Hi! Language and culture are tightly connected. Language is formed by culture and culture is influenced by language.
One great example of the connection between a language and a culture is these so-called “untranslatable” words, or words that lack direct equivalent in other languages, as I prefer to say. Let’s take an example. The Finnish word “sisu” has no direct equivalent in other languages, but it is often translated as “guts”, “bravery”, “resilience”, “hardiness”, or “grit”. If you don’t know about Finnish culture and history you won’t truly grasp the meaning of the word and what it means to Finnish people and their national character even if I provide you all those words that kind of describe it but not really.
Another example would be the Japanese words “本音” (honne) and “建前” (tatemae). Jisho.org translates them as “real intention; true opinion, what one really thinks” (honne) and “face; official stance; public position or attitude” (tatemae). These translations probably don’t say much to you unless you know about Japanese culture, behaviour patterns, and communication styles.
Another example of why language and culture are connected are jokes. You may be advanced in a language and understand every single word but still not quite figure out what was so funny about the joke that was just told to you. If you understand the culture, you’ll understand the sense of humour the people of the culture share and you’ll understand the jokes. This applies to memes as well.
Understanding the culture is not only important for understanding “untranslatable” words or jokes, but also important for avoiding misunderstandings and conflicts. In the beginning of my Japanese learning journey I used to make a lot of Japanese people uncomfortable and even get into conflicts with them because even though I was speaking their language, I was acting like a Finnish person. I didn’t understand what they were really thinking because I didn’t understand their culture. Now that I do know about their culture and understand their communication styles I can adjust my behaviour and language in such way that it doesn’t make Japanese people uncomfortable anymore and I haven’t gotten into arguments with them anymore – in fact, I have gotten a lot closer to them because if I speak to them in their language and act in the way that they are used to they trust me.
There are a lot of great quotes that describe how important it is to learn culture along with learning the language but one of my favourites is “the person who learns language without learning culture risks becoming a fluent fool”.
If you’re looking for more proof or information just google “language and culture” and you’ll find a lot of great articles that probably explain it much more
elaborately than I did. Hope this cleared it up a little though!
People have no idea what I do to try and help the planet. They have no clue the lengths I go to to live in an environmentally friendly house and to minimize my impact on the earth.
I even wrote a god damn article about environmental activism vs performative activism in the Zero Waste movement, and gave examples on how to live a more eco-friendly life.
It’s ugh, it’s whatever. People are going to complain no matter what. At least I’ll be hydrated while they do it.
Are y’all five and can’t drink from a glass without a straw?
I have profound nerve damage in my face and throat that prevents proper muscle function. I also have cfs and other muscle problems. I recently discovered that using straws helps to alleviate some of the pain and difficulty out of being able to drink fluids, because it puts less strain on certain muscles. This means that for the first time in over two years, I have been able to finish a glass of water without choking. So no, not five. Just very fortunate to be alive.
Have a good day, and I hope life is kind to you.
Truly unfortunate. Get a washable reusable metal straw.
As I have explained many, many, many times in the last 48 hours, this is not a feasible option for me, or many disabled people like me.
If you would like to know more, here is an informative video with captions to explain it:
Ha, I was just talking about this the other day with an editor friend, weird.
It depends largely on what kind of relationship I have with the author, and whether this is someone coming to me for in depth editing and consult, or someone who states outright all they want is a final line proof.
Most of my clients at the moment, tend to be people who come to me and go “I don’t know what the heck I’m doing please god help me!”, at which point I explain what kind of services I can provide.
For some of them, the idea that you can have an editor go back with you from scratch is a new concept. Developmental editing is not something they are aware of, and for many it comes as a relief to have someone go “actually upon reviewing this, I can see what you are going for, but if you are open to suggestions, I think you could expand upon [AWESOME FEATURE] by pursuing this”
(Which is why charging a reading fee is paramount to understanding what you are getting into before you agree to a project.) (Also shout out to the people who help me do this with Phangs, because yes, this happens to all of us.)
