“No One Could See the Colour Blue Until Modern Times”

-This article is about perception and how it’s evolved. It talks about how before,  the color blue was not seen and how it became “discovered” to what we know now to be as blue. Basically saying do you actually see something if there’s no name for it. 

-This was my favorite article to read, because I love the unknown. This reading questions so much that we do not usually think about day to day. There is a graphic of green squares and it asks which is a different shade. I was unable to differ between them. Something that was even stranger to think about is where Gladstone counted the references to each color in the book and black and white were mentioned a lot whereas other others such as red and yellow were mentioned very little and blue not at all.  Regularly I see the color blue, like looking at the sky. Do you think people didn’t see the color at all, or just didn’t name it until later. Like was it evolved? These are questions that puzzle me. 

The CCCC’s article “Discourse Community”

-This is a very short article on what discourse community means. It also gives a significance section to say how it is significant to us when writing and questioning our own work. 

-This is the article that first introduced me to the term Discourse Communities. I immediately related it to UCBA and many other organizations. I took it as people who share common goals working together. It is very widespread and common however it is  not necessarily something I have thought about until after reading this article. I didn’t know what the term meant so I never really associated in depth what it meant when people work together and want to achieve similar outcomes in a similar setting. Looking back to this article I think about the profile project we had and how The Coalition I wrote about works together. I want to know if there’s other terms for smaller discourse communities within a larger discourse community. Like are there different types of them named I guess?

“Mother Tongue” by Amy Tan

-In this article Amy wrote about her mother who spoke Chinese and broken english. Amy talks about how living in a family with broken languages seemed to be a limitation but that actually there is a deeper understanding. She mentions how this language shaped the way she sees the world and how it affects her and her family.

-Firstly, I read this article out loud. There are parts where she quotes what her mother says when speaking in broken English. When I was reading it my family clearly knew what I was saying even though there were things missing and out of order. I was going to say I don’t know how people don’t understand it,  but then I thought I easily comprehend it because my grandma speaks broken english regularly because she is hispanic. Going off what Amy says at the very end, she says her mother said her writing was very easy to read because of how she had written it. I think it’s a way of understanding people and how they perceive languages. Sometimes people don’t comprehend or understand to a full ability and so we made these modifications or broken languages. They’re a way of communication which can easily be understood to them personally. Many Americans do not speak a second language or at least I do not know many that can, so I see these broken languages as a step further and an attempt to get your point across when learning a new language. 

How Language Shapes Our Perception of Reality

-Vivian Giang describes different ways in which language has made us question our perceptions. She includes some examples which have an impact on how we perceive things such as words, grammar and metaphors.

-In the article Vivian mentions how in Russia they have multiple words for different shades of blue. Kind of like how we have pink and red but really pink is red just lighter. I immediately related this back to the first article “No One Could See the Colour Blue Until Modern Times.” Both readings are based on perception and mention that studies say you are unable to see a color until there’s a word for it. I find it so hard to wrap my head around. Also in this article she says that people in Brazil and the Amazonas do not keep track of exact quantities. It is something I would like to experience once, to go to a country that has these different language perceptions and see how my understanding would kick in. 

Also, out of quarantine purposes, I have read these articles to my family just so they feel a little mind blown.