Spoons.
Žlice.
Cardboard boxes.
Kartonske kutije.
Toddler-size electric trains.
Električni vlakovi veličine djeteta.
Holiday ornaments.
Blagdanski ukrasi.
Bounce houses.
Kuće na napuhavanje.
Blankets.
Prekrivači.
Baskets.
Košare.
Carpets.
Tepisi.
Tray tables.
Preklopni stolići.
Smartphones.
Pametni telefoni.
Pianos.
Klaviri.
Robes.
Ogrtači.
Photographs.
Fotografije.
What do all of these things have in common, aside from the fact they're photos that I took in the last three months, and therefore, own the copyright to?
Što sve ove stvari imaju zajedničko, osim što su to fotografije koje sam uslikao tijekom zadnja tri mjeseca te na njih imam autorska prava?
(Laughter)
(Smijeh)
They're all inventions that were created with the benefit of language. None of these things would have existed without language. Imagine creating any one of those things or, like, building an entire building like this, without being able to use language or without benefiting from any knowledge that was got by the use of language. Basically, language is the most important thing in the entire world. All of our civilization rests upon it. And those who devote their lives to studying it -- both how language emerged, how human languages differ, how they differ from animal communication systems -- are linguists. Formal linguistics is a relatively young field, more or less. And it's uncovered a lot of really important stuff. Like, for example, that human communication systems differ crucially from animal communication systems, that all languages are equally expressive, even if they do it in different ways.
Sve su to izumi stvoreni zahvaljujući jeziku. Ništa od toga ne bi postojalo bez jezika. Zamislite stvaranje bilo čega od toga ili građenje cijele zgrade poput ove, a da ne možete koristiti jezik ili da se ne možete okoristiti znanjem stečenim upotrebom jezika. U biti, jezik je najvažnija stvar na cijelom svijetu. Cijela se naša civilizacija temelji na njemu. Oni koji posvećuju živote njegovom proučavanju - kako je jezik nastao, kako se ljudski jezici razlikuju, kako se razlikuju od životinjske komunikacije - su lingvisti. Formalna lingvistika je relativno novo polje, a otkrila je mnogo važnih stvari. Primjerice, to da se ljudski komunikacijski sustavi bitno razlikuju od životinjskih komunikacijskih sustava, da su svi jezici jednako izražajni, iako na različite načine.
And yet, despite this, there are a lot of people who just love to pop off about language like they have an equal understanding of it as a linguist, because, of course, they speak a language. And if you speak a language, that means you have just as much right to talk about its function as anybody else. Imagine if you were talking to a surgeon, and you say, "Listen, buddy. I've had a heart for, like, 40 years now. I think I know a thing or two about aortic valve replacements. I think my opinion is just as valid as yours." And yet, that's exactly what happens.
Ipak, unatoč tome, mnogo ljudi voli lupetati o jeziku kao da o njemu imaju jednako znanje kao i lingvisti jer, naravno, govore neki jezik. A ako govorite neki jezik, to znači da imate jednako pravo govoriti o njegovoj funkciji kao bilo tko drugi. Zamislite da razgovarate s kirurgom i da mu kažete: "Slušaj me. Imam srce već 40 godina. Mislim da znam ponešto o zamjeni aortnog zalistka. Mislim da je moje mišljenje jednako bitno kao tvoje." Ipak, upravo to se događa.
This is Neil deGrasse Tyson, saying that in the film "Arrival," he would have brought a cryptographer -- somebody who can unscramble a message in a language they already know -- rather than a linguist, to communicate with the aliens, because what would a linguist -- why would that be useful in talking to somebody speaking a language we don't even know? Though, of course, the "Arrival" film is not off the hook. I mean, come on -- listen, film. Hey, buddy: there are aliens that come down to our planet in gigantic ships, and they want to do nothing except for communicate with us, and you hire one linguist?
Neil deGrasse Tyson upravo to govori u filmu Dolazak, on bi doveo kriptografa - nekoga tko može dešifrirati poruku na jeziku kojeg već zna - radije nego lingvista, da komunicira s izvanzemaljcima, jer što bi lingvist - zašto bi to bilo korisno u razgovoru s nekim tko govori jezik koji ni ne poznajemo? Iako, ni film Dolazak se nije izvukao. Mislim stvarno, taj film. Izvanzemaljci siđu na naš planet u ogromnim brodovima i žele jedino komunicirati s nama, a vi zaposlite samo jednog lingvista?