Which means you still get to give your input, but you’re not just taking away the manuscript from the author and fixing it for them like a frustrated parent taking over the diorama because it’s just easier to do it yourself.
That’s not what your job is.
Your job is to help the author be the best they can be, and sometimes that will involve a little hand holding. And occasionally a bout of tough love when you need to convince the author that while this is a scene/moment they are fond of, it’s hindering their dialogue/plot/character development. Some things belong in the character drafts to better help the author get a feel for the character. That doesn’t mean the reader needs to see all of it. Those moments can be hard to realize on your own.
When I want to suggest this type of editing, I am very open and up front about how much it will cost, but stress that I am willing to work with the author over X amount of weeks/offer discounts/payment plans, to achieve this goal, because I want to see them succeed.
Some people think it’s a money grab on my part, but most recognize it for what it is—a professional offering their experienced opinion and skills for a price, which in theory, the author should recoup from the increased sales their work will garner from being an overall better finished piece.
Those who think it’s a money grab, will usually also be offended by the idea that their work as is, is imperfect and needs that kind of attention. They don’t want you for that, you’re just supposed to fix the spelling, how dare you suggest their baby is flawed etc etc etc. Those are people I don’t want to work with anyway, so I wish them well and decline to work with them. I have other clients who need my time and are happy for my attention to detail in their work.
Others will simply say “no thanks but can you still fix the typos?” in which case, yea sure, I’ll do a basic proof. A gig’s a gig.
It might rankle at my personal sensibilities to let something “imperfect” go out into the world, but *shrug* what you think of as bad might be gold to someone else. I sit and correct the grammar of famous published authors in my head while reading sometimes. That doesn’t mean the book is bad, it just means it’s not my style.
And it’s important to realize when something is bad, vs when something is simply not your cup of tea.
I’m fortunate in that I’m a consummate mimic. It’s something I’ve always been somewhat able to do when it comes to writing and was able to hone it over the years. It made me a valuable asset for when it came to ghostwriting. But it also means you’ll rarely see the seams between where the author begins and the editing ends in a book I’ve worked on. (Sometimes it’s obvious and incredibly jarring, and that is bad editing.)
A lot of bad editors don’t or can’t do this. In their head they are right, right, right and if you deviate from what they deem to be a good style, you’re a Bad Writer. Which is just blatantly not true in a lot of cases.
If you can’t style match, or the style is too jarring for you to work with, then this is not a job for you. Be honest and tell them that, and if you can, maybe suggest someone you think will work well for them.
There will also just be instances where something is a minefield of problems, and it’s up to you whether you want to put the time and energy into unraveling it all.
Learning not to take on work is also a vital part of retaining your professional sanity and energy, particularly in freelance where it sometimes feels like you have to take any and all jobs you can get your hands on just to keep afloat. Trust me, I’ve worked on things I hated just to pay the bills, but I did so, hopefully, with detached and inoffensive professionalism. I’m very fortunate to find myself in a position where I can occasionally decline work if it seems like it’s going to be too much of a struggle just to make something legible.
Actual love triangles are polyamorus triads and y’all can quote me on that.
You’re also right and should say it.
Yes see this has always bugged me because a triangle implies both ways at all three points
A polyamory triad: a group of three people involved in a mutual relationship involving all three of them. Almost… a triangle of love… if you will.
A polyamory V or “hinge”: Person x has two partners Y and Z.
Y and Z are aware that X is dating both of them, and are totally down with this arrangement. They are not however interested in each other either sexually or romantically, but may be good friends through their association to X.
Not polyamory:
Two people competing for the affections of one person, who is attracted to both of them but can only choose one. Usually accompanied by unparalleled drama and hurt. So more like a Y really.
As in Y is this toxic shit so God damn prevalent in romance and YA fic, urgh.
