certain functional uses for the language. The design makes it readable, it doesn't overload with new vocabulary, it explains grammar fairly clearly, and has review built-in. But fundamentally you're still doing exercises and translations before creating your own sentences. The dialogues are inane ("How are you today?" "I'm not good." "I am good. And where is the French Embassy?") but it still hasn't taught me useful things for actually visiting Armenia like, say, "how much is it?" or "I'd like lahmaçun, sarma and a Coke Zero, please". 

My Taiwanese textbook is even worse, made bearable only by my lovely teacher, who adds as much actual language practice as she can and only tests rarely. It was typed out, likely by hand, sometime in perhaps the 1980s and doesn't appear to have been updated. It's Maryknoll, created by Christians to teach missionaries, and as such it does weird things like teach you the words for minister, priest, nun and monk before you ever learn how to address a woman (the minister's wife, however, makes an appearance early on. Lots of wives in this book, not many single women who aren't nuns).

There are essentially no comprehension tasks; it's composed almost entirely of a dialogue (some weirder than others), extensive vocabulary notes, and then some grammar notes. There are a few translation exercises at the end of most units. My comprehension is tested only because my teacher tests it. The book never does. 

The actual materials are really no better (and are in some ways worse) than the old Practical Audio-visual Chinese books that I hated so much, but I'm more motivated to learn Taiwanese -- yes, it's political -- and I like my teacher more. She doesn't go around like my old MTC teacher being all "我們中國人"! In fact, I think she'd rather drop dead than say anything of the sort.

Though the whole "we Chinese" business was my MTC teacher's right to say -- we can all identify how we please -- that's not how I feel about Taiwan, and to me that's not a helpful way to gain a closer perspective into Taiwanese culture, society and language. 

Other materials exist: my friend who took a Taiwanese course at TMI used 生活台語 and called it "okay". Chieh-ting Yeh (a friend of mine) and Alice Yeh wrote Harvard Taiwanese 101. Phillip Lin's highly inconcise Taiwanese Grammar: A Concise Reference is a solid reference material. 

Not a lot beyond my Eastern Armenian coursebook exists for Armenian. Reviews call it "innovative", and I was touched that when you buy it, the author mails you a copy herself from Yerevan. But really, it's just the best of a very limited field of otherwise terrible textbooks. 

Neither textbook, Armenian or Taiwanese, seems to have much in the way of visual aids. For Taiwanese, it's a good thing I speak Mandarin, as my teacher won't use English, because the book will pretty much never support you with pictures. On the upside, learning Taiwanese has been the biggest boost to my Mandarin in years. Have you tried to learn a third language through your second language? It's a real trip.  You get better at both. It helps that my teacher is a fierce gossip, offering all of her political opinions and deets on her annoying neighbors.

The result of these two modes of study -- one online weekly with a teacher, and one almost entirely at home or in a cafe by myself -- have led to two very different areas of proficiency in each language. My Armenian writing is so much better because all I really do is write. I have a much bigger lexicon because it's easier to look up whatever I want to know. With Taiwanese it's always a question of whether and how a tone changes, and whether it's rendered in some obscure character I can't really read, or Pėh-ōe-jī. I'm more limited to whatever is covered in the unit. 

And the current Taiwanese unit, by the way? "Would you like a smoke?" "No thanks, I don't smoke." "If you won't smoke, then please have a banana!" 

But with Armenian, I can hardly speak. I know what it should sound like from growing up hearing it, but I don't have anyone to practice with, and I won't for awhile. The grammar is complex enough (it has cases! Like Latin! Murder me, please!) that I have to stop and think before I create even a sentence. Taiwanese as fairly smooth grammar, so it tumbles out more easily. It helps that I can use it on a mostly daily basis.

My Taiwanese lexicon is much smaller, but I'm a far more proficient speaker. And yes, I know how to ask how much something costs, and I'll likely understand the answer. 

The main issue as I navigate my two baby languages is lack of extensive reading. I'm not exactly a Krashenite; I don't believe that extensive reading and listening are the only keys to fluency. But they are one very important key to fluency, and one I'll also admit I've fallen down on vis-à-vis Mandarin. In Taiwanese it's just a lack of literature I can read. My Armenian reading is much better,  but nowhere near the ability to actually read what interests me -- a key issue with the idea that extensive reading for pleasure is the only meaningful way to gain fluency. What if you can't yet read what you would normally read for pleasure? It's the eternal question of adult beginners who aren't engaged by materials for children but can't yet read, say, a novel. 

