# memory in the bilingual brain



## LMorland

Hi!

This is the first time I've contributed to the "cultural forum" -- in fact I didn't even know it existed until today! 

I'd like to refer you to the lines quoted below (presenting this little bit of text falls within the rules permitted, I believe) from an article entitlted* "Forgetting May Be Part of the Process of Remembering" *that appeared today on the New York Times' website: http://www.nytimes.com/2007/06/05/h...l=1&adxnnlx=1181174619-Dbw2j7GRXD10rxJLMtZkEA 

This process [blocking old memories in order to develop new ones] is extremely familiar to people who have been immersed in a foreign language. In a recent study of native English speakers led by Dr. Anderson, researchers showed that beginners being drilled in Spanish were very slow to link pictures and words in English, compared with more bilingual participants. *Those fluent in both languages had resolved the competition between the two tongues, *inhibiting the encroachment, for example, of the word “zapato” on the word “shoe.”

What interests me is _how _we bilingual folks (and here I should add that I am considered fluent in French, but I can just barely dare to call myself bilingual) have _"resolved the competition between the two tongues._"  And further, how that resolution affects those of us who work as translators.

Research has shown that a second language is stored in a different part of the brain from the first; stroke victims who have lived in their adopted country for decades, for example, can suddenly find themselves only able to communicate in their mother tongue. Personally I can feel that, when I speak, my French vocabulary emanates from a different part of my brain circuitry than English.  (The grammar rules may be located yet elsewhere, however.)

Does this correspond with your experience?

And now to up the ante a bit: _what happens in the brains of _those of us who are _professional translators?_  Are we not being called upon to make an "unnatural" connection between two different languages in our brains; connections that, for example, effortlessly bilingual persons who rarely need to translate almost never need to make?


----------



## El Huazontle

Interesting question indeed.

I experience the same feeling of having my non-native languages dictionary stored in a different part of my brain.

Regarding your question of professional translators making "unnatural" connections in the brain, I think it is true, although I don't think apply only to translators. I'm an IT professional working with people with many different origins and it always amazed me that we always perform mathematical calculations in our native language, even if the meeting is happening in English. It is just natural to access that part of the brain without going to the hassle of translating the numbers and mathematical or logical operations.

Cheers,
El Huazontle


----------



## perfavore

Hi,

I don't know how it works exactly but I'm just glad it does. English is not my native language but growing up in an educational system where English is the medium of instruction and an environment flushed with American movies and television programs, I would say that half of my tongue and brain turned English.

 When I first arrived in USA it came as a shock to me when an American told me, "You seem to understand English very well. You don't pause to translate inside your head before giving me an answer." A lot of friends ask me how I remember all the foreign languages I am studying but I don't know what to say or how to explain it. I just know there are other people like me who also love to learn foreign languages.


----------



## Musical Chairs

So what would be an example of "encroachment" of the word "zapato" on the word "shoe"? I am assuming that is "shoe" in Spanish.

I can't say I can physically feel where my words are coming from in my brain, but I've always been amazed at how my brain naturally changes modes when I visit family in Japan. For example, I would say "ita" for when I hit my elbow on something, instead of "ow" which is what it would be in English, and what I would say if I were in the US. It's interesting, because what you say in response to accidentally hurting yourself is a reflex. And I think in Japanese more, and I'm surprised at how much I can still read when I haven't seen the characters and words in years.

But it makes sense that people who are bilingual don't get two words confused. I think when we try to learn new languages, we think in our native language first then try to translate them into the language we want, and that translation process is lacking in those who already know both languages. When I say what a Japanese sentences is in English, I think in bulk instead of separating different letters and phrases, which is what I do when I try to translate French into English (separating nouns, verbs and their many tenses, conjunctions, etc).


----------



## Musical Chairs

El Huazontle said:


> it always amazed me that we always perform mathematical calculations in our native language



Ahhh, this is so true, my mom can speak English but she does her math in Japanese. In Japanese, there's a special way of saying the times tables, they're more like phrases or words stuck together than sentences so someone saying it can say one line very fast. And she can do more complicated calculations very fast because she uses a mental abacus (something children are taught in school). Do they do things like that where you're from?