Personally, I’m really excited in the research being done in literary polyamory, esp by the likes of Joy and other queer romance authors, and hope that the romantic hypercube may become a reality in my lifetime.
Phangs was started as a direct challenge to bring down the toxic love triangle trope. That and my unhealthy inability to shy away from pun based challenges and vampires in general.
I know this, and I love you, you’re an inspiration.
Literally, I started publishing short stories here because of you.
Holy shit I thought this was a joke but look at the lyrics
Rick Astley literally threatens to murder the president of the united states with a crossbow is not something i ever thought i’d see but i’m quite happy i did
I started thinking about it before Amok Time aired.
In the summer of ‘67, watching the reruns of the first season, I very clearly remember a growing sense of, “They really love each other.” I did not jump to “they are in a romantic/sexual relationship,” but I was increasingly aware that there was love and devotion between them. I wrote a speculative essay about their platonic love in our summer fan club newsletter, which I remember being well-received.
With the start of Season 2, our whole fan club (and often others) watched the show together, at the house of the one person we knew with a color TV. The show was on Friday nights, so we would start the weekends by piling into her living room and watching “in living color” for the first time. Afterwords we would stay and discuss.
When Amok Time aired, we definitely had a lot to talk about. I am pretty sure no one suggested that they were gay – that would have been quite a scandalous suggestion at that time; and I don’t think I thought it myself. But we did have quite a discussion about how much Jim was willing to sacrifice for Spock, Spock’s reaction to seeing Jim alive, and what did Spock mean by “having not so pleasing a thing after all as wanting…?”
Did Spock … want Jim?
Two camps formed: one believing that Spock was in love with Jim and was pining for him, the other believing no way! that’s ridiculous!
Single copies of “Spock pines for Jim” stories started appearing and being circulated hand-to-hand. Two other women and I were doing most of the writing in my circle of fan friends, and because distribution was so difficult, we started having Thursday night gatherings. Anyone could come and we would read the latest installments in our Spock-loves-Jim stories out loud to the group.
Sometime between the second and third season, my primary writing mentor – an established, published sci-fi writer who was much older than me – told me in private conversation that she thought their love was mutual, quite possibly physical, and that she thought their relationship was worth exploring in writing.
She and I each started working on long pieces exploring the Kirk/Spock relationship, and it was the first time I had seriously entertained the idea that their love was also physical. That was a very secret project. We only ever shared our work with each other for comment / revision, and never mentioned it to anyone else at the time.
The first time I realized that the K/S relationship – which was called “The Premise” in those days – was being explored by other writers and even artists was in the summer of ‘69. Star Trek had been cancelled and I went to another state to meet with a handful of people who were forming a fan network to try to get Star Trek back on air. While there, a fellow fan showed me a set of drawings, all very tame by today’s standards, that depicted a physical relationship between Jim and Spock. I remember how shocked I was — not by the subject matter, but by the fact that someone had dared depict it.
Slash stayed very much underground until late 1974, when the first published K/S story used very coded language to suggest a love relationship between them.
Additional history note, for people who aren’t aware of it: In 1973, homosexuality was removed from the DSM (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorder) as a mental illness. Before that time, it was officially listed as, and treated as, a psychiatric disorder, like schizophrenia: a condition that requires treatment, with the goal of removing it, or minimizing its effects if that wasn’t possible.
How happy someone was with it wasn’t important – it was considered a disease. Anyone who was happy being gay was considered to ill to realize how damaged they were.
Claiming that Kirk and Spock might have those feelings for each other was a hard clash against mainstream psychology. It was a very controversial opinion, because it meant not only looking at the series and saying, “I’m seeing a relationship that I’m pretty sure the writers didn’t consciously intend,” but also, “oh, and the entire AMA and the combined wisdom of its doctors are clueless about how human relationships work.”
Believing that two people of the same sex could have a healthy, loving relationship was an act of defiance all on its own.
