[Applause]
almost exactly two years ago today I was
standing in another red circle I was at
my home University the University of
British Columbia Okanagan giving my
first TEDx talk in that talk I explained
how I am a language fangirl someone who
is immensely passionate about language
and about what people do with language
and in that talk I was explaining well I
thought it was important for all of us
to be fans of language I’ll get back to
that in a minute but fast-forward to now
recently I have developed a new
appreciation and love of language
through watching my son now 21 months
old
learn to use and to play with language
as a language fangirl turned mother I
was fascinated by the trend of what many
people call baby sign this is the idea
that you can use sign language ASL or
also known as American sign language in
my case to teach babies to communicate
since they are able to make
approximations of the hand movements
sooner than they are able to control
their vocal cords to make a wide range
of sounds basically it lets babies
communicate more easily sooner of course
as a language fangirl
I started signing at my son when he was
just two months old way sooner than was
necessary since babies aren’t able to
reciprocate sign until they are much
older when he was about eight months old
he started signing back and he began to
use more and more signs and the spoken
words to go with them but then the
coolest thing happened he started to
make signs of his own take a look he
developed
for the word weird weird was weird so
this wasn’t a sign we had taught him and
it’s not the ASL sign for weird which is
this we had said the word around him and
in fact we realized how often we said
the word weird once he started signing
it but it wasn’t a word we had
explicitly tried to teach him the
meaning of he took what he knew about
language and created new pieces to suit
his needs he perfectly Illustrated
language creativity sure he wasn’t
making a poem or writing a piece of
literature but he was playing with
language his he took this as an everyday
event but his creativity brought to
light to myself and to my husband and we
loved that he had made a new sign for
the word weird and we laughed every time
he used it but it made me realize
sometimes listeners enjoy creativity
more than speakers but why does this
matter
studies have shown that creativity can
be beneficial to groups but sometimes it
can be challenging for us to retain our
sense of creativity as we grow up and
concentrate on the daily work of being
an adult creativity however has been
included as one of the unique features
of human language as described by an
anthropologist named Charles huckett
when he looked at what he called the
design features of language and in the
world there are approximately 7099
languages a huge potential for
creativity as well as diversity and how
languages can be put together but also
what they can tell us about the world
unfortunately for those of us who are
language fans there is also the reality
that 90
percent of the world’s languages are
also considered to be endangered at risk
of no longer being spoken as the first
language in the home or even spoken at
all as numbers of speakers continue to
dwindle in many communities around the
world but there is hope and that is what
I spoke about in my last TEDx talk in
that talk I describe my work with fans
of the Navi language spoken in the movie
Avatar and how they could possibly be a
model for speakers and learners of
languages in endangered indigenous
communities one of the things I
mentioned was that fandoms are known for
creating gifts for each other such as
fan fiction fan art or in the case of
the Navi speakers dictionaries and
grammars and I explained why these were
useful tools for learners of Navi and
they were encouraging for them shortly
after my TEDx talk appeared online it
was reviewed by an online fandom website
the heartbeat of geek culture the
MarySue I was thrilled it was a
wonderful review and it captured my talk
well but there was an interesting
misquote in the last line of the review
which read quote Oh
and according to Schreyer creating gifts
fanfiction and fan art is a great tool
for memory so keep at it end quote
creating gifts gif not gifts gif t as a
linguistic anthropologist I found this
fascinating I love when things like this
happen when pronunciations of one word
become heard as something else
creativity delight after I savored the
moment
I turned to the idea of a gif could give
be a language gift something that
learners could use to help further their
goals of learning a language
maybe I’ve spent the last year or so
thinking about this idea and here’s what
I’ve thought about a gift also known as
a graphic interchange format is a series
of three images looping in sequence to
create a sense of movement they can
often be used in social media to convey
emotion but can they be used to convey
language at first I was unsure as gifts
are often silent with written language
included as overlay such as this example
