The Invisible Collage : how language is pasted onto the most basic surfaces of our thoughts.

col·lage

 (kō-läzh′, kə-)

n.

1.

a. An artistic composition of materials and objects pasted over a surface, often with unifying lines and color.

b. A work, such as a literary piece, composed of both borrowed and original material



   What?

                                                                              

                   

Which.....?                                           What kind of....?                      

Who?               Where?

Whose?   



How?



 Why ?

           To see a World in a Grain of Sand
And a Heaven in a Wild Flower
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand
And Eternity in an hour
                                       
                                           - William Blake

       
      The astonishing worlds and heavens and infinities of human  language  araise from very simple materials on a very simple canvas. So simple, in fact, that we all, as children, take these materials and proceed to produce fine art  upon the canvas without ever being formally taught what to do. This innate capacity for the magic of creativity tells us what we are, while also explaining why the power dynamics of human cultures has traditionally tended towards inhibiting our most basic abilities.
     That this human capacity is within everybody and is responsible for the everyday miracle of human communication, the staggering sorcery that small children produce with a wave of the tongue, has largely been ignored, and much of linguistics has tended towards the mechanical and easily observable.  The invisible collage that we actually use to paint the world remains hidden behind curtains of verb phrases and Umberto Eco's arras.                       

    The fact that human beings are born with both the capacity to ask questions and also answer those questions is a truth so self -evident that the study of language has tended to ignore it and focus instead on the refined and fancy parts of speech like articles and particles, as well as the grand and clever-sounding concepts of such well respected members of the academy as semantics and semiotics.

     However, much as if the study of how human beings walk had decided to focus exclusively on skin and muscle whilst ignoring bones and the brain, there is a lot to be gained from peeling back all the nouns, verbs and discontinuous signifiers and having a look at what lies beneath, and where the connections lead to.

 

   



     Whoever you are, and whatever language you speak, you share with everybody else on the planet the same basic communicative step that starts with birth*:

                    (something) ----------> (what?) -------------> (something)

    The world is full of stuff, so the first thing we need to do is sort things out. The way we do this is by considering anything we encounter in terms of : "What is it?" and then assigning it some designation of (something). It is interesting to note that both nouns and adjectives fall under the idea of (something) so clearly figuring out what things are and whether they are good/bad or scary/frightening are high priority. It is fair to suggest that all young living  creatures have the same basic prorities, and express their ideas in similar ways. A human baby, trying to work out if a person is to be trusted or not, is going through the same mental processes as ducklings, except that the human baby will, given time, have ideas  beyond that of the duckling's: (something) ----------> (what?) ------> (moving, sound-making thing I shall trust with my life.)

    The importance of the concept of (something) is that this is the most basic thought we all have, and wherever we are born, we are provided with an already established language that we can use to express our ideas of (something).

     For example, in English (something) is, for example, (a book), whereas in Japanese (nanika/なにか） is, for example, (hon/本）.  It is important to note here that, whereas the english contains the article "a", Japanese does not, and the most basic reason that "a" is there in English is because it is a part of (something), and this is how native speakers understand it. Yet, in 25 years of teaching English in Japan, I have never encountered a single student who has been introduced to this most basic concept.**

    Enter the Which!

   After we know what (something) is, we can then move to consider if (something) is specific or general. To discover that, we employ the questions Which....? or What kind of....? 　(as previously seen in the more appealing**** terms of Which-finder specific and General Whatkindof.)

  Also, (something) may be just an adjective, for example: big, small, good, bad, or cromulent,

and these ideas are generated by the basic question of : What kind of...?

   The Sentencing.

  As soon as you have the information of (something) and the idea of (something), you can make a sentence. In English, it is basically like this: (something) is (something), for example: (a dog) is (an animal). In Japanese it is like this: (なにか/nanika) は/wa　（なにか/nanika) です/desu. For example: (いぬ/inu) は/wa (どうぶつ/doubutsu) です/desu.

