Referencing

• Turner (1985: 1), Addressing the body page 21 of critical studies reader 2A: The Body.

•  Douglas (1973,1979b, 1984), Addressing the body page 25 of critical studies reader 2A: The Body.

• Pierre Bourdieu (1984), Body in consumer culture page 43 of critical studies reader 2A: The Body.

•  Fay,B. 1996. Contemporary Philosophy of social science. Massachusetts: Blackwell publishers

• Overcoming Communication Barriers Between People By Martin Hahn, Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/119628. Accessed 20 March 2011.

• Meaningful Conversation Contributes to Happiness?

  By Nancy Schimelpfening, About.com Guide  March 10, 2010. Accessed 22 March 2011.

Fin

I have learnt alot these past 10 days its been hard and frustrating but is also been fun, exciting and very interesting.
I've learn't there is nothing better than being able to communicate especially in the 1st language of the person you are communicating with be it english or french.
A sense of happiness comes from being able to express your thoughts and share your life with friends and family and a stronger sense of belonging and home comes from speaking the same language.
I felt very comfortable speaking to my mauritian friends and could understand why its easier for them to stick together as most immigrants do have a group of friends from similar country, language or culture that brings a bit of home and the familiar with them on their travels.
I also experienced how hard it is to do basic everyday interactions when there is a language barrier.
I am much more confident in my knowledge of french and my ability to speak it in front of friends and family as well as strangers.
I really feel this project has helped me over come some of my shyness especially when it comes to speaking french and when i spend time with my mom, my family and my mauritian friends I look forward to using my new confidence to communicate with them.

                                                                     Merci et Adieu

Sava? Sava. Sava? Sava! :D

Day 10. Wed 23:

Today i was mostly at college and I had a quick chat with Richard in French. Unlike my friends or peers who had by now just stopped trying to speak to me He asked me questions and engaged with me which was nice that someone was making an effort and a good way to end my intervention.
I discovered how irritated and sad i got when i couldn't speak engagingly with my friends and family. I found this article by Nancy Schimelpfening that talks about a study to see if  meaningful conversation really does make you happier.

"According to a new study, small talk is great, but meaningful conversation is what connects us to people and makes us happier.

For the study, researcher Matthias Mehl and his team equipped 79 college men and women with with a portable device called an electronically activated recorder (EAR), which periodically recorded bits of conversation as the participants went through their daily routines. Every 12.5 minutes a 30 second sample of sound was recorded. The sampling went on for a period of four days, acquiring more than 23,000 recordings (about 300 per participant).

Mehl and his team then listened to the recordings, classifying them as either small talk (e.g. "What do you have there? Popcorn? Yummy!) or substantive (e.g. "She fell in love with your dad? So, did they get divorced soon after?").

The participants also took tests to evaluate their personality and their well-being.

Mehl and his team found that those who reported higher levels of well-being were those who spent less time alone and more time talking with others. Those who were happier also spent more time engaged in substantive conversations rather than small talk.

The study doesn't prove whether deeper conversations actually make people happier, according to Mehl. It could be that happy people are simply better at engaging in deeper conversation. The study results do, however, complement other happiness research, which indicate that happiness is linked with greater social support."

Konnichiha

Day 9. Tues 22:

Today was a very hard day at college and i was so frustrated with no-one understanding me i  eventually started to speak english.

Later on when I went for sushi with friends if was very hard ordering in french when the waitress could hardly speak english. I take my hat off to immigrants they a very brave and have a lot of patients. I know i was having trouble and frustration and at least i can speak english. I can imagine how hard it is for them daily.


This article talks about overcoming communication barriers between people and highlights what hinders communication.
"The meaning exists in your mind and in the mind of your receiver. To understand one another, you and your receiver must share similar meanings for words, gestures, tone of voice, and other symbols."
Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/119628

Allez Le Bleu

Day 8. Mon 21:

Im not referring to the french rugby team but  to a personal joke my dad and I have, we used to say this when going canoeing into the blue sea in Mauritius.

So i thought it was appropriate as we went on a restored submarine in Simon's town today. It was Fantastic to go inside and have a tour from the now retired men who used to serve in that very same submarine. Again being in a tourist attraction i was accepted as normal by tourist standards.

As Turner (1985: 1) says in Addressing the Body “dress is a basic fact of social life and this is true of all known humans”  so i decided to dress in a very stereotypical french way, with blue and white stripes, braided hair and a berret and i got some funny looks from people, it was interesting how the way i dressed changed peoples judgements of me and how they easily decided what kind of person i was just by what i was wearing.

Ce la vie!

Day 7. Sun 20.
Its another amazing day in fishhoek no wind and sunny skies. Not much happened today except a waitress being very confused when I was ordering in French and repeating myself loudly while pointing and hand gesturing what food and drink i wanted, But she handled it very well loudly gesturing right back at me, I think the restaurant must get  a lot of tourist because she was very good at it.
Why is it we think by speaking louder and slower with very frantic charade gestures people will understand us better? If it achieves anything is comedy for the people watching.

Oh La La

Day 6. Sat 19:

Today was a beautiful day in fishhoek and i spent the morning on the beach with my family.

Later on we all went to the Cape Town Carnival which was amazing! www.capetowncarnival.com 

It was a very exciting experience and the floats and costumes where beautiful.