I see that this post is trending today, so I’m going to take this moment to reblog it myself with the important addition of the comments from @elfwreck (Thank you for these, @elfwreck !)
I’d like to add a bit more historical context myself. Until the 1970s, years after TOS had finished its run, sodomy was a felony in 49 out of 50 states of the US – a felony which was punishable by prison or death. Throughout the 60s and into the 70s, I can remember reading carefully-worded news stories about gay men being arrested and given decades-long prison sentences.
For being gay.
Think about this for a moment. When TOS was on the air, not only was a white man kissing a Black woman a crime in a third of the country – but one man in a consensual, loving sexual relationship with other was committing a crime so serious he could be imprisoned or killed in everystate but one.
I’ve seen tags from people and received questions about why Spock and Kirk were not allowed to be out on TV, since they were so clearly in love. This was not remotely possible at that time. The average American understood a man who loved another man to be mentally ill and his behavior to be criminal.
@elfwreck put it beautifully above: “Believing that two people of the same sex could have a healthy, loving relationship was an act of defiance all on its own.”
In the early years of writing slash, one had to be very, very careful about who knew you read or wrote such material. Women and men both went to jail for violating obscenity laws. Just letting people know you entertained the idea of “The Premise” of K/S love could (and did) have people openly questioning your mental health, your morality, your character, your ability to do your job, and the safety of children in your presence. I know a woman who lost all rights to visit her own children in a divorce, when the court found out she had K/S slash material in her home.
so my school had this thing called “senior skip day,” except that senior skip day didn’t exist and every year the administration sent out emails in the spring that were like DON’T FUCKIN SKIP CLASS OR YOU WILL RECEIVE RESTRICTION (restriction was like, my boarding school’s equivalent of detention where instead of staying after school you had to go to bed early and help stuff envelopes advertising the summer program until your hands were BLOODIED AND CRIPPLED BY CARPAL TUNNEL) and every year the seniors were like YOLO THEY CAN’T PUNISH ALL OF US!!!!!
spoiler alert: yes they can? THEY ALWAYS CAN.
200 years of american high school and teenagers still think that there is a cap limit on kids in detention and that you can leave after 15 minutes if the teacher doesn’t show up.
anyway, my senior year, we all got together and nattered at each other until some brave soldier (i feel like it was my friend paula but WHO KNOWS) was like “OK SENIOR SKIP DAY IS THIS THURSDAY!!!! NOBODY GO TO CLASS OR UR A SCAB.”
she didn’t say scab because she’s not from the 1920s and we aren’t newsies, though this story would be way more interesting if we were
what she said was “YOLO THEY CAN’T PUNISH ALL OF US!!!!!”
except not yolo because it was 2009 and drake hadn’t been invented yet except as a dear sweet boy in a wheelchair.
we also used this email system to communicate with one another that has very deeply informed the way i understand email and which probably makes it very frustrating to be my friend and receive emails that have subject lines like “URGENT” and then just 42 links to the same florida georgia line youtube video.
I’M NOT ASHAMED, but in that way where like i kind of AM ashamed so i’m really aggressively NOT ashamed?
so the day of reckoning rolls around and my alarm goes off at 8 (class started at 8:05 but i liked to PLAY WITH FIRE when it came to being late; my mom actually asked the school to stop emailing her when i was a sophomore because i was late so often that their rote “Mrs. Ofgeography we are emailing you to say—” was CLOGGING UP HER INBOX and she was like “i GET IT MY CHILD IS THE MOST BORING MISCREANT OF ALL TIME.”) and i looked at my roommate elle and she looked at me and went, “you going?”
“hell no,” i said. “YOLO. they can’t punish all of us.”
elle, who was far prettier and far cooler than i was with the notable exception of her obsession with tswift’s “love story” and her tendency to look at the endangered species list and cry sometimes during study hall, quickly bizounced across the street to this shopping center thing where all the cool kids smoked in secret where huge trucks dropped off clothes for the Dress Barn. i think there were also tennis courts nearby. more importantly there was this chinese food delivery place and a lil restaurant that made HELLA BAGELS.