(Laughter)
(Smijeh)
What's the US government on a budget or something?
Zar američka vlada štedi?
(Laughter)
(Smijeh)
A lot of these things can be chalked up to misunderstandings, both about what language is and about the formal study of language, about linguistics. And I think there's something that underlies a lot of these misunderstandings that can be summed up by this delightful article in "Forbes," about why high school students shouldn't learn foreign languages. I'm going to pull out some quotes from this, and I want you to see if you can figure out what underlies some of these opinions and ideas. "Americans rarely read the classics, even in translation." So in other words, why bother learning a foreign language when they're not even going to read the classic in the original anyway? What's the point? "Studying foreign languages in school is a waste of time, compared to other things that you could be doing in school." "Europe has a lot of language groups clustered in a relatively small space." So for Americans, ah, what's the point of learning another language? You're not really going to get a lot of bang for your buck out of that. This is my favorite, "A student in Birmingham would have to travel about a thousand miles to get to the Mexican border, and even then, there would be enough people who speak English to get around." In other words, if you can kind of wave your arms around, and you can get to where you're going, then there's really no point in learning another language anyway.
Mnogo toga može biti pripisano nesporazumima, o tome što je jezik, o formalnom proučavanju jezika, o lingvistici. Mislim da je nešto u pozadini mnogih tih nesporazuma, nešto što se može sažeti u ovom divnom članku u Forbesu o tome zašto srednjoškolci ne bi trebali učiti strane jezike. Izvući ću iz njega neke citate i želim da vidite možete li dokučiti što je u pozadini tih mišljenja i ideja. "Amerikanci rijetko čitaju klasike, čak i u prijevodu." Drugim riječima, zašto bi uopće učili strane jezike kad i tako neće čitati klasike u originalu? Čemu? "Učenje stranih jezika u školi je gubitak vremena kad se usporedi s drugim stvarima koje biste mogli raditi u školi." "U Europi se puno jezičnih skupina nalazi u relativno malom prostoru." Dakle, zašto bi Amerikanci učili još jedan jezik? Nećete baš profitirati od toga. Ovaj mi je najdraži: "Student iz Birminghama bi morao putovati oko 1600 kilometara da bi došao do meksičke granice, a čak i tad bi bilo dovoljno ljudi koji govore engleski da se može snaći." Drugim riječima, ako možete mahati rukama i možete stići tamo gdje idete, tad stvarno nema smisla učiti još jedan jezik.
What underlies a lot of these attitudes is the conceptual metaphor, language is a tool. And there's something that rings very true about this metaphor. Language is kind of a tool in that, if you know the local language, you can do more than if you didn't. But the implication is that language is only a tool, and this is absolutely false. If language was a tool, it would honestly be a pretty poor tool. And we would have abandoned it long ago for something that was a lot better. Think about just any sentence. Here's a sentence that I'm sure I've said in my life: "Yesterday I saw Kyn." I have a friend named Kyn. And when I say this sentence, "Yesterday I saw Kyn," do you think it's really the case that everything in my mind is now implanted in your mind via this sentence? Hardly, because there's a lot of other stuff going on.
Ono što je u pozadini mnogih tih stavova je konceptualna metafora, jezik je alat. Nešto se čini vrlo istinitim u ovoj metafori. Jezik jest vrsta alata. Ako znate lokalni jezik, možete napraviti više toga nego ako ga ne znate. No implicira se da je jezik samo alat, a to je sasvim netočno. Kad bi jezik bio samo alat, bio bi to jako loš alat. Davno bismo ga zamijenili nečim puno boljim. Razmislite o bilo kojoj rečenici. Evo rečenice za koju sam siguran da sam je izgovorio: "Jučer sam vidio Kyna". Imam prijatelja Kyna. Kad izgovorim ovu rečenicu: "Jučer sam vidio Kyna", mislite li da je stvarno moguće da je sve iz mog uma sad ugrađeno u vaš mozak preko te rečenice? Teško, jer se još mnogo tog drugog događa.
