Colourless Green Ideas Sleep Furiously

I've taken Semantics Class years a go. But if I'm not mistaken, that was the very first time my lecturer, Mr. Diding, informed me that "Thank you in advance" or "Thanks beforehand" is not common in English. I already knew that "Thanks before" is really "Indonesian English." But I didn't know that the more common version of it "Thank you in advance" is also uncommon in English.

At that time, I just accepted what he said without researching more about it. But today, my curiousity came back in sudden. I googled "Thank You in Advance" and I have found out that "Thanks in advance" is not "only" Indonesian English. It is also a custom in Spain and Russia to say "thank you" even before someone does a favour for us. But definitely, it is not a custom in English speaking countries. They only say thank you after they really receive the help.

And my conclusion from this little research is... I find there's nothing wrong with the phrase. I think there's something wrong with English native speakers. How come they don't say thank you when they know that other people will take an effort in order to help them?

And I think this shows how popular the concept of empiricism in England. they don't think people help them if they haven't received the "actual" help from them.

Well, if you're English native speakers... No offense. Really I just find it strange not saying thank you in anticipation for other people's effort for us. But again, maybe it's because of cultural differences.

"Luna has told me all about you, young lady. You are, I gather, not unintelligent, but painfully limited, narrow, close-minded."

- Xenophilius Lovegood (Luna Lovegood's father) to Hermione Granger -

Well, for people who have learned philosophy, you probably know that there is always a never-ending war between two general perspectives of truth: empiricism vs. rationalism.

In short, rationalists believes that something is right if it rationally makes sense, even if you don't have any evidence to prove it. Meanwhile, empiricists believe that something is right if you have a living proof in reality (not only in your mind). In other words, one has its center in your rationale and the other has its center in the five senses (anything you can see, smell, touch, taste, and hear).

In the past, rationalism was popular in France while empiricism was popular in England.

....... No wonder there's always a sense of competition between the two countries.

This has always been problematic. In some cases, rationalism is not always right. For example, in English Grammar: rationally, the correct form is "you weren't sad" instead of "you wasn't sad." But in fact, there's in an evidence that there was a native speaker who said, "You said you wasn't sad to see her go." (That native speaker was Alex Turner from Arctic Monkeys when he sang the song "Bigger Boys & Stolen Sweethearts"). The rational rules made by the native speakers was destroyed by the native speakers themselves.

So in that case, rationalism is proven wrong.

However, there are many cases in which rationalism wins over empiricism. Take Galileo Galilei as an example. He was executed because he rationally initiated the idea that the earth is round, and he even rationally supported Copernicus' idea that the sun is the center of the universe. At that time, he couldn't find a living proof to strengthen his arguments.

Years later, when people have discovered many things, when people could take a picture of the earth and the solar system, Galileo and Copernicus' ideas were proven right. Empiricism was proven really limited due to humans' incapability of sensing something really faraway from them.

So in this case, empiricism lost the battle.

Now, what does it have to do with Hermione Granger and Luna Lovegood?
Well, as you know, both of these smart girls hardly get along in terms of ideology. Ms. Granger called Ms. Lovegood as "Loonie" Lovegood because she believes in some magical creatures that can't be seen by ordinary wizards/witches. Ms. Lovegood, on the other hand, considered Ms. Granger as "narrow minded."

I think Ms. Granger is an example of a conservative empiricist and Ms. Lovegood is an example of an eccentric rationalist.

Well, in the Harry Potter series, Ms. Lovegood was proven right because finally Mr. Potter could see the "invisible" creatures. It only takes some different perspective for Mr. Potter to be able to see them. *well, at least that's what J.K. Rowling tried to say. I think somehow she supports Luna over Hermione.

For me, I used to be the loyal defender of Hermione Granger. The way she studies, the way she resolves problems, the way she answers questions in the class.... they all remind me of myself, when I was in highschool. And when I was a Maba. I always want the evidence first before believing in something (except when it comes to my God and my religion, I prefer to use my faith and my rationale in believing it).

However, lately, after 3.5 years studying Humanities (actually, I'm not sure whether it has anything to do with this), I think there's a "Luna" that was born in me. When I meet some eccentric people from my faculty, with their various different kinds of point of view, I feel like I could think much wilder than I used to. Those people have taught me to see "beyond" what I see. I'm not saying that I don't believe in a living proof. I'm just saying that this "Luna-syndrome" has made me realized that there are things that cannot be proven empirically or even explained rationally. There are things beyond what you see, as Rafiki, the wise monkey from the Lion King once said.

And I can't explain it further in a more ordinary living written words. You know, it's rationalism. Hahaha.

Language is a process of free creation; its laws and principles are fixed, but the manner in which the principles of generation are used is free and infinitely varied. Even the interpretation and use of words involves a process of free creation.