There were a lot of foreigners in the restaurant we went to even brazilians i think its great that we have started this carnival which is a festive celebration of the wonders of Cape Town with a slight Brazilian flare. I fitted in quite well as a foreigner and no-one thought it strange i was the only one speaking french. I had a nice chat with a car guard as well.

un chat, une souris et un oiseaux

Day 5. Fri 18:  

I had baguettes with my mother this morning, yum!

Tonight I am going to a animal themed house warming party and look forward to speaking french all night with people who actually respond and understand me. I think the hardest part about this project is becoming the lack of communication between my friends and i because of the language barriers.

The party was great and i got to speak and listen to french with my friends and got to have engaging conversations for one of the first times this week. Its great to be able to speak their language and feel even more part of the group.

As Fay (1996:90) writes “ people recognizably living in different cultures cannot be living in a different world but the may well be living differently in the same world.” i felt this quote expresses exactly how different culture and language can be and how a totally different whay of living and expressing life comes about. 

Bon Anniversaire

Day 4. Thurs 17:

Today i spoke a lot with my french neighbours and it was a lot of fun.

Later I went to checkers and the employee's just stared at me funny when i spoke to them. When I went out with my friends for a 21st I didn't speak that much although I had a nice chat with the bouncer at tiger tiger.

Not much happened with people interacting with me and i have noticed I'm starting to just speak less in general.

Paris Je t'aime

I love this video as it show imagination, love and a different kind of communication.

i also felt that i had to mime to get people to understand me, its interesting how world wide people can understand the body and expressions even if language fails.

Je m'appellel Natalie

Day3. Wed 16 March :  

I'm becoming more confident in speaking french but also more lazy. It is very hard to speak french when I go buy things for example when I went to Plastics for Africa i ended up speaking english because otherwise I couldn't get any help.

Class was very interesting because we all had to stand up and explain our interventions and communicate how our interventions where going. Speaking french infront of the whole class made me very nervous  but by doing it has made me more confident about it. People reactions were different from staring, to confusion and laughing.

Douglas (1973,1979b, 1984) speaks about having two bodies, the physical and the social “the social body constrains the way the physical body is received. And later states that “There is a continual exchange of meaning between the two kinds of bodily experience so the each reinforces the categories of the other.”

I understood this in the way I was changing my physical body with language and dress and in turn changing my social body and how people interacted differently with me.

Une chocolate chaud et a crotte-monsieurr sil vous plait

Day2. Tues 15:  

I had a wonderful breakfast with my mother, which put me back in the mode of speaking French. 

It was still difficult speaking with my friends and I often just said the English after I said the French a few times which I should try and stop doing over the next few days. 

Today I wanted to try speaking with waitrons so I went to ‘Menu’ by my college and got quite a response. When I asked the one waitron for a hot chocolate she stood back and said shocked “what the Hell?” her reaction made me laugh but it also made me feel like I was not welcome to speak French or be different.

I wonder if foreigners who immigrate feel they cant fit in until they have the language and pronunciations down? The waitron’s confused and slightly scared expression made me want to explore if the fear of foreigners is rooted in the fact we can’t communicate properly. Is language the first point of connection between people rather than culture or country?

Later on I was chatting with my Mauritian neighbours and felt so relaxed and at home especially now I was speaking their language, I felt a kinship as if I was excepted more easily even if I was south African because I spoke the same language. Is there a social currency with language and correct communication?

Foux du fa fa

Day 1.  Mon 14 March:

Today I woke up excited about the next 10 days. I played loud French songs as I got ready for college and smed my mom is French I even wore a blue and white-striped top. When I got to college and saw my friends I enthusiastically said bonjour and gave them all a kiss on both cheeks. 

It gradually got harder when I tried to talk to them and comment on their conversation is was frustrating not to be able to say all I was thinking and just to see confused faces staring back at me when I did. Already tired of trying to get people to understand me I ordered lunch in half English half french and had to explain to my lecturer in French than in English my ideas for my project. 

I noticed when I had to repeat myself I used a lot of body and hand gestures as I slowly said my words again hoping that my friends would guess what I was saying. Thankfully i saw my mother later on. It was so much easier to speak to someone who understood and could talk back to me.

This is the flight of the concords singing a french parody. Its just a funny stereotyping of french culture and communications.

It is strange with all the different technologies and forms of media and communication forums the one thing that still hinders communication and understanding is language. Why is it that languages still separate the world and why don't we have some system or technology to understand people no matter how they are trying to communicate with us. Are we that un-evolved when it comes to true communication?

Bonjour

My name is Natalie Kirkwood I am a 20 year old South African but I also have a strong connection to Mauritius. My mother is Mauritian and I have my passport and Id for both Mauritius and South Africa. I can understand French and speak most of it but am very shy to speak it in front of people I don’t know or who don’t understand me. I’m a shy person who doesn’t talk a lot although I have a lot to express.

i wanted to focus on these aspects in my intervention. 

Below is a picture of my mother who has given me life, love and a wonderful heritage to be proud of.

My intervention for 10 days is to speak French all the time to everyone I encounter be it my friends, neighbours, lecturers and general public whether they understand me or not. I am interested in challenging my fear of speaking French and my shyness in general as well as exploring how it affects my communication with the world around me.