Like, when I say "yesterday," I might think what the weather was like yesterday because I was there. And if I'm remembering, I'll probably remember there was something I forgot to mail, which I did. This was a preplanned joke, but I really did forget to mail something. And so that means I'm going to have to do it Monday, because that's when I'm going to get back home. And of course, when I think of Monday, I'll think of "Manic Monday" by the Bangles. It's a good song. And when I say the word "saw," I think of this phrase: "'I see!' said the blind man as he picked up his hammer and saw." I always do. Anytime I hear the word "saw" or say it, I always think of that, because my grandfather always used to say it, so it makes me think of my grandfather. And we're back to "Manic Monday" again, for some reason. And with Kyn, when I'm saying something like, "Yesterday I saw Kyn," I'll think of the circumstances under which I saw him. And this happened to be that day. Here he is with my cat. And of course, if I'm thinking of Kyn, I'll think he's going to Long Beach State right now, and I'll remember that my good friend John and my mother both graduated from Long Beach State, my cousin Katie is going to Long Beach State right now. And it's "Manic Monday" again.
Primjerice, kad kažem "jučer", mogao bih misliti na to kakvo je vrijeme bilo jučer jer sam bio tamo. Ako se prisjećam, vjerojatno bih se sjetio da sam nešto zaboravio poslati, što je istina. Ovo je bila planirana šala, ali stvarno sam zaboravio poslati nešto. To znači da ću to morati napraviti u ponedjeljak jer se tad vraćam kući. Kad pomislim na "Monday" (ponedjeljak), pomislit ću na Manic Monday od The Banglesa. Dobra pjesma. Kad kažem riječ "saw" (vidio; pila), pomislit ću na ovu rečenicu: ''Vidim', reče slijepac dok je uzimao čekić i zapil(j)io (se)." Uvijek to pomislim. Svaki put kad čujem ili kažem riječ "saw", uvijek pomislim na to jer je moj djed to govorio pa me podsjeća na njega. Vraćamo se na Manic Monday, iz nekog razloga, i na Kyna, kad kažem nešto poput: "Jučer sam vidio Kyna", pomislit ću na okolnosti u kojima sam ga vidio. To je bio taj dan. Bio je s mojom mačkom. Naravno, kad mislim na Kyna, pomislit ću da upravo pohađa Long Beach State i sjetit ću se da su moj dobar prijatelj John i moja majka diplomirali na Long Beach Stateu, moja rođakinja Katie upravo pohađa Long Beach State. Opet smo na Manic Monday.
But this is just a fraction of what's going on in your head at any given time while you are speaking. And all we have to represent the entire mess that is going on in our head, is this. I mean, that's all we got.
No ovo je samo djelić onoga što vam se događa u glavama u bilo kojem trenutku dok govorite. A sve čime možemo uobličiti taj cijeli nered koji nam se događa u glavi je ovo. Ovo je sve što imamo.
(Laughter)
(Smijeh)
Is it any wonder that our system is so poor? So imagine, if I can give you an analogy, imagine if you wanted to know what is it like to eat a cake, if instead of just eating the cake, you instead had to ingest the ingredients of a cake, one by one, along with instructions about how these ingredients can be combined to form a cake. You had to eat the instructions, too.
Je li ikakvo čudo što nam je sustav tako loš? Ako vam smijem predložiti jednu analogiju, zamislite da želite saznati kako je to jesti kolač, ako biste umjesto jedenja kolača, morali probaviti sastojke nekog kolača, jedan po jedan, zajedno s receptom kako se ti sastojci mogu kombinirati da bi nastao kolač. Morali biste pojesti i recept.
(Laughter)
(Smijeh)
If that was how we had to experience cake, we would never eat cake. And yet, language is the only way -- the only way -- that we can figure out what is going on here, in our minds. This is our interiority, the thing that makes us human, the thing that makes us different from other animals, is all inside here somewhere, and all we have to do to represent it is our own languages. A language is our best way of showing what's going on in our head. Imagine if I wanted to ask a big question, like: "What is the nature of human thought and emotion?" What you'd want to do is you'd want to examine as many different languages as possible. One isn't just going to do it. To give you an example, here's a picture I took of little Roman, that I took with a 12-megapixel camera. Now, here's that same picture with a lot fewer pixels. Obviously, neither of these pictures is a real cat. But one gives you a lot better sense of what a cat is than the other.
