These both are very important to you. The first step toward learning something is to start with an understanding of what IT IS IN the context of its being. Language is a social phenomenon, SO a human being's ability to express thoughts depends on surroundings. If you are listening carefully TO how and what people AROUND YOU ARE SAYING, you can understand society where you are. The reverse is ALSO true: Knowing a society, its tradition and values, relations between cultural and political groups, the youth and the aging, and the like, gets you deeper into the language's structures and word meanings.

IMAGINE THAT you are getting on board a ship for a long trip. You know the name of the ship and the direction of your trip, meet with the captain and know which university he attended, see the cloth of the sailors and figure out the trademark and quality of their uniforms, calculate the number of passengers and their origins, and so on. IN THIS WAY you become comfortable when you are aboard the ship.

If you still believe that it is enough JUST to know some thousands of vocabulary WORDS for being a good talker you are wrong. LISTEN to how people from different social classes are speaking.

Introducing and imagining how language works in social context help a speaker to go deep into the "rules" and the "laws" of using language. Every social group (E.G., the poor, the middle-class, and the rich) has a specific vocabulary and uses certain expressions to FRAME AND USE the same thought IN different ways.

IMAGINE entering a room full of people you don't know. What will you do FIRST? Do you attempt to say anything to them? Look around? Yes, you try unconsciously to DEFEND yourself from their unexpected actions or unknown words that make you feel uncomfortable or even ashamed. For that, you need to understand what THE social types of THESE strangers are.
And what could you say about diversity of the cultural and sub-cultural groups in a society and around you - radical, homosexuals, bank clerks, computer users, etc.? Surely, you have noticed the diversity of their languages. Have you ever heard the word "to click" from a man who never uses computers? Have you ever seen a high class representative come into a room without "May I come in?" It is obvious there are some social signs on the road of teaching foreign languages to "freshmen".

Be careful coming into that room, a metaphor for society. What are the most useful indicators for you?

1. Clothing. Color, brightness, cleanness, cost, and fashion, so on are expected to suit the situation. Different languages are used to depict different clothing styles (casual, formal, party, work, etc.).
2. Kind of occupation. Every sphere of human activity is full of special terms or jargon. The more people work in one field the more alike are the languages they use.
3. Age. People of different ages often use different vocabularies, even within the same language. (Of course, you already know this.)
4. Relations. Movements, looks, peoples' voices, etc. can indicate the "social distance" between them (for example, relatives, friends, colleagues). So you can use the appropriate words.
5. … (add yourself).

What can a beginner do TO enter the "swim" in a society? An emigrant to USA, Marcio Villanueva (USA Today, Monday, August 25, 2003), describes A TYPICAL SITUATION: "When I couldn't express myself, I felt pulled apart inside, like I was another person". Motivation to learn the native language and ways of thought in a foreign country is high because without knowing the native language you may be doomed to being unproductive, marginalized, and even "invisible".

That is we would like to remember:
while studying a foreign language you are going deep into a room filled with strangers until you know everyone by name!

Nataliya Balabanova, PhD,
Associated Professor of Sociology and Management,
Head of Social Sciences Department, Ukranian Institute of Arts and Sciences
(Specially for ELC).