I do my math in English regardless of where I am, because I was taught most of it in English.


----------



## LMorland

Musical Chairs said:


> So what would be an example of "encroachment" of the word "zapato" on the word "shoe"? I am assuming that is "shoe" in Spanish.



Dear Musical Chairs,

First of all, I'm afraid you have to read the article I cited to understand what they mean by "encroachment"; it's too long to try to explain here!  (And yes, you are right about _zapato -- _but your question makes me realize that the U.S. is becoming such a bilingual country that simple Spanish words are given in a major newspaper article without translation!)

I like your phrase about "thinking in bulk" -- that feels like a good description of what I do when I'm speaking French.  And also your pointing out the importance of reflex words: when I come back to California for the summer, the first couple of weeks I'm always saying _"pardon"_ when I bump into someone!  

You made me think of a related example:  I've been singing in a chorus here in Paris for five years, and in the context of everyone speaking French I always naturally mutter in French to my neighbor (when appropriate).  But now we're practicing three pieces from Haendel's _Messiah, _written in English, and last week, after singing English words for two hours, I found myself unthinkingly responding "What?" when I didn't understand something! 
El Huazontle, I'm glad you brought up numbers.  I remember being shocked a few years ago when I caught an Italian friend of mine, whose English is perfect after 40 years in California, counting in Italian!  I'd be willing to bet that numbers are definitely stored in a different part of the brain.

Moreover the visual representation of numbers, at least for non-Asiatic and non-Semetic speakers, looks the same, so there is no compulsion to translate them.

Question: does a "naturally bilingual" person, such as you, perfavore, have the same experience with numbers?


----------



## Musical Chairs

LMorland said:


> I like your phrase about "thinking in bulk" -- that feels like a good description of what I do when I'm speaking French.  And also your pointing out the importance of reflex words: when I come back to California for the summer, the first couple of weeks I'm always saying _"pardon"_ when I bump into someone!
> 
> You made me think of a related example:  I've been singing in a chorus here in Paris for five years, and in the context of everyone speaking French I always naturally mutter in French to my neighbor (when appropriate).  But now we're practicing three pieces from Haendel's _Messiah, _written in English, and last week, after singing English words for two hours, I found myself unthinkingly responding "What?" when I didn't understand something!
> El Huazontle, I'm glad you brought up numbers.  I remember being shocked a few years ago when I caught an Italian friend of mine, whose English is perfect after 40 years in California, counting in Italian!  I'd be willing to bet that numbers are definitely stored in a different part of the brain.
> 
> Moreover the visual representation of numbers, at least for non-Asiatic and non-Semetic speakers, looks the same, so there is no compulsion to translate them.
> 
> Question: does a "naturally bilingual" person, such as you, perfavore, have the same experience with numbers?



I think it's weird and cool how my verbal reflexes are in different languages depending on the country. I would never say "ita" at a restaurant in America, for example. 

Actually in Japan, the visual representation of numbers is the same as in the Western world when children are taught math. It's just that we have a faster way of saying the times tables and doing more complicated calculations (like adding/subtracting higher numbers for example). Do you do your math in French or English?


----------



## perfavore

Hi LMorland,

No, unfortunately, I don't. I have the same experience as MusicalChairs. All my math lessons were in English so I never experienced computing anything in my mother's tongue but what El Huazontle said is exactly true because I have heard my Turkish and Chinese friends compute in their native languages. It would take me forever to compute in Pilipino since twenty-two translates into "dalawampu't dalawa" and it just gets longer and longer. 

Anecdotally, I've heard that a sign of proficiency in a foreign language is when you hear yourself speaking it in your dreams. I know it's true because I'm able to converse in English and Pilipino in my dreams but never in Chinese which I never learned well from my dad. There must be a spot in our brains that memory and dreams share.


----------



## El Huazontle

perfavore said:


> Anecdotally, I've heard that a sign of proficiency in a foreign language is when you hear yourself speaking it in your dreams. I know it's true because I'm able to converse in English and Pilipino in my dreams but never in Chinese which I never learned well from my dad. There must be a spot in our brains that memory and dreams share.