Kad bismo morali tako iskusiti kolač, ne bismo ga nikad jeli. Ipak, jezik je jedini način na koji možemo dokučiti što se događa u našem umu. To je naša unutrašnjost, ono što nas čini ljudskima, ono što nas razlikuje od životinja, sve ovo negdje unutra, a sve što imamo da bismo to izrazili su naši jezici. Jezik je najbolji način da pokažemo što nam se događa u glavi. Zamislite da želim pitati nešto važno poput: "Kakva je priroda ljudskog mišljenja i emocija?" Ono što biste htjeli je proučiti što je više različitih jezika moguće. Jedan ne bi bio dovoljan. Primjerice, ovo je slika malog Romana koju sam uslikao kamerom od 12 megapiksela. Ovo je ista slika s puno manje piksela. Očito, nijedna od tih slika nije prava mačka. No jedna vam daje puno bolji dojam o tome što je mačka.
Language is not merely a tool. It is our legacy, it's our way of conveying what it means to be human. And of course, by "our" legacy, I mean all humans everywhere. And losing even one language makes that picture a lot less clear.
Jezik nije samo alat. On je naše nasljeđe. To je naš način da prenesemo što znači biti čovjek. Naravno, pod naše nasljeđe mislim na sve ljude svugdje. Gubitak samo jednog jezika čini tu sliku puno nejasnijom.
So as a job for the past 10 years and also as recreation, just for fun, I create languages. These are called "conlangs," short for "constructed languages." Now, presenting these facts back to back, that we're losing languages on our planet and that I create brand-new languages, you might think that there's some nonsuperficial connection between these two. In fact, a lot of people have drawn a line between those dots. This is a guy who got all bent out of shape that there was a conlang in James Cameron's "Avatar." He says, "But in the three years it took James Cameron to get Avatar to the screen, a language died." Probably a lot more than that, actually. "Na'vi, alas, won't fill the hole where it used to be ..." A truly profound and poignant statement -- if you don't think about it at all.
Tako mi je zadnjih 10 godina posao, ali također i razbibriga, smišljanje jezika. Zovu se "smijezici", skraćeno od "smišljeni jezici". Iznoseći redom ove činjenice, da na našem planetu gubimo jezike i da ja smišljam sasvim nove jezike, mogli biste pomisliti da postoji neka dublja veza između njih. Zapravo je mnogo ljudi to povezalo. Ovo je lik koji se razbjesnio što postoji "smijezik" u Avataru Jamesa Camerona. On kaže: "U tri godine koliko je trebalo Jamesu Cameronu da Avatar dođe na ekran, jedan jezik je izumro." Zapravo, vjerojatno više njih. "Na'vi, nažalost, neće ispuniti tu prazninu..." Stvarno duboka i potresna izjava - ako o njoj uopće ne razmislite.
(Laughter)
(Smijeh)
But when I was here at Cal, I completed two majors. One of them was linguistics, but the other one was English. And of course, the English major, the study of English, is not actually the study of the English language, as we know, it's the study of literature. Literature is just a wonderful thing, because basically, literature, more broadly, is kind of like art; it falls under the rubric of art. And what we do with literature, authors create new, entire beings and histories. And it's interesting to us to see what kind of depth and emotion and just unique spirit authors can invest into these fictional beings. So much so, that, I mean -- take a look at this. There's an entire series of books that are written about fictional characters. Like, the entire book is just about one fictional, fake human being. There's an entire book on George F. Babbitt from Sinclair Lewis's "Babbitt," and I guarantee you, that book is longer than "Babbitt," which is a short book. Does anybody even remember that one? It's pretty good, I actually think it's better than "Main Street." That's my hot take. So we've never questioned the fact that literature is interesting. But despite the fact, not even linguists are actually interested in what created languages can tell us about the depth of the human spirit just as an artistic endeavor.
