“Multilingual people perceive reality in their own
way – thru a labyrinth where they never get lost” a friend once wrote to me. “It
is a lovely gift to an artist.”
Indeed, I often encounter inquisitive looks when for a split second during a conversation I pause to allow my brain make connections between languages, words, colours and phonetics. It is not something I control, but surely anticipate. Sometimes I mix words from a different language while speaking in English. Often I recall names by making phonetic and descriptive associations with the name of newly met people. Other times I remember their names, as I did in my studies of biology and chemistry complex molecular structures and their names (phonetic mnemonics) by creating my own sentences about them mixing two or more languages. Recently I was in the Botanic Gardens of Denver, Colorado recently and I could not immediately recall the name of my favorite flower. It took me a second to think of an Orca to continue my conversation about the Orchids section. Later in the evening, we were talking about Barbara Streisand movies and I said that a comedy themed one was my favorite.
“Which one?” I was asked.
“The one that had a rabbit in the title” I said.
After a Google search, I was told that the movie
with Ryan O’Neal was called “What’s up,
Doc?”
Ha! That was the famous line from Bugs Bunny, the 1930s
Disney cartoon character… I was surprised myself that my brain had stored that
association with the movie title decades ago.
So, when I talked about the incidents with a clinical
psychologist friend via email, he wrote:
“You should watch the 2016 movie “Arrival”. I sometimes show segments of that
movie during therapy sessions.”
So I did.
Arrival
is a science fiction movie where The Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, also known as linguistic relativity, is used to explore how languages act
as cognitive filters for experiencing and interpreting reality. The hypothesis
proposes that brain pathways filter reality differently through the structure
of different languages especially regarding spatial structures, the concept of
linear time, colour, and sound. Eventually the worldview of a polyglot varies
from that of single language users.
Needless to say, such a “skill” would benefit creative
thinkers. One description in the movie resonated splendidly with me – it was that
change in brain pathways, resulting to the knowledge and use of multiple
languages, may lead a person to have memories of his future while still passing
through his present reality.
Like being homesick for places we have never known.
Unformed faces about which we have written poems on papyrus or sheets made of
multi-layered synthetic polymers to save trees. And during unmoon nights,
remembering the taste of wines made from grapes yet uncultivated.
… As I read more about the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis
and the reaction of the scientific community to it, I wondered if in addition
to my linguistic vagabondage between languages I also can find some examples in
my photography in literary works.
Indeed, I have often gotten feedback that my prose,
poetry and even scientific publications, when written in English, have a hint of
unusual sentence structure, use of words and imagery.
As to my photography, I thought of two photos that
may be of interest to my psychologist friend during his therapy sessions! The
first is atop this entry and is of a woman on a bridge looking at young people
and children coming down a narrow stream in floats on a warm day. The vintage
look of the photo is a gift of using a 1953 Soviet Fed -2 sporting a Jupiter-9
85mm lens from the same year.
The second photo is one I took more than a decade
ago on the shore of the Pacific Ocean.
Clearly the compositions are very similar and neither
photo tells a story of the moment in a unique way. But, after watching “Arrival” it occurred to me that these
photos may tell more about myself
than of a fleeing moment a street photographer tries to capture.
Could my “transition” from a vast space (the ocean)
to a narrow stream be a reflection of the cognitive filters as time, linear or
otherwise, had reshaped my brain’s pathway of inquiry and interpretation? Was I
unconsciously re-taking the same photos with a new worldview? If so, was my
memory of the future, which is now, influenced my taking the two photos in the
past, which was my present then? In the photo atop this essay page did I
associate the stream and the people in floats as memories coming back to the
woman on the bridge, hence the reason of taking that shot?
Hmm.
I am eager to get my own therapy session, online
this time, from my friend comfortably laughing in the Scottish Highlands….
August 18, 2026
© Vahé A. Kazandjian, 2026
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