I agree with that statement as well, it happens to me, and I also think that you are actually getting bilingual when you're able to dream or think in a different language without thinking in translating it.

Musical Charis, I'm originally from Mexico and we don't learn numbers using abacus. It's very interesting how different cultures learn the same things with different methods but the brain actually store that basic teachings in a special location that never fades, even in your last moments as you mentioned.


----------



## ryuusaki

It's a very interesting question.

I speak Cantonese as my native tongue, but I can speak English almost equally well. I started learning English when I was in pre-kindergarten, and I studied almost all of my subjects in English even before I came to America. Also, because I was so exposed to English that, I always thought/talked in a mixture of Cantonese and English. I would use Cantonese grammar but use a lot of English words at the same time.

So, even though I still have a feeling that those two languages are stored in different parts of the brain, I think they are kind of mixed up in a way.

Besides, as I live in America longer and longer, I seem to think in English more and more. I pretty much think in English all the time, even in my dreams. However, when I read Chinese or speak Cantonese, I can change channel automatically without any problem.

And, actually I know how to speak some Mandarin too, and I am learning German at high school. When I speak those languages, I seem to be thinking in a different part of the brain too. Whenever I speak a different language, I seem to think in that language. I feel like I have several brains and I use a different one when I speak a different language.

But as I am not very fluent in Mandarin, and barely know German, very often I have to refer to Cantonese/English since I don't know how to express myself in those languages. It's like my brain for Mandarin/German is not so developed that I can't just depend solely on it. It's weird, but I really feel that I have several brains. I guess because of that, sometimes I have difficulty translating one language to another (it takes me some time to get that transition) since I have to connect two brains together. But just one more thing, when translating, I usually take the concept and meaning of the sentence and translate, instead of trying to translate the words.


----------



## Musical Chairs

I would say it:

But as I am not very fluent in Mandarin, and barely know German, very often I have to refer to Cantonese/English since I don't know how to express myself in those languages. It's like my brain for Mandarin/German is not developed enough that I can depend solely on it. It's weird, but I really feel that I have several brains. I guess because of that, sometimes I have difficulty translating one language to another. It takes me (some) time to connect two brains together. But just one more thing, when translating, I usually take the concept and meaning of the sentence and translate, instead of trying to translate the words.



But, usually when you try to translate the concept and meaning, you end up with inaccurate translations especially if they're more complicated things.


----------



## LMorland

ryuusaki said:


> It's weird, but I really feel that I have several brains. I guess because of that, sometimes I have difficulty translating one language to another (it takes me some time to get that transition) since I have to connect two brains together. But just one more thing, when translating, I usually take the concept and meaning of the sentence and translate, instead of trying to translate the words.


 I appreciate that ryuusaki can't switch instantaneously between his "two brains", as it fits with my experience.  (People will often ask me, at the drop of a hat, how to translate a certain word, and I'm often frustrated by the number of seconds that elapse before my brain produces a response!) 

Has anyone had time to read the article I referenced in my original post?  I'm curious as to your reactions!


----------



## badgrammar

I read the article, very interesting, although only the part you quoted directly addresses the question of the "bilingual mind."  I imagine  more research and studies  focused on that particular question could show us how the mind sorts out its language centers and stores languages away in memory. 

I'm totally bilingual in French and English, but not so much as my kids will be by the time they are adults.  I'm fascinated by how they sort things out seamlessly, much more so than I, at times.  

When I was studying two other languages a couple of years back (German and Turkish), my mind was totally working like a dictionary, I remember making jokes about being a "wörterbuch".  How was my mind classifying all the new entries?  Well, I'd have to say not like 1 big multi-lingual dictionary.  It seemed like each bit of info was going to (and coming back from) a particular point of reference in my head.  I had that vague impression then, now I am starting to believe that may be just what happens.


----------



## palomnik

I have a problem that is sometimes uncomfortable.  When somebody tells me something in one language, I can't remember what they said when I'm speaking another language.  Has anybody else ever had this problem?


----------



## LMorland

palomnik said:


> I have a problem that is sometimes uncomfortable.  When somebody tells me something in one language, I can't remember what they said when I'm speaking another language.  Has anybody else ever had this problem?