Međutim, dok sam bio na Caltechu, završio sam dvije studijske grupe. Jedna je bila lingvistika, ali druga je bila engleski. Naravno, studij engleskog nije zapravo studij engleskog jezika, nego studij književnosti. Književnost je predivna stvar jer je u osnovi poput umjetnosti, potpada pod umjetnost. Ono što radimo s književnošću, autori stvaraju nova bića i priče. Zanimljivo nam je vidjeti koju vrstu dubine i emocija te jedinstvenog duha autori mogu unijeti u ta izmišljena bića. Toliko da - pogledajte ovo. Ovo su cijele serije knjiga napisane o izmišljenim likovima. Cijela je knjiga o samo jednom izmišljenom liku. Postoji cijela knjiga o Georgeu F. Babbittu, iz romana "Babbitt" Sinclaira Lewisa, i jamčim vam da je knjiga duža od "Babbitta", koji je kratak. Sjeća li se uopće itko te knjige? Prilično je dobra, mislim da je čak bolja od romana Main Street. Samo moja nepopularna misao. Nikad nismo preispitivali činjenicu da je književnost zanimljiva. Unatoč tome, ni lingvisti nisu zainteresirani za ono što nam smišljeni jezici mogu reći o dubini ljudskog duha samo kao o umjetničkom pothvatu.
I'll give you a nice little example here. There was an article written about me in the California alumni magazine a while back. And when they wrote this article, they wanted to get somebody from the opposing side, which, in hindsight, seems like a weird thing to do. You're just talking about a person, and you want to get somebody from the opposing side of that person.
Dat ću vam jedan lijep primjer. Napisali su članak o meni u časopisu bivših studenata prije nešto vremena. Kad su pisali taj članak, htjeli su razgovarati i s nekim sa suprotne strane, što se, kad razmislite, čini čudno. Samo pišete o nekoj osobi, a želite nekoga sa suprotne strane te osobe.
(Laughter)
(Smijeh)
Essentially, this is just a puff piece, but whatever. So, they happened to get one of the most brilliant linguists of our time, George Lakoff, who's a linguist here at Berkeley. And his work has basically forever changed the fields of linguistics and cognitive science. And when asked about my work and about language creation in general, he said, "But there's a lot of things to be done in the study of language. You should spend the time on something real." Yeah. "Something real." Does this remind you of anything? To use the very framework that he himself invented, let me refer back to this conceptual metaphor: language is a tool. And he appears to be laboring under this conceptual metaphor; that is, language is useful when it can be used for communication. Language is useless when it can't be used for communication. It might make you wonder: What do we do with dead languages? But anyway.
U biti, to je samo napuhana hvala. Tako su uspjeli dobiti jednog od najgenijalnijih lingvista našeg vremena, Georgea Lakoffa, lingvista ovdje na fakultetu Berkeley. Njegov je rad zauvijek promijenio lingvistiku i kognitivnu znanost. Kad su ga pitali o mom radu i smišljanju jezika općenito, rekao je: "Postoji puno toga što treba napraviti u proučavanju jezika. Trebali biste trošiti vrijeme na nešto stvarno." Da. "Nešto stvarno." Podsjeća li vas to na nešto? Da iskoristim okvir koji je on sam smislio, dopustite mi da se vratim na našu konceptualnu metaforu: jezik je alat. Čini se da on djeluje pod tom metaforom koja kaže da je jezik koristan kad se može koristiti za komunikaciju. Jezik je beskoristan kad se ne može koristiti za komunikaciju. Mogli biste se upitati što radimo s mrtvim jezicima? No, bilo kako bilo.
So, because of this idea, it might seem like the very height of absurdity to have a Duolingo course on the High Valyrian language that I created for HBO's "Game of Thrones." You might wonder what, exactly, are 740,000 people learning?
Zbog te se ideje može činiti kao vrhunski apsurd imati na Duolingu tečaj visokog valirijskog, jezika koji sam smislio za HBO-ovu Igru prijestolja. Mogli biste se upitati što točno 740 000 ljudi uči?