from Harry Potter fandom Snape approves
but what if we had a familiar meme and
we had new words in a different language
would that allow you to learn the
language more easily maybe I was
thinking about this for many months now
and I’ve wondered can languages
particularly endangered languages be
giftable me mobile hashtag able actually
I think they can I’ve been following a
wonderful woman on Twitter now a public
speaker named Savi Simon who developed
the hashtag speak Mingma and the
catchphrase L know easy it’s that easy
which means let’s all speak nigma
together and she has promoted her
community’s language online in YouTube
videos on Instagram and on Twitter take
a look at one of her videos here ah
gorson hat all ooh easy it’s that easy
I got s’en hat all ooh easy it’s that
easy her love of her community’s
language and her enthusiasm shine
through in this language gift for her
community another example of the meme
ability of languages occurred recently
on February 21st
of this year 2017 which is International
Mother Language day a group of
organizations dedicated to the promotion
and encouragement of use of indigenous
endangered languages developed a meme ml
challenge or the meme mother language
challenge which encouraged language
users to create new slogans for familiar
memes in their own language such as this
example of Jack Nicholson saying you
can’t handle the truth in Cree an
indigenous language spoken across the
prairies in Canada or this example of
Captain Picard saying what’s wrong with
you in the indigenous language of Karuk
spoken in northern california the
creator of this last meme Susan Gare
said in an online interview quote I made
memes because they make me laugh end
quote
she also said that she was participating
in this challenge because it allowed her
to engage in learning the answer
ancestral language with her son a
language gift for her son so rewind and
think back to my son at the beginning of
this talk did you learn the sign for his
word for weird think back and when I
count to three
sign my son’s word for weird one two
three
weird did you remember some of you did
did you get it exactly right maybe you
did you have fun doing so wonderful so
can language gifts or memes or hashtags
be language gifts absolutely they
provide us an opportunity to play with
language to express our creativity
but also to share our emotions our
fandoms our lives
so let us delight in the creative both
for ourselves and for our listeners
[Applause]
almost exactly two years ago today I was
standing in another red circle I was at
my home University the University of
British Columbia Okanagan giving my
first TEDx talk in that talk I explained
how I am a language fangirl someone who
is immensely passionate about language
and about what people do with language
and in that talk I was explaining well I
thought it was important for all of us
to be fans of language I’ll get back to
that in a minute but fast-forward to now
recently I have developed a new
appreciation and love of language
through watching my son now 21 months
old
learn to use and to play with language
as a language fangirl turned mother I
was fascinated by the trend of what many
people call baby sign this is the idea
that you can use sign language ASL or
also known as American sign language in
my case to teach babies to communicate
since they are able to make
approximations of the hand movements
sooner than they are able to control
their vocal cords to make a wide range
of sounds basically it lets babies
communicate more easily sooner of course
as a language fangirl
I started signing at my son when he was
just two months old way sooner than was
necessary since babies aren’t able to
reciprocate sign until they are much
older when he was about eight months old
he started signing back and he began to
use more and more signs and the spoken
words to go with them but then the
coolest thing happened he started to
make signs of his own take a look he
developed
for the word weird weird was weird so
this wasn’t a sign we had taught him and
it’s not the ASL sign for weird which is
this we had said the word around him and
in fact we realized how often we said
the word weird once he started signing
it but it wasn’t a word we had
explicitly tried to teach him the
meaning of he took what he knew about
language and created new pieces to suit
his needs he perfectly Illustrated
language creativity sure he wasn’t
making a poem or writing a piece of
literature but he was playing with
language his he took this as an everyday
event but his creativity brought to
light to myself and to my husband and we
loved that he had made a new sign for
the word weird and we laughed every time
he used it but it made me realize
sometimes listeners enjoy creativity
more than speakers but why does this
matter
studies have shown that creativity can
be beneficial to groups but sometimes it
can be challenging for us to retain our
sense of creativity as we grow up and
concentrate on the daily work of being
