To Know Russian Grammar, Is to Love Russian Grammar
Taken in a little Russian town, just outside Moscow
Thoughts about where I am having been cycling through my head since I arrived here and today I was borderline breakdown. I am just not learning Russian grammar the way I would like. My classes are difficult and although I do feel I understand most of what is being taught, I’m not retaining in any visible substantial way. This is frustrating beyond what I am able to express on this blog and I have shed so many tears over it these past few weeks I am not sure why I am even here. I can hardly understand what people say unless its slow and I am never quick to answer. I am questioning my reasons for coming here and whether picking Russian was the stupidest decision I have ever made. I am not adept at languages and I picked Russian?! What in the hell was I thinking? It wasn’t a random choice. This, as I have mentioned has been a well thought out ambition of mine for years. Why now am I realizing it may never happen? This is not the first time I have ever struggled with something difficult. I was a classical musician for nearly 10 years and although it did come a bit easier than Russian, I do still remember moments of complete despair and lots of tears when attempting to learn difficult and seemingly impossible passages of… oh … I don’t know… Shostakovitch, Stravinsky, Copland, Bernstein and many others that gave me problems. I suppose I managed because I love music so much. This is where it gets a little complicated I suppose. I have been thinking, “to know, know, know you is to love, love, love you…” So, does truly knowing something mean one has to love that something? To really love something takes a ready heart, I know this. I have always thought that one can never truly give or receive love before he or she is ready. This goes more with relationships. I had thought until recently that love was never possible for me. Like what guy in his right mind would want to make babies with a mess of a person such as me? That’s what I used to think. I’ve grown out of that. Now, I think that it has nothing to do with me being not lovable, or anyone really, not just me. It has more to do with just being ready. That’s the truth as I see it. So I suppose I could possibly apply the same logic to learning Russian. It may not have anything to do with me being unlearnable, or un able to learn, but I have to be ready to learn. Ready to really let myself love Russian grammar. Love it for all of its nuances and complexities. Most languages have these. Any thoughts on this issue are welcome. I am feeling like I could break under all the pressure.
04/11/2009 at 10:27 am
Deep breath, It’ll come to you. Maybe not at the speed you’d like it to but if there’s anything we know about you it’s that you’re fully capable of getting this. Don’t bother second guessing yourself, it’s a waste of your time and mental state. We are all proud of you and please know that you didn’t make a “stupid decision.”
04/11/2009 at 11:40 am
Adri,
I just saw a film on learning and it was talking about there being two kinds of processes accomodative (like driving and talking) and cognitive (like doing math problems or making abstract connections.) The educator was arguing that we can only do one cognitive task at a time but we can do 2 or more accomodative tasks at any given time. So we can talk and drive without a problem but we can’t do complex math and drive without making a mess of one or the other.
There are also two basic processes to talking; the storage process and the retrieval process. When we are speaking our first language we have lots of brain pathways to the words we are looking for and we have lots of pathways that help us to store new words next to words we already know.
When you are learning a new language, like Russian, you have to lay all new pathways for storage, all new pathways for retrieval and all new pathways for how to organize those words when they come out of your mouth. So when you are speaking another language you shift from an accomodative process to a cognitive process. You have to spend a lot of time decoding words and then you have to spend time figuring out what those words mean together and THEN you have to figure out your answer or response and once again go fishing for the words to express your idea.
If you think about it, it is really asking a lot to expect to be able to respond quickly just yet. And I understand that it is more than that that is getting you down, it is the stress. Stress adds to the thinking time in any cognitive process–that is fact. I know you can’t help but feel stressed when class is so difficult and there is so much pressure to perform. Try to remember to breath. Focus on relaxing as much as you can in class so that when it is your turn to answer you have given your brain a little “space”. Try very hard to be positive about what you do know and about what you are learning–thinking positively has been shown to make a big difference in problem solving.
Shut down the gremlins–you are a smart girl and what you are doing is hard. It is ok not to have the answer, even though it doesn’t feel that way all the time. And remember you have always been your own worse critic. You are doing better than you think you are, I promise. (No matter how hard the piece was, you always played it beautifully–maybe not flawlessly but you brought joy with your oboe.)
Remember your friend’s words, “Russia will remember you.”
