[geeks] New Tech Schools: Digital Harbor in Baltimore

[Micah R Ledbetter]

Sandwich Maker wrote:
> " From: Sridhar Ayengar <ploopster at gmail.com>
> " 
> " Sandwich Maker wrote:
> " > " The linguist in question is Finnish, and once told me (about Hungarian)
> " > " something like "the rhythms and lilt are dead ringers for Finnish - if
> " > " I don't listen to it, it sounds like Finnish, but if I pay attention, I
> " > " can't make out a word of it".  A rather disorienting experience,
> " > " apparently.
> " > 
> " > it would sure freak me out.
> " 
> " I had an interesting acid trip once, where I could still easily 
> " understand the grammar and syntax of English, but I no longer could 
> " understand any of the words.  (vocabulary -> 0)  I could really only 
> " think in my native language, Tamil.  With great concentration, I 
> " reconstructed the word "friend" in my head in English, and as I kept 
> " concentrating, more and more of my vocabulary came back.  It was an 
> " interesting experience to be sure.
> 
> fascinating!  iirc these parts of language are physically in different
> places - broca's ares, wernicke's area, others?
> 
> and you'd think the brain would use the same areas for generation and
> parsing of sentences, right?  not so, apparently.
> 
> it is possible to dysfunction so that you can understand language but
> not speak it, and vice versa.  

This was some of the most interesting stuff I learned in Intro to 
Linguistics... it seems completely bizarre to me, almost enough that I 
want to hit myself in the head really hard just to see what it (the 
language dysfunction, not the head trauma) feels like.

  - Micah