When you hang out with the same person, you tend to borrow language patterns from each other. What my girlfriend and I discovered is that there's actually a certain leader-follower interaction going on. In a relationship where both partners have the same first language and dialect, the difference between the languages is so small that the language leadership phenomenon is invisible, but in a relationship between two people with different first languages, language leadership is pretty easy to see.
My girlfriend and I do most of our talking in English, which is my first language, while hers is Japanese. The main reason for this is that her English is near fluent, whereas my conversational Japanese is weak. (Another reason is that English is more open and direct than Japanese, making it inherently better for a healthy loving relationship) One day we noticed that I've been picking up certain speaking habits of hers in English. For example, she makes a lot of use of the generic adverb "somehow", and, since hanging out with her, I've started using that adverb a lot too. It's a pretty useful wildcard adverb, but that's beside the point. The main thing is that I was slowing down my speech and injecting pauses, in the same way she does.
We realized that there was a leadership-follower relationship in our use of language. One person dictates the style of speaking while the other follows. Without ever being consciously aware of the choice, I had handed the language leadership over to her. I was letting her set the speed and characteristics of our English, and I was following along like a little b!tch.
That was a bad fit, since I'm the one who's the native speaker. I'm a mutha-frakin English GURU, yo, and all it took was a quarter century of nonstop exposure and practice. My girlfriend's English is really impressive-- and sexy-- but my English is in a different league. (Just like her Japanese completely blows mine out of the water)
I don't even know why I was taking the language-follower role. It makes no sense. The only thing I can think of was that I was subconsciously trying to "baby" her, in the same way that the stereotypical bigoted Republican talks slooooow and looooud to anyone with brown skin. That might fly if she was a waitress taking my order in a Watami, but in a loving relationship, you can't be babying each other like that. It obstructs communication. And I was depriving her of valuable English training.
Once we became aware of this notion of Language Leadership, it was pretty obvious that, while Glowing Face Girl gets to lead when we're speaking Japanese, I get to lead when we're speaking English, which is most of the time. That includes all the slurring, slang, and speed that I use when I'm yackin' with another native speaker. GFG loves when I speak like this, and she's certainly smart enough to follow along. Not to mention it trains her English to the hilt.
When you're conversing, and not everyone has the same native tongue, be aware of who's leading and who's following. Who's setting the style and speed? Who's selecting the vocabulary level?
When should you follow and when should you lead? Like any other type of leadership, it depends on the situation. Generally, if the gap in speaking skill is really huge, the weaker speaker should lead, or else communication will be impossible. If the gap is small, it might be better for the stronger speaker to lead. Of course, other factors are involved, like who's the leader in the more conventional sense, who has more authority, or who wants to lead or be lead.
FURTHER READING
For a more general look at the role leadership plays in relationships, read my article, Leadership In Relationships.
If you and your significant other do share the same native tongue, you can still enjoy conversing in a more exotic language. Read my article, Six Reasons To Learn A Language Together. The title is self-explanatory.
To improve your speaking skills in general, check out Toastmasters International, a giant worldwide club about public speaking. I wrote up a Toastmasters meeting summary so you can get an idea what it's like. You can also read more about the organization here.
If you're a native English speaker yourself, check out my article, Why English Is A Hard Language, to get a better idea just what non-native speakers are up against. English is tough!
My girlfriend and I do most of our talking in English, which is my first language, while hers is Japanese. The main reason for this is that her English is near fluent, whereas my conversational Japanese is weak. (Another reason is that English is more open and direct than Japanese, making it inherently better for a healthy loving relationship) One day we noticed that I've been picking up certain speaking habits of hers in English. For example, she makes a lot of use of the generic adverb "somehow", and, since hanging out with her, I've started using that adverb a lot too. It's a pretty useful wildcard adverb, but that's beside the point. The main thing is that I was slowing down my speech and injecting pauses, in the same way she does.
We realized that there was a leadership-follower relationship in our use of language. One person dictates the style of speaking while the other follows. Without ever being consciously aware of the choice, I had handed the language leadership over to her. I was letting her set the speed and characteristics of our English, and I was following along like a little b!tch.
That was a bad fit, since I'm the one who's the native speaker. I'm a mutha-frakin English GURU, yo, and all it took was a quarter century of nonstop exposure and practice. My girlfriend's English is really impressive-- and sexy-- but my English is in a different league. (Just like her Japanese completely blows mine out of the water)
I don't even know why I was taking the language-follower role. It makes no sense. The only thing I can think of was that I was subconsciously trying to "baby" her, in the same way that the stereotypical bigoted Republican talks slooooow and looooud to anyone with brown skin. That might fly if she was a waitress taking my order in a Watami, but in a loving relationship, you can't be babying each other like that. It obstructs communication. And I was depriving her of valuable English training.
Once we became aware of this notion of Language Leadership, it was pretty obvious that, while Glowing Face Girl gets to lead when we're speaking Japanese, I get to lead when we're speaking English, which is most of the time. That includes all the slurring, slang, and speed that I use when I'm yackin' with another native speaker. GFG loves when I speak like this, and she's certainly smart enough to follow along. Not to mention it trains her English to the hilt.
When you're conversing, and not everyone has the same native tongue, be aware of who's leading and who's following. Who's setting the style and speed? Who's selecting the vocabulary level?
When should you follow and when should you lead? Like any other type of leadership, it depends on the situation. Generally, if the gap in speaking skill is really huge, the weaker speaker should lead, or else communication will be impossible. If the gap is small, it might be better for the stronger speaker to lead. Of course, other factors are involved, like who's the leader in the more conventional sense, who has more authority, or who wants to lead or be lead.
FURTHER READING
For a more general look at the role leadership plays in relationships, read my article, Leadership In Relationships.
If you and your significant other do share the same native tongue, you can still enjoy conversing in a more exotic language. Read my article, Six Reasons To Learn A Language Together. The title is self-explanatory.
To improve your speaking skills in general, check out Toastmasters International, a giant worldwide club about public speaking. I wrote up a Toastmasters meeting summary so you can get an idea what it's like. You can also read more about the organization here.
If you're a native English speaker yourself, check out my article, Why English Is A Hard Language, to get a better idea just what non-native speakers are up against. English is tough!
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1 comments:
That's a very interesting observation, however, there is another element that might be missed. Nothing to do with the two of you, but the degree of a person picking up another's language also has strong correlations to that person's level of empathy and openness to others. Lots of people will pick up other's accents or expressions very quickly and it doesn't necessarily have anything to do with them in power leader-follower relationships, but rather how likely they are to mirror people (another interesting post of yours). And completely unrelated, being prone to mirroring people audibly also has to do with how you process sound.
You picking up your girlfriend's speaking habits could equally be characterized as a sign of your empathy, you paying a lot of attention to her way of speaking, and picked up her habits. Not a bad thing.
And to clear the slate on why she didn't pick up yours, 1) she probably does, 2) see above to random human variation in how much one picks up such things. and 3) non-native speakers usually learn the language more formally, more structured and have to more actively think about what words they use, and hence are poorer at picking up slang and unique expressions.
Of course that is all complete crap conjecture, but just some thoughts that not all language pick-up between a couple is a power situation of one leader and one follower.
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