WHAT KIND OF BAGELS?
FUCKIN
HELLA.
off goes elle! meanwhile i’m like, “yessssss i’m gonna use senior skip day to watch 14 hours of tv shows and eat frozen peanut butter bars that i stole from the dining hall! I’M GONNA LIVE LIKE I’M 23 ALONE IN CHICAGO ON A WEEKEND WHEN MY ONLY PLAN IS TAKEOUT AND CUDDLING WITH THE FAUX-SNOW-LEOPARD BLANKET I WILL ONE DAY SURELY OWN.”
of course, during this time the administration was continuing to send out emails that reminded us with increasing urgency that senior skip day was NOT A THING and that we were ALL GETTING RESTRICTION if we didn’t get our STUPID ASSES TO CLASS, GODDAMNIT, WE ARE NOT RUNNING A CIRCUS HERE.
but i was like! yolo, motherfuckers!!! i already got into college, YOU CAN’T TOUCH ME.
at some point during the day elle and our friend ginna came back to the room with takeout from the chinese delivery place and we sat on our floor eating it and probably watching veronica mars or looking at the endangered species list and crying.
all of a sudden, elle said, “guys shut up, guys shut up, GUYS SHUT UP,” and ginna and i were like, “WHAT we have a LOT to SAY about FRIED FUCKING DUMPLINGS, ELLE,“ and elle said, “did you hear that?”
“hear what?”
“that!”
‘that’ was the sound of one of our dorm moms, mrs. f, knocking on doors and saying things like, “IF YOU DON’T GET YOUR BUTTS TO CLASS IN 5 MINUTES YOU’RE ON CATEGORY 4 RESTRICTION FOREVER.” elle quickly scampered up our raised beds to hide in the corner, where a tiny human like elle could actually hide from view; i leapt immediately into what we called a closet but was basically a cubby with a flap that was DEFINITELY not meant for a 5’8” individual with knobby as hell knees.
our door, which was never locked because we both hated the effort of typing in the lock code, opened. mrs. f said, “mollyhall?”
i held my breath.
i should add here that i seemed to be operating on like a scooby-doo level of logic where basically i thought that she was somehow NOT ALLOWED to investigate?
like, if she can’t see me, there is NO POSSIBLE WAY that she could prove i’m in here, right?
she’ll just poke her head in and be like oH GOSH NO KIDS HERE and leave!!
you can see the flaw in my logic.
mrs. f sighed. “mollyhall, i know you’re in here, i literally heard your voice ten seconds ago.”
there’s no WAY she guesses i’m in the closet!!!
“mollyhall, i know you’re in the closet.”
NO YOU DON’T
I AM SCHRÖDINGER’S SENIOR
“mollyhall—”
there was a creak. mrs. f stopped. it wasn’t actually a “creak,” so much as this like, prolonged groan? like it’s the sound an elephant would make if it sat on a really large accordion.
i poked my head out of the closet. mrs. f looked at me. elle sat up.
i said, “where’s ginna?”
YOU KNOW WHERE GINNA WAS.
“um,” said elle, “she’s in the—”
GINNA NO
ginna yes.
i really wish i could describe the sound the ceiling made when it collapsed. it sounded a lot like the way losing your breath feels. i sort of remember ginna falling in like, really slow motion, like i could see the expression on her face. i didn’t really think about how i would describe this in words. ginna’s face said:
oh no.
what have i done?
this was a mistake.
i regret a series of decisions that i have made.
is there a way out of this?
are those oreos under mollyhall’s pillow?
why are there oreos under mollyhall’s pillow?
mollyhall, you HAVE a food cupboard, what good is a food cupboard if you don’t—
oh, crap.
she belly flopped onto the floor. i mean, the girl bounced. and then she just laid there. mrs. f looked at her. elle looked at her. i looked at her, still mostly in the closet. we were all going to get category 4 restriction forever.
ginna said, “hi, mrs. f. i feel like i should explain.”
