'If' ...

Monday, December 16, 2002

Fire

"But I was taken by the assertion that the Japanese have a multiplicity of words for fire, so I checked my dictionaries. Sure enough, there were a hundred or more. (The Chinese character for fire is pronounced ka, hi, ho, bi or bo, depending on the context.) Some fire-related words:

kachū in the fire hisaki direction in which the flames are spreading hosaki flame tips kataku house on fire kasai conflagration kaji mimai sympathy visit after a fire kajidoro thief at a fire kajiba scene of a fire hiyo(ke) protection against fire hibashira pillar of flames hidaruma mass of flames hiashi spreading of a fire hiusturi catching fire kasei force of the flames kaen fire and smoke kanan'yoke charm against fire shōka, boya small fire yamakaji forest fire . . ."

. . . more

:: comment :: . . . though never blinked before have read Jonathon Delacour regularly & it is an honour to finally have the opportunity to thank him for his fine discourses . . .

12:28:22 AM

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language death

"We should care because languages are interesting in themselves. As Adult Education and Universities of the Third Age are increasing in constituency, there has been a considerable demand for language courses. I have been fascinated by words and languages all my life and have lately undertaken the study of Coptic through the University of the Third Age in Canberra. I have also been engaged in teaching languages and linguistics over several decades and am constantly surprised by the number of people who share my own fascination for language studies.
Ultimately we should care, because language is the most valuable single possession of the human race. (p.66)
Why do languages die?
In most cases, languages die as people die, especially people in a small community. Languages can also be murdered as the result of a deliberate political stratagem. David Crystal quotes part of a play, Mountain Language, by Harold Pinter which very clearly illustrates the dictatorial process:

'Your language is forbidden. It is dead. No one is allowed to speak your language. Your language no longer exists.' (p.86)"

:: comment :: . . . am working on Mountain Language with students . . . a plunge into the language of silence . . . the silences shape the dominant ideological power . . . questions haunt with so many unspeakable, yet knowable answers . . . too terrifying . . . utterances beneath the breath . . . please stop it . . . why is it so easy to speak this playlet and so hard to continue the performance research . . .

12:20:50 AM

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Thoughts, wrote Nietzsche, are shadows of our feelings: always darker, emptier, and simpler than these. And the written word, it strikes me, is but a shadow of our thoughts.

Proust wrote: "The only true voyage of discovery, the only really rejuvenating experience would not be to visit strange lands, but to possess other eyes, to see the universe through the eyes of another, of a hundred others, to see the hundred universes that each of them sees."

"In everyday life 'if' is an evasion, in the theatre 'if' is the truth. In everyday life 'if' is a fiction, in the theatre 'if' is an experiment." Peter Brook -- The Empty Space

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