Equivalent to anáǧoptaŋ?

[Kevin]

I have been listening to the KILI Radio program and transcribing some of it everday. If you do not yet use this resource, you are robbing yourself of a wealth of idioms and understanding of colloquial Lakota and also of tuning your ear to hear the sounds and understand conversation. Peter Hill who is a fluent second language learner highly recommends that people strengthen their comprehension skills this way. He told me that he knows some that could speak well but could not understand what was said to them. These programs are not in slow speech but fast speech so it will help you recognize how it sounds in everyday use.
Anyway, I did not intend on that plug but anyway. As I was listening to different shows I have heard the expression, naȟ’úŋ yaŋkA as a way to express listening. I have also, of course, heard anáǧoptaŋ yaŋkA. Are these two basically equivalent in this use with yaŋkA? Thanks.

[Jan]

As I was listening to different shows I have heard the expression, naȟ’úŋ yaŋkA as a way to express listening. I have also, of course, heard anáǧoptaŋ yaŋkA. Are these two basically equivalent in this use with yaŋkA? Thanks.

The two are not completely identical. Their difference is based on the difference between the verbs "to listen" and "to hear". Look at their definitions (taken from Collins COBUILD English dictionary)

to listen = if you listen to someone who is talking or to a sound, you give your attention to them or it
to hear = when you hear a sound, you become aware of it through your ears

Based on these definitions we could argue that "to listen" describes a process of giving attention to a sound/speech with your ears, while "to hear" describes the result of that process. And this result means becoming aware of the sound or the content of the speech. This means that anáǧoptaŋ (listen) is an inperfective verb (it describes an unfinished activity) while naȟ’úŋ (hear) is perfective (finished activity, a result of an activity).
When you add yaŋká to these verbs, you change them into progressive - the activity continues. This has impact on naȟ’úŋ, making it somewhat "non-finished" or continuous.

anáǧoptaŋ maŋké = I was listening to him
naȟ’úŋ maŋké = I was hearing him / I kept hearing him / I have been hearing him/it

The former describes the process, the latter emphasizes the result of that process - i.e. becoming aware of the content of the speech. The latter can be difficult to translate into English, especially if we want to use idiomatic English.
So, although those two collocations are highly synonymous, they are not exactly identical as each one emphasizes different semantic features.

[mitchmiye]

I have been listening to the KILI Radio program and transcribing some of it everday. If you do not yet use this resource, you are robbing yourself of a wealth of idioms and understanding of colloquial Lakota and also of tuning your ear to hear the sounds and understand conversation. Peter Hill who is a fluent second language learner highly recommends that people strengthen their comprehension skills this way. He told me that he knows some that could speak well but could not understand what was said to them. These programs are not in slow speech but fast speech so it will help you recognize how it sounds in everyday use.
Anyway, I did not intend on that plug but anyway.

I agree with everything Kevin said about utilizing the KILI files for listening comprehension practice. They are awesome practice if you're willing to put in the time. Unfortunately I've heard some folks complain that they are too large of a leap for the average beginner or beginning-intermediate, which I tend to somewhat agree with. Therefore, there probably needs to be some listening comprehension files for folks lower on the proficiency pole to chew on and transcribe; files that have "slower,fast-speech speakers" (did that make sense?!?!?) engaged in more basic dialog. And most importantly, they should be categorized as such (if possible). How can we, as a forum, fill this gap here on LLF?

Sorry if this is drifting from the original thread here (but... since Kevin brought it up.. ); feel free to re-categorize this post, as needed.

Mitch

[Ali]

Surely those KILI programs are excellent resources of learning. Would anyone be interested in choosing one program and cutting it into smaller pieces for transcribtion and moderate it? I would do it but unfortunately at the moment I'm somewhat busy to functionally moderate it. Alternatively, we could make two or three moderators working with it. If someone selects a good program to work with. I could cut it into smaller sentences and so on.

Anyone interested?


ps. Just to remind all of us there are the Second audio still in progress. Excellent material too.

AV

[Jan]

I agree with everything Kevin said about utilizing the KILI files for listening comprehension practice. They are awesome practice if you're willing to put in the time. Unfortunately I've heard some folks complain that they are too large of a leap for the average beginner or beginning-intermediate, which I tend to somewhat agree with. Therefore, there probably needs to be some listening comprehension files for folks lower on the proficiency pole to chew on and transcribe; files that have "slower,fast-speech speakers" (did that make sense?!?!?) engaged in more basic dialog. And most importantly, they should be categorized as such (if possible). How can we, as a forum, fill this gap here on LLF?

There are not many texts in slow speech available for a number of reasons that are not easy to describe in short. Part of the reason is the lack of audiovisual media which would help cultivating a more formal speech style (e.g. compare the colloquial English pronunciation and style with that on TV news channel). Another reason is that fast speech has become the norm in many families, in other words the language has been gradually shifting towards the fast speech forms. The current spelling of many of the words is somewhat in between the older generation of speakers and the youngest generation that has not really experienced what we call slow speech. Such shifts are common to all languages and every spelling reform represents a lot of decision making in terms of which pronunciation to accept for a standard.

The forum does include at least two recordings with slow speech:

http://lakotadictionary.org/phpBB3/view ... ?f=8&t=507 (long one)
http://lakotadictionary.org/phpBB3/view ... f=8&t=1208 (short one)

These contain narratives in a speech that is as slow as you can get today. Forum members can try and transcribe parts of these sentences and then refer back to our transcription.

The Level 3 textbook will include short listening comprehension activities designed for beginner learners. And such activities will get longer and more advanced with each level of the textbook.

[Jana]

Mitákuyepi,

For those who think KILI is too hard for beginners: Just jump into the cold water (as we would say in German)!
If you have no Native speaker around to talk and listen to, this is a great way of creating a Lakota environment to immerse yourself in. Just don't expect to understand it - just listen (when sitting on a bus/train, when dishwashing or driving or mowing your lawn...). You will understand a word here and there, and maybe only one or two sentences of the whole show - but the happier you will be when after a week or two you understand some more words and some more sentences.
I'm having this feeling of success everytime when I understand even one word more than last time - and I hardly understand maybe 3 % of it. Anyway, next time maybe 4 %. And there is always also a little English in the shows. Some stories and jokes are translated - this helps a lot when listening to the Lakota version. Just rummage around in our KILI Radio treasure box and I'm sure you will find a jewel for yourself. Mine is "The girl who loved wild horses" (which has been transcribed and translated in the forum) and a lot of jokes, too.

Jana, who loves the joke with the sheep

[John Vander Veer]

Mitákuyepi,

Listening to KILI is hard at first, but it does get easier faster than you would think. At first, I knew about one word in 20, and slowly I recognized more. Yes, at first, this is frustrating listening to a radio show without comprehension. However the practice of listening does work. Yesterday somewhere between 6 PM and 8 PM CDT USA there was a show about learning the language. The native speaker recited a Lakota fable in Lakota about a woman and wolves in Lakota. I knew that the story was about a women, one or several wolves, and going to or from somewhere. Next this speaker recited the same story in English. It was about a Lakota woman captured by the Crow on a raid. She was help captive there for some time till Crow women had pity on her,and allowed her escape. She was befriended by wolves who promised her to show her the way back home. You just never know what you will find or learn unless you take the time to explore.

John