Idiom Idiyum

One thing which interests me a great deal that I have written about in blogs before is the use of idioms. Kolln wrote, “The term idiom refers to a combination of words whose meaning cannot be predicted from the meaning of its parts; it is a set expression that acts as a unit.” Some examples we commonly use would be things like catch some Zs, hit the books, or on crack.

I think that quite often we appreciate our own language in an ethnocentric way, neglecting to find the beauty in languages which are not our own. One way I’ve found of appreciating the unique cultural differences of others is by finding idioms in other languages and asking for their translations in English. I also try to find equivalents of English idioms to see if other languages have similar ones.

I have a friend who is living in China right now, and he acquainted me with an idiom for something being difficult. Like pulling feathers from an iron chicken. This seems very similar to our “like talking to a brick wall,” or “like pulling teeth.” They also have like scales on tofu, meaning “obvious.” I am not sure why, but I always find learning new idioms and traditions from other languages interesting. In Russian, when you wish a person good luck, you can use the phrase commonly used to wish a hunter well. You would wish them “neither down nor feathers,” and in response, they tell you to “go to hell.” This is interesting in that the tradition uses an idiom, and people wish for and respond with the exact opposite of what they really hope (not wanting to jinx the other person). While I’m not sure why I find these differences in speech so fascinating, I am always hoping to learn new idioms from other languages. If anyone has some they would like to share, I would greatly appreciate it.

I haven’t always been as interested in idioms as I am now, and I think it’s because I have lived in many places where there really was not a variety of different languages, dialects, or major differences in writing present. Going to college and working with ESL students has helped me to appreciate the immense variety of languages and ideas that are different from those to which I am accustomed.

A question I would pose to others would be this. Some cultures circle round an argument before coming to their point. Some start with the most drastic statement and then slowly move towards stating what it is they are really after. To what degree do you tend to think of English as “absolute” or forget that others might be communicating in different ways when talking to people or perhaps doing a peer review for a non-native speaker? If you're a non-native speaker, do you find that you think of your first language in those same ways? Do you always take into account the differences in language, even in the country in which you've grown up? Do you make assumptions, as I often have, based solely upon a particular view, having grown up in the United States where I speak and write Standard English?