(Laughter)
(Smijeh)
Well, let's take a look at it. What are they learning? What could they possibly be learning? Well, bearing in mind that the other language for this -- it's for people that speak English -- English speakers are learning quite a bit. Here's a sentence that they will probably never use for communication in their entire lives: "Vala ābre urnes." "The man sees the woman." The little middle line is the gloss, so it's word for word, that's what it says. And they're actually learning some very fascinating things, especially if they're English speakers. They're learning that a verb can come at the very end of a sentence. Doesn't really do that in English when you have two arguments. They're learning that sometimes a language doesn't have an equivalent for the word "the" -- it's totally absent. That's something language can do. They're learning that a long vowel can actually be longer in duration, as opposed to different in quality, which is what our long vowels do; they're actually the same length. They're learning that there are these little inflections. Hmm? Hmm? There are inflections called "cases" on the end of nouns --
Promotrimo to. Što to oni uče? Što bi to mogli učiti? S obzirom na to da je drugi jezik - da je tečaj za ljude koji govore engleski - govornici engleskog poprilično uče. Evo rečenice koju vjerojatno nikad neće koristiti u komunikaciji u cijelom svom životu: "Vala ābre urnes." "Muškarac vidi ženu." Mala crtica na "a" označava duljinu, a prijevod doslovno znači to. Zapravo uče vrlo fascinantne stvari, pogotovo ako su govornici engleskog. Uče da predikat može doći na samom kraju rečenice. To inače u engleskom nije moguće kad imate subjekt i predikat. Uče da ponekad jezik nema ekvivalent za riječ "the" - on uopće ne postoji. To je nešto što jezici rade. Uče da dugi samoglasnik može duže trajati, a ne promijeniti kvalitetu, što se događa s našim dugim otvornicima koji zapravo isto traju. Uče da postoje male sklonidbe. Ha? Postoje sklonidbe po tzv. padežima na kraju imenica -
(Laughter)
(Smijeh)
that tell you who does what to whom in a sentence. Even if you leave the order of the words the same and switch the endings, it changes who does what to whom. What they're learning is that languages do things, the same things, differently. And that learning languages can be fun. What they're learning is respect for Language: capital "L" Language. And given the fact that 88 percent of Americans only speak English at home, I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing.
koje vam kažu tko radi što kome u određenoj rečenici. Čak i ako ostavite isti red riječi, ali promijenite nastavke, oni mijenjaju tko radi što kome. Uče da jezici izražavaju iste stvari na drukčiji način i da jezici mogu biti zabavni. Uče poštovati jezik s velikim J. Budući da 88 % Amerikanaca govori samo engleski kod kuće, ne mislim da je to nužno loše.
You know why languages die on our planet? It's not because government imposes one language on a smaller group, or because an entire group of speakers is wiped out. That certainly has happened in the past, and it's happening now, but it's not the main reason. The main reason is that a child is born to a family that speaks a language that is not widely spoken in their community, and that child doesn't learn it. Why? Because that language is not valued in their community. Because the language isn't useful. Because the child can't go and get a job if they speak that language. Because if language is just a tool, then learning their native language is about as useful as learning High Valyrian, so why bother?
Znate li zašto jezici na našem planetu izumiru? Ne zato što vlada nameće jedan jezik manjoj skupini ili zato što je cijela skupina govornika nestala. To se događalo u prošlosti, a događa se i sada, ali to nije glavni razlog. Glavni je razlog to što se dijete rađa u obitelji koja govori jezik koji nije raširen u njezinoj zajednici te ga dijete ne nauči. Zašto? Zato što se taj jezik ne cijeni u njezinoj zajednici. Jer taj jezik nije koristan. Jer se dijete ne može zaposliti ako govori taj jezik. Jer ako je jezik samo alat, tada je učenje njegovog materinskog jezika jednako korisno kao učenje visokog valirijskog pa zašto bi se trudilo?
Now ... Maybe language study isn't going to lead to a lot more linguistic fluency. But maybe that's not such a big deal. Maybe if more people are studying more languages, it will lead to more linguistic tolerance and less linguistic imperialism. Maybe if we actually respect language for what it is -- literally, the greatest invention in the history of humankind -- then in the future, we can celebrate endangered languages as living languages, as opposed to museum pieces.
Sad... Možda učenje jezika neće pridonijeti većoj jezičnoj tečnosti. No možda to nije tako strašno. Možda će, ako više ljudi uči više jezika, to voditi većoj jezičnoj toleranciji, a manje jezičnom imperijalizmu. Možda ćemo, ako stvarno poštujemo jezik jer je to što je - doslovno najvažniji izum u povijesti čovječanstva - tada u budućnosti moći slaviti što su ugroženi jezici ostali živi, a nisu postali muzejski primjerci.
(High Valyrian) Kirimvose. Thank you.
(Visoki valirijski) Kirimvose. Hvala.
(Applause)
(Pljesak)