As I wrote the last time I covered this subject, I fill that void with music. It does work; I can look up lyrics so I know what is being said, and gain a clear idea of how the language sounds and flows together. It's not enough, but it'll do for now. It's a good thing I genuinely like the sound of Fire EX, because they comprise most of my Taiwanese listening practice now, with Ladaniva doing a lot of heavy lifting for Armenian. 

All of this leads me down a winding, weedy path of where to go next, and why. Like a pot of dirt left out to the elements, I don't have specific goals for either language. Whatever grows there, grows. I'm learning one language for heritage reasons, the other mostly for political and cultural ones. Or rather, both are political, if you take the view that choosing to learn a language at all, especially not for utilitarian reasons, is a fundamentally political act. If I wanted to learn a language that would be helpful in Armenia but more broadly useful, I'd have chosen Russian. Any foreigner in Taiwan can tell you that the language of greatest utility is Mandarin. I've decided I don't care. 

Even my Taiwanese friends will sometimes say they aren't concerned with whether their children learn Taiwanese because it's "not useful". It is, though! What about befriending your elderly neighbors? Getting people to like you in the south? Sealing a sale or contract where relationships matter? Making a clear point about the cultural and historical distinctness of Taiwan? Not necessarily wanting to be understood by Mandarin speakers? Those are all technically uses.

One language I might be able to use in daily life soon (I've already started incorporating it), the other may never be used that way. For Taiwanese, I may never achieve full fluency, but I might be able to use it in a majority of my daily interactions, and it does make a point. Maybe that point is this white lady is crazy. Maybe it's hey, there are foreigners in Taiwan who care about the country beyond a place to live well and make money. Maybe. After all, my Taiwanese teacher has said all of her students are foreigners. None are local Taiwanese. She charges a bit more than a typical tutor, and still has clients. Clearly, the interest is there. 

For Armenian, who knows. I find myself at a խաչմերուկ -- an intersection. There are a lot of weird things about this language that I want to better understand. Which bits seem to have non-Indo-European origins. Words like խնձոր (khndzor, or apple) came from somewhere, and no one knows exactly what the Hayasa/Urartu/Ararat people spoke. Why does every other language in the region call a couch a sofa, divan, settee or canapé, but Armenian calls it a բազմոց (bazmots)?  

Here's what I envision: perhaps never full fluency, but online classes once I get my dental situation sorted out (don't even ask). Then, a savings account. Approximately ten to fifteen thousand dollars. In...let's say...2025? I hop a flight to Yerevan, rent a short-term apartment, sign up for language classes and a conversation partner, and go live my life in Armenian for three months. If I save, I can probably afford three months, no? There are all sorts of things I missed the last time I went to Armenia, including the extremely old and fascinating dragon stones, cuneiform tablets, petroglyphs and weedy, overgrown fortresses.

I have a hankering for the unspeakably ancient, and now I can do that հայերենով --  in Armenian. 

Brendan's already on board with this, and would come to see me off. After all, he liked Armenia too. 

The Two-Tongued Pretender

 

"Բարեւ Ձեզ սիրելի կամավորներ: Շատ ուրախ եմ նսրից հանդիպել ձեզ,"  Anna says. She goes by Anna, not Dr. Sahakyan. 

I understand and nod. I'm not a volunteer, not in Peace Corps, and not in Armenia, but the language course videos are online, so why not? 

"Այսօր մենք սովորելումենք ինչպես հարցնել ճանապարհը:"

Now I freak out -- I don't understand this at all. The first twelve videos were introduced in English, but the actual volunteers learning Armenian with Anna have materials and live online sessions, which I do not have. I suppose by the time they get to this point, their service has begun and they're far ahead of me. I figure out what she just said using logic, educated guesses, an Armenian keyboard and Google Translate.

At least my pronunciation seems fine, because I'm able to recall and imitate what my grandfather's generation sounded like when they met for the holidays and had throaty, velar conversations from which I was completely excluded. But I don't really know. There's no one to check if my ը is schwa-y enough or my խ sufficiently tubercular.

The video ends and I set a reminder to transfer my messy notes to the neater record I keep. I reach to the right and grab my Taiwanese textbook. We've had a few lessons, all of which have focused on mastering pronunciation. I expected the tones to be difficult, but they're not (yet). It reminds me of all the musical training I'd otherwise forgotten, and anyway it's a similar principle to Mandarin, just...more of it, and harder. 