Your biggest fan,
Mom
04/11/2009 at 11:59 am
Remember as Socrates would say (in Plato’s Republic), “Fine things are difficult.” And, I might add, no one enjoys learning grammar in any language. Don’t be hard on yourself. It will come with patience and time. Any language, no matter how difficult, takes a lot of time.
Forge ahead.
We’ll talk soon.
Love,
Dad
26/11/2009 at 5:47 pm
Dear Adri,
I feel like your parents have already said everything I was going to say and in a much more well-rounded and intelligible way. Yes, learning another language, especially so grammatically complex as Russian, can be hard and frustrating. There is nothing “natural” about it, since the human brain is designed so that you are supposed to learn, or at least to be somewhat exposed to all the languages you needed by your adolescence. If you start to learn a language when you’re 18, it’s a challenge. But it’s possible.
I think that what’s going on right now is no doubt very painful, but also very natural process. To cite even more Socrates, “The more you know, the more you realize you know nothing.” So, frustration with not knowing something after spending so much time studying it seems to be a good sign to me. It simply means that you got to another level where you can see that things in Russian grammar are more complex than you previously imagined and might take you more time to learn. (Hell, look at me – I’ve been learning English since I was twelve and I’m still making mistakes and learning a lot of new things!) From what I observed, the time when you feel like you aren’t really learning anything – or aren’t learning as much as you would like – is actually very helpful in the learning process. I don’t have any research evidence for this, but I think what might be happening is that when you have a lot of new information dumped on you, your brain needs some time to process it. And yes, during this time you feel awful because you spend nights trying to memorize case endings or verb prefixes and then when it’s your turn to answer you can’t recall them or use them properly. Well, if you just continue as patiently as you can at some point you will realize that it actually became much easier and you don’t think about it as much when you’re speaking. You probably already had these moments when you suddenly realized that you’re using some words or sentence structures without thinking to much. It will be the same with everything you are learning now, just give it some time.
Now, to the loving-learning metaphor. Sure you have to love Russian as an entity, as a whole, to learn it – otherwise, what’s the point? But I think you don’t have any problem with this, I think you are one of the most motivated people I know in what you’re doing. It doesn’t mean, however, that you have to love every single thing about a person, or a language, or anything you love. Examples? I love Nietzsche. I adore his poetic language, his metaphors, his talent as a storyteller and a million other things about him as a writer. I totally disagree with his ‘overman’ philosophy. But this doesn’t keep me from reading and enjoying his works. I’m just conscious that this philosophy is a part of them. Same about relationship. There are some things I don’t like about Al as a person and, as you probably had a chance to notice, we fundamentally disagree on some important issues. Well, it’s just something that we both are ready to deal with for the bigger things that keep us together. Again, it’s all about being aware of what you love about smth/someone and whether it is worth of dealing with things you dislike. So, in this case, reading Dostoevsky in Russian or making new Russian-speaking friends in Moscow would be an awesome experience. But you just have to accept that you have to work on your grammar to achieve this. You don’t have to love the grammar itself! Ugh, do I even make sense with all this? I think it makes a big difference though: the minute you stop forcing yourself into loving that horrible tense/aspect system – or whatever it is that gives you trouble – you actually get rid of a lot of anxiety and second thoughts about your choice of learning Russian.
Of course I would prefer to talk about this in person rather then trying to type my chaotic thoughts
I really really miss you and I can’t wait for you to come back to Lexington. I hope you’re enjoying your time with your Russian host-family and the Russiannes of it at this moment. Good luck with your final exams, too (if you have them). Try to think about all of this positively. You are a very talented and smart person, and overall I don’t see any reason for which you should be unable to learn Russian – or to do anything else that you want. Needless to say, I will be more than happy to try to help you with any problems you have with all things Russian – and we will speak Russian when you come back! Yay! I am already excited about it!
*hug*
Dasha
26/11/2009 at 6:31 pm
Dash,
I am so entirely blessed to have a friend as insightful and intelligent as you! I am feeling better, although to be honest I had a rough two weeks where I kept asking za chem? ZA CHEM!!!!!????? But I recognize this can also just be a natural part of the process. Life is process. Process, process to the end.
04/12/2009 at 3:56 pm
Hey, you should be asking POCHEMU? instead – sounds more like Russian intelligentsia
Or even better yet KTO VINOVAT? and CHTO DELAT’?
But I’m glad you aren’t. You are right, life is a process (and I suspect there is no end as such).