As a student majoring in Spanish, I often think about the significance of our learning compared

with bilingual native speakers. Since it is almost impossible for us to reach their level, why are we
still struggling with learning languages?
In the learning process, I gradually realized that the difference lies in that we study cultural
background and intercultural communication, and we need to know about all aspects of translation
content. In the comparative literature class, I realized for the first time that linguistics studies the
nature of language, which reflects culture, society, national character, etc. We compared the
difference between inflectional languages and agglutinative languages, and their difference affects
the national character to a certain extent. For example, inflectional language strengthens rules and
order and contains part of the information through conjugation. However, Chinese has no
conjugations, while sentences are formed by superimposing various adverbials, and the order of
sentences is relatively random. Correspondingly, the Chinese are more flexible in dealing with
things, do not obey orders, and have an indifferent awareness of rules.
I had only a vague understanding of this concept at first, but over time I became more and more
aware of this idea. Our language is ambiguous, thus a sentence can have multiple interpretations
and connotations depending on individuals. Our political society also exhibits this feature. Rules
and systems can be interpreted according to superiors, and there is a vague and variable range for
them to choose from. In life, we don't make appointments in most cases and many things are
decided randomly by the communication and willingness of both parties. China is more a society
of power and relationships than a society based on rules.
The language contains too many meanings. In specific groups, certain words and expressions are
strengthened repeatedly, converting to symbols and common behaviour. I hope to analyze society
through language phenomena, especially mass psychology, to understand how language affects
culture, how culture affects language in reverse and the inevitable and accidental relationship
between them.
I am particularly interested in the course Sociolinguistic Research Design. I hope to understand
the research methods of sociolinguistics and learn to conduct research more systematically and
scientifically. Under the covid, some terms have become extremely popular, such as isolation and
antigen detection. In China, where prevention and covid control have transformed into political
behaviour to a certain extent, the use of some words in different stages reflects a more profound
meaning. For example, in November, the covid keywords in China were long-term sequelae,
strong contagion, and strict prevention. However, with the sudden change of policies, the previous
derogatory words began to be whitewashed, and the covid has become almost harmless flu in
domestic propaganda. I wish to analyze systematically this phenomenon and its deeper cause
through the course. At the same time, I am also very interested in the Bilingual Interaction course.
As a multilingual learner, I am very interested in languages and their interaction. When we
translate, we analyze the structure of the original text and more importantly, the connotation of the
sentence. When converting to another language, we also consider language idioms, language style,
and colloquial usage. The interaction involves the transmission of basic meanings and the same
time the expression habits and cultural customs. So I am eager to do an in-depth study to better
understand intercultural communication.
The University of Edinburgh's cutting-edge research on linguistics and the open curriculum of this
project has attracted me. I would like to pave the way for my career through this opportunity. I
hope to enter the media industry in the future, working as a project manager, and using linguistics
to analyze social phenomena. In the long run, I hope to study for a PhD in psychology or gender
study, combined with the interactive knowledge of applied linguistics, to understand this society
more deeply from the aspect of language.