It's the the k and g that get me: I can't hear the difference, so each is inconsistently produced. haven't learned a single actual word that I can remember, but I dutifully listen to the recordings and parrot along. Someone's going to check, and Ms. Deng has struck me as rather meticulous. 

Both methods are strikingly Audiolingual. Armenian has to be; how else does one deliver asynchronous online sessions? You can't teach communicatively without someone to communicate with. For Taiwanese, I suspect it's partly based on how Mandarin is taught (that is, very traditionally), and partly because most of Ms. Deng's students are hopelessly Indo-European: they need and expect the pronunciation support. I'm told by a friend who also takes lessons that she'll be happy to practice speaking authentically once I'm able to speak at all. 

Still, Armenian starts with conversation: Hello, how are you? I'm fine, you? I'm fine, thanks. What's your name? My name is Anna. And you? I'm a teacher. I'm a volunteer. Communicative methods aren't embedded in Armenian; they went through centuries of inefficient teaching and learning modalities just like everyone else. The method is Anna's doing.

Armenian also has something called the trchnakir, a Medieval illustrator's avian dream, in which the letters of the alphabet are rendered as brightly sinuous bird bodies. I know the difference in learning style has nothing to do with that, but there's something poetic in thinking of one of your new languages as music, practiced like I quacked those first notes on a trumpet years ago. I had to learn to read music, of course, before I could do much of anything. It was months before I played a real song. The other is the organized chaos of a watch of nightingales, a murmuration of starlings or a charm of finches. You just up and go.

(Originally from this tweet)

Taiwanese starts with a, á, à, ah, â, ā, å (I made that last one up; my keyboard won't type the actual diacritic). Do all that, then you can have some words. We go over it again, and yet again, until Ms. Deng is satisfied with my ability to stumble around in her language. 

"Okay!" she says. 
"Okay," I laugh. Just okay.

Okay, but why am I doing this? Do I enjoy elaborate constructions of linguistic masochism? (A little, yes.) Why both? Why now? Why these two hilariously unrelated languages? At the same time?

One is about the past, one is about the future, and in both, I'm a pretender. I speak neither language yet, though I can make sounds which imply I kind of do. Generously, I am a small child in the body of an adult, whose tongue can thrash around like a baby: goo-goo gaa-gaa barev dzez, inchpes ek, shnorakalutiun yev hajogutsyun Զեփյուռ կդառնամ, մեղմիկ աննման: Սարերից կիջնեմ, նստեմ քո դռան. Cháu chháu kâu gâu pōng bōng ng hng ióng hióng 在這個安靜的暗暝, 我知道你有心事睏袂去, 想到你的過去, 受盡凌遲, 甘苦很多年。

Neither my Armenian nor my Taiwanese is that good, but I understand those lyrics. One of the ways I bolster my motivation is to listen to music I like in languages I'm studying. I look up what is being said, even if I'm not ready to truly learn it yet.

I chose Armenian because I simply felt I had to. For too long, I've acted like a victim of the heritage language denied me, all those ideas and modes of expression that nobody thought important enough to pass on, a cold wall between all those relatives who thought their opinions, ideas and perspectives didn't matter enough for me to understand them. My great-grandmother died when I was 14, and while we had real conversations, I can't say we ever had full, deep, real ones. I both knew her and didn't. 

This memory resurfaces every time a Taiwanese acquaintance reveals that they could barely communicate with their own grandparents because their generation was raised in Mandarin but their elders barely spoke it.

Being a linguistic victim sucks, though, and it doesn't even suck in an interesting way. I'm unlikely to ever be fluent, but if I can have an understanding and some basic Armenian conversational skills, it'll be a victory. Just because my grandfather made a decision in 1953 doesn't mean I have to abide by it. I think it's necessary not just to connect with my heritage, but to move my own story forward as well. As far as I know, I'm the only Renjilian of my generation who decided to re-learn, however imperfectly, what was lost. 

I have no such ancestral connection to Taiwanese. I moved here at the age of 26 for no specific reason: it just looked like an interesting place to be. I stay for a thousand reasons, which deserve their own post. Whatever connections grow from learning this language, they are entirely in the future. I don't know that I'm trying to prove that Taiwan is actually my home now...except perhaps, I am. 

