My linguistic history
Before the FSF40 gathering, William Goodspeed checked my blog when receiving my inquiry email. When I opened the same website in person, he asked: ‹Are you into linguistics?› I was not sure what expectations an English major might have by ‹into linguistics›, so I awkwardly avoided answering.
The other day, I read a reflection on their linguistic journey from a linguistics guru. This guru’s encounter with language began with academic competitions and has since woven a marvelous double helix of career and language, an achievement I can hardly imagine. Their article, however, debunked my single-origin hypothesis of the linguistics community, as I had assumed the entire language circle stemmed from discussions on a BBS forum in the early 2000s. This prompted me to reflect on the role language and linguistics have played in my life.
说说选登
晚七点，我逡巡在积石堂三个大字下，啜泣不止，看着门洞越来越陌生。
此生最自由的时刻，就是高中听着阁子的鸟鸣，对未来懵懵懂懂，或者刚来兰州时看着技术书睡着，不知今夕何夕。我在自我介绍里 “passionate about” 的 “my chosen field” 仅那时才给过清欢片刻，此后只有无尽的遗憾。
Childhood
This series is taken from Lú Chānghǎi’s Retrospection. Only after being reminded by a classmate did I come to understand that Chānghǎi’s account of his unique experiences with his contemporaries was not accidental. I did not lament, for they at least had once been the chosen ones, whereas I was far from being someone at the forefront of the present age. No matter how difficult or arduous, or even how resentful, I was merely a country bumpkin, watching the spectacle from afar, unable to take part.
Though our choices varied greatly, my nostalgia was in many ways similar to Chānghǎi. My self-perception in high school was even based on the concept like ‘Muqliongism,’ but the distant past merely existed like still water in an old well, a phantom lodging in the present. The later misfortunes could not be blamed on the hometown; they were equally due to the limits of my nature and mistaken decisions.…