Author Archives: seijif

It’s a Blog!

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Open Topic: Nisbett and Coordinate Learners

While I’ve grown up somewhat in-between cultures, I’m definitively more American than I am Japanese. This last article, by Nisbett gave me a framework with which to describe my placement on the American-Japanese spectrum, as well as explaining some interesting phenomena I deal with as a heritage learner with intermittent Japanese exposure in my childhood. Nisbett described a difference between individuals who learned an L2 later in life as coordinate learners and those who learned roughly at the same time as their L1 as compound learners. While Nisbett’s discussion focuses more on differences between coordinate and compound learns for cognition, what I found to be the most interesting was that coordinate learners appear to process information notably differently depending on which language in which it is presented. This is definitely something I have experienced, although it’s very fluid for me. There are something that transfer across very easily and something that I process more distinctly in one language as compared to the other.

I’ve spoken with my other half-Japanese friends at length on this topic, so it was nice to see it in literature.

Final Reflection

This course has greatly helped with JPN 410 (grammar), which I taking concurrently, as there is a degree of topic overlap. EALL presents these ideas in basic structure, where JPN 410 – at least for the subject matter that overlaps –  elaborates on it in great detail. As I have never taken linguistics before and have no formal background in the subject, this overlap during my first quarter at the University of Oregon was greatly beneficial, as it helped me build some foundations.

I really appreciate how often previous concepts are brought back into class and elicited from students. My psychology professor in Community College stressed how important it was to do elicitation tasks for memory recall for studying to improve connectivity to memories, and it was nice to see that put into practice in a teaching setting.

Getting to practice the basics of linguistic data analysis and writing in a relatively low-stakes setting was also very helpful. I found the background research I did for my papers actually increased my interest in those subjects.

On study tasks, I realized that I recall readings in much more detail if I read them the day before, within a few hours of going to bed, rather than trying to pre-study and cramming them into the weekend.

The UO Welcome Graphic

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Writing

As shown in class, there is a welcome graphic doors near the fishbowl at the EMU.

However, I noticed that this same graphic is used on a small print out that I’ve seen a few places around campus.

I decided to see how many places I could find it. I limited my searches to the entry floor/1st floors of the buildings I picked.

This first one is by Mckenzie 201, right outside the Cinema Studies office.

In expected fashion, there was also one posted inside the Yamada language center, but I didn’t want to intrude just for a photo.

I found another one of these framed graphics on the research desk of Knight Library.

I did not find any on the first floor of Lillis, but I may have missed them.

My last location I checked was in the science commons. Walking through Klamath Hall, I spotted the graphic on the foor of the General Science Advising/Marine Biology Advising center.

I deliberately left out the ones in Oregon Hall because that was almost too obvious a place.

It seems as though these welcome graphics appear more frequently in contexts more closely associated with students for who their L1 is not English. Additionally, it also seems to occur more frequently around offices associated with broad students services that are focused on intra-university items.

Reflection

On the Material

It was really intersting to look at how metaphors can be culturally relative, resulting from differences in cultural and societal development. I wonder how metaphors used in different culturals are influenced by different religious traditions.

On Learning

I find it is most helpful if I read the article the night before, so that it is fresh in my mind, but also not brand-new. Assignments are somewhat similar. It works best for me I give the homework a go early after it is assignded, step away for a day, throw out the first draft, and then start over. I think it helps me sort my thoughts, but I’m sure if that’s it.

I struggled a bit with the dimensions of Chinese politeness, as it was much more complex and discrete than Japanese or American politeless, the only two I am really familiar with.

Hello Class! – Seiji

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On Me

Hi all! My name is Seiji Furukawa (say-gee, like gee-whiz) and I’m a Japanese Linguistics major transfer student. I’m originally from the Chicago suburbs, but I ended up in Spokane Washington during high school and spent 3 years at Washington State University studying Economics and Finance. I’m half-Japanese (my dad’s Japanese), but only conversationally fluent.

I spent my summer helping run and plan a 3-week ESL summer camp for Japanese Junior High and High School students from Okinawa Japan. It was my third year working the camp and probably the last, but it was a lot of fun.

This is my first quarter here at University of Oregon and I really don’t know much of anything about the area. I went to the Japanese Student Organization’s first meeting on Thursday to meet new people, but also really because I needed to ask where the best Asian Market was.

I have a lot of hobbies, but I spend most of my time on two of them:

Cooking (Traditional Japanese Kelp Stock Soup)

 

 

 

 

 

Italian-Style Pasta:

Recording Music

My main interest in East Asia stems from my father being Japanese. Since I was born and raised in the United States, I don’t have the familiarity I wish I did with Japanese culture and history. I’m also interested on an academic level, discovering what shaped East Asian cultures and how these factors can have obvious but surprisingly non-linear impacts. Career-wise, I’d like to go to grad school for second language acquisition or Japanese Linguistics because I’m interested in specifically studying the efficacy of current English teaching methods in Japan, as I’ve observed some very broad teaching method and curricula issues in that area.

On the Class

The number of loan words across Japanese, Korean, Chinese is fascinating. I understood to a degree – due to the presence of Kanji in Japanese – that Japanese and Chinese had significant contact, but I didn’t realize just how much language contact had dictated the formation of new words across these languages. I think the course structure builds upon itself well, with lecture and the readings being very well connected. The class doesn’t really challenge how prepare so much as being in a new school does. As a transfer student, being at a new and different University really revitalized my learning efforts and helped me correct some less functional learning strategies I’d fallen into. Certainly, having a class structured as well as this helps enact those changes though.