     On the surface these sentences are different, but at their most basic level they are the same, in that eash sentence takes information and idea and explains their relationship.

      When we don't know, or are unsure of, the relationship between information and idea, then we must ask and check in order to get a better understanding of their relationship.

                                 information ---------------------------> idea

                           (something)   --------------------------->   (something)

                            

                              (a hotdog)   --------------------------->   (an animal)

              is             (a hotdog)                                             (an animal) ?

                            ( nanika/ なにか）　　　　　　　　　　　　(nanika/なにか）

　（hottdoggu/ ホットドッグ)                              (doubutsu/どうぶつ)

（hottdoggu/ ホットドッグ)  は                         (doubutsu/どうぶつ) desu ka?

 

  

    Nobody teaches children how to make a sentence. Consequently then, it must be an instinctive skill, like walking, or breathing. As such, although everybody can do it, there is not much thought given to how we do it, or why we do it.

    Most basically then, we make sentences to either (a) describe and explain the relationship between information and idea, or (b) ask and check the relationship between information and idea.
   So that:

              Information         ----------------------------->      idea

                   (something)                                                      (something)

                    (something)                         is                          (something)

                      is        (something)                                            (something)?          Beyond (something), a young child will, at the same time, be also pasting their native language onto the most basic concept of (someone) --------> Mum/Dad/Sister/Brother/Person/Known person/Unknown person/Scary person/interesting person.
          After that the concepts of (sometime), (somewhere), (someone's), (somehow) and (some reason) will all pile up to form  the most basic questions of Bela Lugosi's pyramid:







                These are the most basic questions, linked to our most basic concepts (something), (somewhere) etc. For any native speaker then, the information of any of these questions triggers a range of basic ideas, for example:

         

          Who?              ----------------------->       You, me, a woman, Chinese people, Stanley Rous,
                                                                         representatives of Illinois' law enforcement community.

              When?     --------------------------->  Today, sometimes, next week, February, Thor's day,
                                                                                 Thermidor, 1999, never, the Age of  Enlightenment


              Why?      ---------------------------->   It's good, I like it, it will rain, it's very funny, God,
                                                                         evolution, explanation of choice. Thor

As this is the basic goal of a language user,  to connect information to idea(s), it might be worth a mention.

              Clearly then, the language learner will naturally go from the more basic ideas the more complex ones. All of which makes it somewhat baffling++ that a basic textbook would start with ideas like: catsup, astronaut and millionaire, yet ignore the more basic ideas of: a thing, a place, a person, and of course (something) itself.

       I am not suggesting that everybody starts burning their textbooks, but rather that there should be at least some mention of how languages most basically work.+++
               Also, to reiterate an important point: language speakers don't know how they do it. They don't know how, but they take their materials and craft their collage, borrowing the patterns and themes of their neighbours and local dialects, reproducing the work of other artists, and breathtakingly and majestically, the most average of speakers will, daily, produce the equivalent of a masterpiece between getting up and going to bed.
                The Mona Lisa, everyday. By Bloggs.
          

 

* Or before, to be more accurate.

** Because Japanese students are familiar with constant translation of sentences, they are never introduced to the simple step of : What is (something)? ---------> (something) and are fearfully insistent that they must start their answer with It is.... Seriously, can we stop doing this? +


























*** Except in the episode of Star Trek (TOS) The Ninth Question where the crew of the Starship Enterprise encounter a race of hermetic monks who seek to explore the mind of God by discovering the titular question and thereby transcending human thought. This episode usually fails to get the attention it deserves, largely because of a final scene where Kirk ends up grappling with what appears to be a sentinent draft excluder.


**** To me, anyway.

+ FFS!

++ Or, if we accept that none of the teachers were taught in this way, or are aware of this concept, and that the power structures in societies necessarily seek to inhibit communication, not baffling at all.

+++ Note how this example goes straight past any effort to explain how, most basically, using a language works. It's not wrong, but why not make it better?
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