Well, my problem is that I tend to remember, as Musical Chairs has said, "in bulk" what people said.  So if I want to quote what one French person said later on to another French person, I have to recreate it in my head.  

Unless the person used a particularly memorable phrase, I remember the conversation almost as if we had spoken in English.  I imagine that this is due to the fact that I have become fluent only in the past six or so years; perhaps if I'd grown up bilingual I wouldn't have this problem.

Is this what you meant?  Or do you forget what people said entirely?


----------



## LMorland

perfavore said:


> There must be a spot in our brains that memory and dreams share.


I like that idea!  

As for dreaming in the second language, I agree that it probably is a sign of fluency.  Unfortunately I don't speak French any better in my dreams (except for, maybe, my accent!) than I do in real life.


----------



## perfavore

Hi LMorland,

I just read the article and now find myself struggling to accept the concept they are espousing. Knowing how to say, "How are you?" in my native tongue has not impaired me at all in expressing it in more than 20 other languages. If anything it has actually given my brain amusement as it compares the words, the sounds, the accents of all the different languages. Friends always inquire how I retain all of them since there is no one to practice with. I could never give a clear explanation other than "it's my passion to learn them" but I think the phrases from one language actually help me to remember the other phrases since my brain keeps making comparisons across all of them.

If what they claim is entirely accurate then I would start losing/forgetting the other ways of saying, "how are you?" as I keep trying to learn more and more ways to say it.


----------



## badgrammar

Hi perfavore, I didn't understand that article as making a claim about the ability to learn and use numerous languages.  I think the study really just showed how our memories access and process and/or ignore certain language related info at particular moments, but not our overall ability to learn and store language-related information...  

Maybe I did not read closely enough?


----------



## perfavore

Hi badgrammar, the article didn't make any claims about our ability to learn other languages. What I was pointing out was their claim that the brain has a process of helping us forget/block other things in order for us to remember the other things. This sounds counterproductive for anyone who wishes to learn more and more. If what they claim is true, how does Kim Peek, the real _Rain Man,_ able to store all the information in his head?


----------



## badgrammar

But it means that during a situation where we have to make quick decisions or are otherwise under pressure to "perform", we block out other information stored in our memories that is not immediately necessary.  But the block is temporary, related to a particular situation.  

Imagine yourself in a situation where you have to concentrate on just one task...  It makes sense that your brain would block out thoughts that will distract you - but that doesn't mean that later you will not think of those things again.


----------



## nichec

LMorland said:


> Hi!
> 
> This is the first time I've contributed to the "cultural forum" -- in fact I didn't even know it existed until today!
> 
> I'd like to refer you to the lines quoted below (presenting this little bit of text falls within the rules permitted, I believe) from an article entitlted* "Forgetting May Be Part of the Process of Remembering" *that appeared today on the New York Times' website: http://www.nytimes.com/2007/06/05/h...l=1&adxnnlx=1181174619-Dbw2j7GRXD10rxJLMtZkEA
> 
> This process [blocking old memories in order to develop new ones] is extremely familiar to people who have been immersed in a foreign language. In a recent study of native English speakers led by Dr. Anderson, researchers showed that beginners being drilled in Spanish were very slow to link pictures and words in English, compared with more bilingual participants. *Those fluent in both languages had resolved the competition between the two tongues, *inhibiting the encroachment, for example, of the word “zapato” on the word “shoe.”
> 
> What interests me is _how _we bilingual folks (and here I should add that I am considered fluent in French, but I can just barely dare to call myself bilingual) have _"resolved the competition between the two tongues._" And further, how that resolution affects those of us who work as translators.
> 
> Research has shown that a second language is stored in a different part of the brain from the first; stroke victims who have lived in their adopted country for decades, for example, can suddenly find themselves only able to communicate in their mother tongue. Personally I can feel that, when I speak, my French vocabulary emanates from a different part of my brain circuitry than English. (The grammar rules may be located yet elsewhere, however.)
> 
> Does this correspond with your experience?
> 
> And now to up the ante a bit: _what happens in the brains of _those of us who are _professional translators?_ Are we not being called upon to make an "unnatural" connection between two different languages in our brains; connections that, for example, effortlessly bilingual persons who rarely need to translate almost never need to make?