Noam Chomsky

The father of modern linguistics, should I say? He used to be a psychologist, before moving on further to linguistic studies. Now he studies politics with linguistic perspectives. I adore his interdisciplinary approaches. I'm really interested in his psycholinguistic theory about the language acquisition. The idea that we, humans, have a blueprint in mind containing knowledge about language. Okay, this theory has been criticized a lot. But at least, this theory has opened a new perspective on linguistics, that language is not simply a part of learning that involves human efforts, but also a part of God's secret that still can't be resolved until now. Chomsky pointed out mystery of languages that can't be explained rationally. For me, this shows that language is supra-rational, beyond our knowledge as a limited creature. And that shows there are things beyond us that our mind cannot reach. Language is one of them.

Again, these are just my thoughts and feelings on my current life. If you think they're crap, you may leave for your own good.

I have always felt that I never fit in almost anywhere. I could only get a long with several people, in my real life. Even in the internet, I couldn't be as outgoing as other people. The bad news is... some people think I'm arrogant, impolite, and ignorant because of that. Some people even consider me as a cold hard bitch, because I don't seem to care about other people.

These opinions have been really affecting me lately. For in working life, people think I don't meet the requirements as an UI graduate. I am not outgoing. I don't talk much. If I talk much, I cannot talk about things that could please others. I don't sound smart. I don't look smart. I'm lack of sociability. I cannot convince other people to at least listen to my arguments. I cannot start cool conversation with other people because I hardly share the same interest with most people I just met. I am not a Ms. Up to Date who knows every entertainment happening news. I like to talk more about history than future. I am a boring person and am easily bored by people. I am not confident in expressing my opinions, and when I finally could raise my confidence, people find that I am far too "loud". I don't know, I just get the sense that no matter what I do, either speaking up my mind or just keeping silent, people will still despise me.


In short, even If I graduated with good GPA and even if my lecturers were happy about my thesis, I still feel that I am not one of those qualified UI graduates.

I guess I will stop pursuing prestigious jobs, then. Being a teacher is already fine by me. I don't want to feel any more useless in other fields due to my lack of sociability. I know my capability. I can only speak fluently in classrooms (well, even in the classroom, I guess people wouldn't want to hear much about my opinions. But I love classroom activities, so I don't really mind being looked down on as long as I could do something I really like).

But I still put my hopes on studying abroad. Even if I would probably feel more terrible to adjust myself with people from other country, I still want to study a lot of things related to language and linguistics.

I want to find out more why there are people like me, who cannot communicate very well with any kinds of language. And I hope by mastering linguistics, I could apply what I've learned in the real life so that I could fix my relationship with my social environment. All my life, I've always had a terrible relationship with the world because I cannot communicate well with the world. It's so weird, when I really love to learn language but I don't love to communicate with it. I guess competence and performance are two really different things*.

Maybe I could put these ideas in my study objectives for Fulbright application. I know these ideas sound stupid, but that's what I feel from the bottom of my heart. That is the reason why I really want to learn language.

*For more explanation: In linguistics, Chomsky distinguishes between "competence" and "performance." To make the story short, competence is any knowledge you have in mind about a language (the pronunciation, the grammar, the vocabularies, the idioms, etc). While performance is the actual realization of how you use the language (your actual writings and speech). Sometimes these two are just too different. A person may know everything about a language, but in fact, they may be weak in the execution.

Kali ini saya ingin membahas tentang sebuah konstruksi aneh dalam bahasa Perancis.

Jadi, sebenarnya konstruksi kalimat aktif dalam bahasa Inggris kan:

Subject + Verb + Object

Nah, kalo dalam bahasa Perancis itu konstruksinya malah begini:

Subject + Object + Verb

Contoh dalam kalimat:

Kalo kita mau bilang "Aku menelepon dia"

Kita bilangnya begini dalam bahasa Perancis:

Je (Aku = Subject) + Lui (Dia = Object) + Telephone (menelepon = Verb)

Tapi ada pengecualian dalam bahasa Perancis. Pengecualian ini terjadi pada ekspresi "I Miss Him."

Kalau kita mau bilang, "I Miss Him" dalam bahasa Perancis, kita malah menggunakan verb "Manquer" yang memiliki arti "to be lacking" atau "to be missing"

Dan penggunaannya dalam struktur tata bahasa pun malah jadi seperti ini:

Il (Dia = Subject) + Me (Aku = Object) + Manque (Menjadi kehilangan/kekurangan = Verb)

Jadi dalam arti harfiahnya, sebenarnya Il me manque itu berarti "He lacks me." Atau dengan kata lain, "Dia membuat ku merasa kehilangan/merasakan sesuatu yang kurang"

Jadi, "Aku" yang biasanya menjadi subjek dalam bahasa lain (pelaku kata kerja "merindukan" atau kehilangan) dalam bahasa Perancis malah menjadi objek yang pasrah dipaksa untuk merindukan atau merasa kehilangan/kekurangan sesuatu.

Sejujurnya menurutku ini menandakan bahwa orang Perancis itu romantis.
Soalnya kalo dalam keadaan merindukan seorang, sebenarnya kitalah objeknya. Kitalah yang tidak berdaya. :(

Gue ngomong apa sih? Crap.