The Colin Mochrie story? Gladly. This is a good story.
So I go to this college, and it can best be described as a little weird. It desperately wants to be Cambridge, but it’s not Cambridge, so it takes out its frustration with not being Cambridge on weird collective mockeries of Cambridge stuff. So far so good.
One of these weird mockeries is the debate club.
It’s hard to even properly call the Literary Institute a debate club – it is a club, and it does debates, but the debates are 100% stand-up comedy in a parliamentary format and the other half is bullshit pantomiming. For instance, every year at matriculation, the club drunkenly rushes the stage, interrupts the ceremony, and calls everyone in the audience a horse’s ass (occasionally while quoting Dune). It also puts on a yearly event called ‘Tuck-Ins’, in which people in the dorms can sign up (or sign their friends up) to have the entire LIT burst into their room, give them bedtime snacks, give them bedtime beer, sing some bedtime songs, and tell them a bedtime story. Except, the LIT never does anything seriously, so the bedtime song was always Barrett’s Privateers and the bedtime story was almost always something we called ‘The Rat Story’. Let me tell you about the Rat Story.
The Rat Story was a piece of… literature… that a LIT member dragged out of the dregs of the internet many years ago. Nobody knows where it came from, and my efforts to find it again were unsuccessful, but good lord, it was bad. It was a page-and-a-half-long Hermione/Wormtail (rat form) smut fic and it was awful.So awful. I’m cringing just thinking about it. It’s the worst thing I’ve ever read, and at this point I basically know it by heart. We read it aloud, from the poorly worded introduction to its horrible closing line (AND HE SCAMPERED AWAY WET! STUNNED! AND THRILLED!) dozens of times in a single night to unsuspecting students. It was an experience.
Now you might be wondering how Colin Mochrie fits into this.
So, one of the other things my college does powerfully and often is pretension. We are the most pretentious college you will ever see, and our college clubs are proof positive of this. Every year, various college clubs send out dozens of official-sounding letters inviting our various favourite well-known-people to attend our meagre college events (I, as president of the James Bond Society, personally invited Barack Obama, Sean Connery, and the Queen to our AGM). However, this year the Comedy Club was riding particularly high, and it sent out quasi-sincere invitations to speak to a variety of Canadian comedians.
And Colin Mochrie showed up, one fateful Tuck-Ins night.
He gave a talk, which was very good, but noticed as the talk finished that many students were rushing away to something in an awful hurry. We explained that it was the night of Tuck Ins, an important and sacred college tradition and that
We would be delighted if he would join us.
And that, my friends, is the story of how I found myself crammed in a dorm room with 20 other people, listening to Colin Mochrie describe Peter Pettigrew’s rat boner to a couple of second years who had no idea what they were getting into.
I’m not tolerant. I don’t tolerate anything. I’m not tolerating you.
Fascists are people too, yes. And some people deserve to be punched in the face. People who want to commit ethnic cleansing, for example.
Fascism came first, then antifascism. Also, if being punched causes you to commit genocide you’re a bad person who deserved to be punched in the first place.
You are very passionate about defending fascists for a “liberal”. You might give someone the wrong idea talking like this.
Next time I approach a fascist it’ll be with a closed fist. so fuck right off, sympathizer.
If you message me again with this disgusting pro-fascist bullshit you will never be allowed to interact with me again. Anarchism is about liberation, not putting up with some half-baked nazi prop.
“Oooh, why can’t we all get along?”
Maybe it’s because they want to murder me for being gay and trans, you fucking pile of trash? Why don’t you go talk to the fashits about love and tolerance?
As a former Liberal I understand the struggle, so I made this handy flow chart to help out!
rip tumblr 