 
Hummm....tough one.....thinking.....
I never find myself in a situation where I can't change from one language to another immediately and right away, actually I feel that I can *think* in both languages, which means I don't even need to translate them in my brain.....sometimes I feel that there are two Silvia, half speaks Chinese as her mother language, and the other half speaks AE. I tried to watch European films with both subtitles before, to see if I need more time to understand one subtitle than the other, but I didn't feel any difference.
That's probably why I'm good at my job

But when I started to learn French, I found myself trying to translate everything into English in my head when I learned it, maybe because it's closer to French.

And also, sometimes when I'm interpreting a conversation between an English speaker and a Chinese speaker, I would suddenly start to talk to the Chinese guy in English, and talk to the English guy in Chinese

Besides, it seems that my brain has an ability to categorize my friends by the languages they speak, when I think about an American friend, all the memory and the things I want to say to him/her would be in English, and when I see his/her face, I would start to think in English.....


----------



## Trisia

Hmmm, interesting article indeed... I wonder why I keep forgetting where I place important documents but I always remember my Internet passwords 

I sometimes dream in English... wow, does that mean I'm proficient?

I'm not bilingual. In fact, most of my English comes from writing school-related essays and watching cartoons. I always try to dodge situations when I'm supposed to translate, mainly because I simply forget which language I'm supposed to use. English comes very natural in the most awkward circumstances (like when there are only Romanians in the room). And sometimes I forget whether somebody told me something in English or Romanian - I don't translate it in my head, it's just... there, no matter which language of the two. Yeah, I guess it's that "other brain" feeling some mentioned 

Cool stuff actually


----------



## perfavore

badgrammar said:


> But it means that during a situation where we have to make quick decisions or are otherwise under pressure to "perform", we block out other information stored in our memories that is not immediately necessary. But the block is temporary, related to a particular situation.
> 
> Imagine yourself in a situation where you have to concentrate on just one task... It makes sense that your brain would block out thoughts that will distract you - but that doesn't mean that later you will not think of those things again.


 
Hello again Badgrammar,

Your point is perfectly valid but if you look again at the title, *Forgetting May be Part of the Process of Remembering*, it says forgetting not blocking. I don't have a problem with blocking but I have a big problem with forgetting. I don't want to forget all the piano lessons I had in high school while trying to learn more symphonies. I don't want to forget Filipino, English, Chinese, and Spanish while I'm trying to learn Italian, German, and French. They seem to suggest that our brain can get overcrowded when other scientists claim that we only use a small percentage of our brains.

I think every multi-lingual person has a certain degree of flexibility because each language has its own syntax. I try not to remember the arrangement of words in English as I study Italian and just focus on the Italian syntax. This reminds me that I have been using English as my reference point to learn new words rather than my native tongue. One obvious reason is the preponderance of English-Other Language Dictionaries.


----------



## ryuusaki

so anyone here works as a translator or interpreter? I want to know how it feels like when you have to "switch channel" from time to time. And when you translate, you must translate the words precisely (I assume you must), and what would you do when you encounter words that can't be directly translated?


----------



## Sepia

ryuusaki said:


> so anyone here works as a translator or interpreter? I want to know how it feels like when you have to "switch channel" from time to time. And when you translate, you must translate the words precisely (I assume you must), and what would you do when you encounter words that can't be directly translated?



I'say, we should transfer the meaning precisely into the target language. That is a toataly different thing, than translating words precisely. There are lots of words that cannot be translated directly, but one should always be able to find the expression of the equivalent meaning. Even this is not always possible - and then you should try to decide if it is important to be that exact. An example: You are translating a conversation, say for a film, where Japanese persons are speaking with each other. Some are titilated with "san" and others with "ku" ( ... I think that is what you use for those of lower ranks, right?) Now, is it important to go really into details with Japanese culture, is the key question. If not, you simply translate it with Mr Takeda and Mr Fujita. If it is a story that goes more into detail - and if it is on print - you could use the original words and put a footnote under the text. 
The question always to ask yourself is, what exactly is the info I want to bring to the receiving point. 

