And I think my Chinese is finally getting to the point where it's actually allowing me to socialize on the same wavelength as the average twenty-something you might see around Taipei on any Wednesday, Friday or Saturday night. What's more, I can talk about infectious disease transmission and the Berlin Wall to the professors and cafe owners who populate my days.
My classes this semester, which officially started January 3rd, are based on three texts. The first is Thought and Society, or
sixiang yu shehui. This is the core of the curriculum at my level and is actually quite difficult. The topics are varied, as one might expect with a title so vague as Thought and Society, but the vocabulary is pretty delicious. I think about new vocabulary the way little kids probably think about Jolly Ranchers. I love unwrapping a newly learnt word for the first time, and seeing that it works in real life just the way I hoped it would. It's an incredibly satisfying experience to watch the materials I work with during the day effect almost immediately the way I interact in Chinese.
About half of my time is spent on Thought and Society, with the rest devoted in about equal increments to my radio plays class and a news class which has been undergoing some changes in the first week or so. Both of those classes are enjoyable, and focus on opposite ends of the spectrum of formality. The radio plays are the epitome of
kou yu, or informal speech (albeit closer to that of the foreigners that arrived along with Chiang Kai-Shek than that of the locals). The textbook that I believe we will be using for my news class is representative of the most formal language still written in modern Chinese society today. The grammar and terminology of modern newspapers bears the marks of an earlier era when printed language was a great deal more exclusive than it is today. I would have said the most formal language still used in modern society, but that would be inaccurate. In fact, many people still deal with classical Chinese on a regular basis, including those who have no claim to any serious academic leanings. An average high school graduate would probably be able to read some classical materials. For a mere 249NT, or roughly $8, one can purchase a collection of three hundred Tang dynasty poems. Each poem comes with the original text, along with an explanation and short commentary.
In general, I'm excited to be here and I really feel my studies are taking me further and deeper than I've ever been before. What's more, before I leave I will complete another semester here at the International Chinese Language Program, and in that semester I will be able to gain an introduction to actual classical Chinese and solidify my progress elsewhere so far. Beyond that, I hope to establish connections here that will stay with me even when I return back to the United States to finish my education in other areas.
Speaking of which, I am still an Economics major! I don't mention this very much anymore, but it's always in the back of my mind. I really enjoy economics and find it to be important to forming a serious understanding of the world around me. It really makes me sad to see how little reason people require when passing judgment on the world around them and those that populate it. Most people don't bother to develop a systematic world view based on verifiable assertions, and this is simply all too human to expect to change anytime soon. But I won't turn this into some sort of rant about human irrationality (maybe later). I'll simply leave this topic by saying that I am eagerly awaiting the opportunity to develop my skills in that area back at Swarthmore this fall.
Now I have to go eat some beef noodle soup down the street :)
