Language and us - Part 1

This person gave a very good comment with regards to whether "Language shape what we think?"

The comment was based on this article in Scientific American.

I think this is missing the point of how language impacts thought because it's too specific.

Language and culture impact the way things are considered. English is very unstructured. We make up new words constantly, change the meanings of words as we go, and really do what ever we want to the language to get across an idea. English speaking nations are also generally good at coming up with new things, re-inventing technologies and ideas. We're not terribly good when it comes to the detail of those ideas.

German is a very structured language. It's quite flexible, but the way new things are done is methodical. Words get longer and more specific and refined meanings are tacked on the end. That same structure is evident in the way Germans approach problems and solutions. There's an essential desire to be specific in a result. Most of the German engineers I know would rather not do something then do it in an inelegant way -- where the American engineers I know will solve a problem any way it can be solved, and worry about refining it later.

The Japanese language is highly structured and very finely detailed. The smallest nuance can have a big impact on meaning in spoken, written, or gestural language. It is not, however, very good at re-inventing itself for new ideas or concepts. In fact, most technology words end up being from other languages even if they come from Japan. This shows up in their engineering as well. They're amazing at taking a new concept and refining it, detailing it, and pulling out its essentials to put in an extremely efficient net package. I believe the 'exactness' of their language helps them communicate in a way that complements these traits. There's no vagueness at all.

Obviously these are archetypal social traits and examples will be freely found that don't match -- but there is a reason archetypes ring true on a broad basis.

One question I have though, is which comes first? Does language impact culture as I've described, or did language differences as described result from those cultural traits?

This lead me to the question: Am I what I am as a result of me speaking English or thinking in English?

I don't think I am "English" but totally am Malaysian. The English language is totally part of me being Malaysian.

More on this later

Thinking about Marcel Proust

I am studying Marcel Proust.
His name came up during a "facebook chat".
It was by accident.
I was texting on Annie Proulx but my co-chatter thought I mentioned Marcel Proust.
I looked him up being vaguely familiar with the name. A philosopher I would think. Perhaps French by the sound of it.

I read a review on his work (see link)and am intrigued about what Proust has to say. The reviewer said:

Transitional though it may be, ''In the Shadow of Young Girls in Flower'' contains the dramatic, glorious entrance, along the seaside boardwalk in the Norman resort town Balbec, of ''la petite bande,'' the little gang of budding girls led by Albertine, who will become Marcel's passionate, obsessive focus of interest later in the novel. As he immediately recognizes, with both excitement and anxiety, the girls represent ''that extension and potential multiplication of self which we know as happiness.'' But he recognizes also the impossibility of ever fully possessing Albertine: ''My desire for her was desire for her whole life: a desire that was full of pain, because I sensed it was unattainable.'' In the pursuit of that unattainable, Proust gives us an extraordinarily detailed chronicle of desire as exploration, as suffering and as knowledge.

And I also found a quote in a another website:

Desire makes everything blossom; possession makes everything wither and fade.

It is extraordinary that Proust set out to explore a human condition, which is abstract, such as "desire", and produced a novel based on it.

I haven't read Proust, but I am intrigued nevertheless by Proust's approach.