This collection of quotes is being compiled by Lo Snöfall

30 August 2010


http://www.mortiis.com/
Go away from me.
I just want to flee.
The god i used to be.
Fill me no more with glee.
Where am I now?
Upon whom to bestow,
The Secrets locked inside.
The universe I hide.
The Monolith is I.
It was always me.
This world has always been,
The place I really lived in.
Here i stand, alone.
My soul has turned to stone.
Half my kingdom to,
Him that helps me through.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/29/magazine/29language-t.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all  It is not easy for us to conceive how Guugu Yimithirr speakers experience the world, with a crisscrossing of cardinal directions imposed on any mental picture and any piece of graphic memory. Nor is it easy to speculate about how geographic languages affect areas of experience other than spatial orientation — whether they influence the speaker’s sense of identity, for instance, or bring about a less-egocentric outlook on life. But one piece of evidence is telling: if you saw a Guugu Yimithirr speaker pointing at himself, you would naturally assume he meant to draw attention to himself. In fact, he is pointing at a cardinal direction that happens to be behind his back. While we are always at the center of the world, and it would never occur to us that pointing in the direction of our chest could mean anything other than to draw attention to ourselves, a Guugu Yimithirr speaker points through himself, as if he were thin air and his own existence were irrelevant.

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