an adult creativity however has been
included as one of the unique features
of human language as described by an
anthropologist named Charles huckett
when he looked at what he called the
design features of language and in the
world there are approximately 7099
languages a huge potential for
creativity as well as diversity and how
languages can be put together but also
what they can tell us about the world
unfortunately for those of us who are
language fans there is also the reality
that 90
percent of the world’s languages are
also considered to be endangered at risk
of no longer being spoken as the first
language in the home or even spoken at
all as numbers of speakers continue to
dwindle in many communities around the
world but there is hope and that is what
I spoke about in my last TEDx talk in
that talk I describe my work with fans
of the Navi language spoken in the movie
Avatar and how they could possibly be a
model for speakers and learners of
languages in endangered indigenous
communities one of the things I
mentioned was that fandoms are known for
creating gifts for each other such as
fan fiction fan art or in the case of
the Navi speakers dictionaries and
grammars and I explained why these were
useful tools for learners of Navi and
they were encouraging for them shortly
after my TEDx talk appeared online it
was reviewed by an online fandom website
the heartbeat of geek culture the
MarySue I was thrilled it was a
wonderful review and it captured my talk
well but there was an interesting
misquote in the last line of the review
which read quote Oh
and according to Schreyer creating gifts
fanfiction and fan art is a great tool
for memory so keep at it end quote
creating gifts gif not gifts gif t as a
linguistic anthropologist I found this
fascinating I love when things like this
happen when pronunciations of one word
become heard as something else
creativity delight after I savored the
moment
I turned to the idea of a gif could give
be a language gift something that
learners could use to help further their
goals of learning a language
maybe I’ve spent the last year or so
thinking about this idea and here’s what
I’ve thought about a gift also known as
a graphic interchange format is a series
of three images looping in sequence to
create a sense of movement they can
often be used in social media to convey
emotion but can they be used to convey
language at first I was unsure as gifts
are often silent with written language
included as overlay such as this example
from Harry Potter fandom Snape approves
but what if we had a familiar meme and
we had new words in a different language
would that allow you to learn the
language more easily maybe I was
thinking about this for many months now
and I’ve wondered can languages
particularly endangered languages be
giftable me mobile hashtag able actually
I think they can I’ve been following a
wonderful woman on Twitter now a public
speaker named Savi Simon who developed
the hashtag speak Mingma and the
catchphrase L know easy it’s that easy
which means let’s all speak nigma
together and she has promoted her
community’s language online in YouTube
videos on Instagram and on Twitter take
a look at one of her videos here ah
gorson hat all ooh easy it’s that easy
I got s’en hat all ooh easy it’s that
easy her love of her community’s
language and her enthusiasm shine
through in this language gift for her
community another example of the meme
ability of languages occurred recently
on February 21st
of this year 2017 which is International
Mother Language day a group of
organizations dedicated to the promotion
and encouragement of use of indigenous
endangered languages developed a meme ml
challenge or the meme mother language
challenge which encouraged language
users to create new slogans for familiar
memes in their own language such as this
example of Jack Nicholson saying you
can’t handle the truth in Cree an
indigenous language spoken across the
prairies in Canada or this example of
Captain Picard saying what’s wrong with
you in the indigenous language of Karuk
spoken in northern california the
creator of this last meme Susan Gare
said in an online interview quote I made
memes because they make me laugh end
quote
she also said that she was participating
in this challenge because it allowed her
to engage in learning the answer
ancestral language with her son a
language gift for her son so rewind and
think back to my son at the beginning of
this talk did you learn the sign for his
word for weird think back and when I
count to three
sign my son’s word for weird one two
three
weird did you remember some of you did
did you get it exactly right maybe you
did you have fun doing so wonderful so
can language gifts or memes or hashtags
be language gifts absolutely they
provide us an opportunity to play with
language to express our creativity
but also to share our emotions our
fandoms our lives
so let us delight in the creative both
for ourselves and for our listeners
[Applause]
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