Sometimes the problem is not only single words. One thing that is very special about the German language is the flexibility made possible by the complicated grammar. You can put an immense amount of info into one word or sentence - in a way that is not always possible if the target language is a much simpler one. Like Danish. Often you have to construct a sentence so complicated that the reader will probably have to read it three times to understand its full meaning, in order to transfer 100% of the original meaning. So here again you'll have to decide - is it so important that we should have the reader reread the sentense or is it such a text where an undisturbed reading flow is more important than whatever gets lost. Is it a contract, a technical description or something you just read for pleasure?


----------



## anthodocheio

Trisia said:


> I sometimes dream in English... wow, does that mean I'm proficient?





> And sometimes I forget whether somebody told me something in English or Romanian - I don't translate it in my head, it's just... there, no matter which language of the two.


 
I don't know about English but I think in Spanish all the time (I never dream anyway!). 
I know, I'm sure I'm not proficient in Spanish. It's just something I love so much... By the way, I enter a site today that was saying; "test your level in Spanish"... I was really very disappointed by the result, it was so bad.. I know I make a lot of mistakes but I think in that language... It comes natural to me.. I also usually think of something I have said incorrectly.. The right answer comes on it's own...

Eventually now that I'm here reading all this I'm thinking in English. Now, if I get to something I'm unable to express to the language used I simply think of it in Greek (or in Spanish now writing English) and try to find a way to say what I'm thinking in the other language.

And, as Trisia said, I almost don't remember in what language was something I heard. As long as I got the meaning it something mine. Then I can say it again in any of the three languages I can use. I think that sometimes my thinking use words but others only meanings... or feelings...


----------



## suslik

I've lived in USA for 7 months by now and already many months ago I discovered myself thinking in English. And because I don't have any Estonian people here to talk with (only my friends on phone once a week) I can't remember suddenly some words in Estonian when I've been asked and I have to answer quickly. Then I start to think to remind those words, and I can't. After little while words come back to my head, but it's still very weid feeling. And it's usual to see dreams where I'm talking in English
And once my friend's friend picked up the phone when I was calling and I started to speak in English, because I was suprised to hear stranger's voice and most natural thing for me was to speak in English. It just came so naturally from me. I think that it's so weird for me because it's first time for me to be so much bilingual by living in other country for so long time.


----------



## perfavore

suslik said:


> I've lived in USA for 7 months by now and already many months ago I discovered myself thinking in English. And because I don't have any Estonian people here to talk with (only my friends on phone once a week) *I can't remember suddenly some words in Estonian when I've been asked and I have to answer quickly*. Then I start to think to remind those words, and I can't. After little while words come back to my head, but it's still very weid feeling. And it's usual to see dreams where I'm talking in English.


 
There were times I also had difficulty recalling some words in Filipino/Tagalog but I think the memory loss or dysfunction is more from lack of use rather than from an active or passive process in our brains to squeeze/push/forget old memories to give space for new information.


----------



## e.ma

I studied Chinese with ch/eng dictionaries (and I found Chinese grammar simmilar in quite a few points to English'!). As a student in China, I used to call my mother in Spain and give her long speeches in Chinese.

Now, when I'm trying to speak Japanese or French, which I have very little knowledge of, Chinese words would often come up.

But I can dream in any language, even Latin!

I think the ability to understand languages (starting from one's own) works like muscles: the more you exercise it, the bigger it gets.


----------



## Packard

There is a concept of "divided reflexes" as relates to our reaction to stimuli.

For example, some bicycles have hand brakes that can be operated with either of two sets of levers.  Tests have shown that the momentary indecision that arises when the operator tries to decide which set of levers to use, yields longer stopping distances.  Hence the term "divided reflexes".

Perhaps our minds do the same when processing language.

As an aside:

In the late 1960's, I took a friend (Lucia) to see "Divorce Italian Style".  It was in Italian with English subtitles.  Lucia's father was a foreign diplomat and was stationed in Italy for several years so Lucia was fluent in Italian.

I read the subtitles; she listened to the dialogue.

When we left the theater she continued to think (and speak) in Italian until I pointed out to her that she was doing so.


----------