Still, I feel like a fake. My family spoke Western Armenian (the last native speaker died just this summer). I'm learning Eastern, because that's what's available. As for Taiwan, well, I consider this my home but I'll always be seen as something of an outsider, no matter what language I learn.

It turns out that both Armenian -- especially Western Armenian -- and Taiwanese are somewhat inaccessible; both suffer from a dearth of teachers and materials. There are days when I have to tamp down annoyance that I have to work for a heritage language I should already know, and a local language I began learning about 15 years too late.

That's a long time to put something off, so I felt a strong need to start now. Not in a year, not after I'd gotten some Armenian under my belt, and not until I could improve my Mandarin (as I used to tell myself). Now. If I wait too long, I'll wait forever.

The inaccessibility is a bit seductive, though. Many have the opportunity to learn Mandarin. Who is so lucky as to have an experienced Taiwanese teacher dropped in their lap by recommendation? I have to learn it via Mandarin, which frankly provides more motivation to improve said Mandarin than I've felt in years.

Armenian is the same: most Armenians speak Russian as a second language, and the diaspora all have other tongues now. Russian is more common as an offering -- how many have the patience to practice Armenian from Taiwan, with no feedback and no real reward? I'd be surprised if there were six Armenian speakers in the whole country! 

Both languages need more speakers: Taiwanese was the target of an intentional campaign of eradication, and even today is insultingly classified as a dialect despite being mutually unintelligible with Mandarin. Unsurprisingly, Taiwanese is an endangered language. Western Armenian is endangered as well, and I'm unlikely to be able to access it unless I learn Eastern Armenian first. 

Neither language is widely considered useful: I've already been advised to just stick with Mandarin -- or worse, to spend my time practicing Simplified characters. I blanch at the thought! I've also been told to just learn Russian as I'll get more utility out of it.

That's just fuel, though. I'm sick of the utilitarian argument. It's a privilege to be able to float around in languages that aren't international, that you don't need for anything in particular. But it's also what draws me.

Maybe I have something to prove or I just like learning "useless" things, but I'm not doing this for utility. My intrinsic motivation to learn Mandarin died awhile ago; I persevered because it was useful. I was never a huge fan of the politics of it. Yes, Taiwanese has a settler-colonial history too, but it should have never been suppressed the way that it was. In any case, most expats come to Taiwan expecting to learn some Mandarin. Some succeed, some don't. How many come and decide to learn Taiwanese?

I know more than one, but there could be -- should be -- even more than that. 

As for Western Armenian, it should still be widely spoken across Anatolia. But it isn't. You know why. 

With opinions like that on why languages are worth learning, who needs usefulness?

And yet, blue eyes in Armenian culture portend bad luck -- they're said to be more susceptible to the effects of the evil eye (I think this is why charms against the evil eye across the Mediterranean are blue). Yeghishe Charents even wrote of it -- Blue-Eyed Armenia. And here I am, a blue-eyed white lady learning two wildly disparate languages and wondering what bad luck might await. 

The worst possible outcome is that I make a short study of both, learn neither well, and they enter the dormant part of my brain where French and Spanish are buried. Just another person who "took a language class" but never actually learned the language. Or I'll try and try but never master tone changes in Taiwanese, and always be stuck sounding like a tortured goose. Or I'll go to Armenia again, someday when it's safe, and proudly try out whatever Armenian skills I've gained by then only to be laughed at because my pronunciation sounds more like a series of sneezes than comprehensible language.

I also wonder, given the endangered status of both languages, if I'm actually helping by being a new person -- something of an outsider -- interested in learning. Or am I just rubbernecking as both languages fall, like birds shot out of the sky by the KMT, or the Young Turks?

As China amps up its provocation and bullying of Taiwan and Armenia stands on the precipice of invasion by Azerbaijan, am I doing anything meaningful by learning Armenian and Taiwanese? It strikes me as a statement: I will help preserve what you are trying to destroy. But am I really helping, or indulging myself? I can't help but think it's closer to the latter.

And yet, I keep practicing pronunciation until Ms. Deng moves us on to actual words. When I feel I've done enough, I head over to Youtube. Anna's classes are a challenge now, but if I'm tired I can always watch Bopo children's television and learn colors, or animals, or whatever.  

Perhaps I'll never succeed at either language. Perhaps Armenian won't lead to whatever window on the past I'm looking for. Certainly, learning Taiwanese won't make me a local. Neither language will lead to a better job, more money or even many conversation partners. But it's worth it.