海賊王に俺はなる!
かいぞくおうにおれわなる!
Kaizoku ou ni ore wa naru!
Words have shaped me into the person I am today.
I have always been surrounded by words. I grew up being that weird kids who sits in a corner and reads all day long. I started writing my own stories and I would write a lot, no matter where. Even my college choice was influenced by my passion for words (I'm studying Letters). And nowadays, this passion manifests itself in language learning.
I navigated through all those phases due some influences. When I was a child, my dad used to read to me every night. When I was about ten, I made a friend who would always read what I wrote and excitedly then talk about it. When I was in the middle of middle school, I started watching anime.
Oh, what a cliché! The anime fan who wants to learn Japanese!
I don’t even know if there was an anime in particular that prompted it. All I knew back then was some sentences from One Piece that would be repeated over and over and over. But that fascinated me! And in 2014, first year of high school I taught myself hiragana and katakana, and since then I’ve had this urge, this desire to learn Japanese.
Throughout this whole reading, you’re going to notice that I’m biased. That’s a topic that I feel strongly about because I’ve seen the superiority complex coming from all sides – even I had a superiority complex (I like to think I grew out of that, but who knows). Some people will want to learn a language because they love the culture tied to the language, or because of this overwhelming desire to interact with and reach more people – and that’s beautiful! Getting to know the culture and people, I would say, are things that do happen along the way (language is culture, language is alive). But is it bad if your reasoning – or your motivator, is not something so “noble”?
I’m also learning French. And as it is now, I really wanna travel to France someday, but if my only motivator was that… I would probably give up.
I am learning French because I love a French cartoon called Miraculous Ladybug and I wanna feel closer to it.
Once again, the anime fan who wants to learn Japanese because of animes. The kpop fan who wants to learn Korean because of their idols. Policing people’s reasons and judging whether their valid or not is creating a wall and preventing more people from exploring languages. Languages are supposed to be inclusive and fun.
Language learning is not a privilege, it is a right. And should be encouraged, no matter the reason the person has to stick with it.
If you have seen the language learning community, you probably noticed how in love those people are with languages. Getting to know one of them, slowly coming to an understanding of it, sharing experiences with people who go through the same thing… it’s awesome! And one should be able to experience it! They don’t need to change the world with their knowledge, they are allowed to do it just for the sake of doing so.
Language learning is not easy, that's true. And it is a hobby rather uncommon (some places encourage it more than others, but here in Brazil it’s definitely rare to see someone doing so for the sheer pleasure of it), so it’s understandable that there’s some mysticism surrounding language learning. Why would someone voluntarily do it? How can you just… enjoy it? It’s so hard! Why don’t you learn this other language, which is… more useful.
Useful. Oh, that ugly, ugly word!
Not gonna lie – sometimes that’s a struggle for me. I wonder why the heck I’m learning French and Japanese if, realistically speaking, I’ll probably never set a foot in either country.
But if I weren’t studying them, what would I be doing? Locking myself in my room and pacing around for hours (literally) or simply procrastinating. I would be wasting time. Maybe I am wasting time by learning those languages – but why the heck does all the time have to be productive anyway? Not everyone make a living out of their hobbies. Hobbies are made to be fun. You can learn languages for the sake of it – you can learn them to understand the songs you like, to understand memes (I’ve seen that one before), just to be able to show off that you know how to speak High Valyrian – even if you cannot effectively use it.
I said I am biased. Well, this ended up being mostly a rant. You are ought to meet some people who are going to try to make you feel bad because of the way you have decided to approach languages, or because of your reasons for doing so. Those people exist, you’re going to see the negativity every now and then, but it’s easy to get rid of them because the number of amazingly nice people is overwhelming larger. One thing I strongly believe is that learning languages broadens our views (we are getting in touch with a whole new world!), and that plays a huge role in having a really inclusive community (that, or I got really lucky with all the people I’ve met. Seriously, I love you guys).
At the end of the day, we are all here sharing one passion, and we do have each other’s back. Even if I end up not going to Japan, even if I forget my French after a year or so, it was worth it because of the people I've met, and because of all the fun I am having currently. Words have shaped me into the person I am today, and they keep shaping me. Every day I find more and more things about myself and about the world – things that speak to me directly. Dedicating time and effort to Japanese and French have influenced that lots, and it’s incredible.
And I hope more and more people are able to experience it.
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