Approaching Language as a Method of Communication †Communications Essay

Approaching Language as a Method of Communication – Communications Essay Free Online Research Papers Approaching Language as a Method of Communication Communications Essay I believe language is a piecing together of thoughts to form an approximation of some mental apparition. Over time, this construction of the mind became standardized, but the primary mechanism has not changed. I have never been very adept at using words to convey any particularities in how I speak or write, so I will let my writing do that for me. My thoughts do not follow any kind of syntax, but behave like abstractions in the form of flying sheets, faint shadows, pointing arrows, halos of light, or jumbles of blocks. When I do think in words, I find a few snippets of Korean or Japanese floating amidst a queue lining up to be uttered. When I read, it feels as though some mental audio book is playing the words that my eyes translate, but sometimes my mind is so noisy that I have to read aloud to keep the distracting voices quiet. These are the voices of students, standing in a sunlit library atrium, their tenor sounds echoing chaos. Their strains are filled with random words and images that constantly shove each other away, vying for my attention. It is through this sea I must wade through in order to find the few fragments to assemble a complete thought. Although I was born in the United States, I spent the first four years of my life in Korea, where I quickly learned its language and customs. Then when I moved back to the United States, it was difficult to transform my Korean thoughts into English words, so I used pictures to say what I wanted. Soon I learned how to speak flawless English, although at times I utter strains of broken phrases like â€Å"eating time eat† during dinnertime or â€Å"I study now.† Other sporadic delivery errors like the misplacement of a verb in a sentence or the mispronunciation of an ‘l’ sound get mixed in my speech and especially when I read out loud. I confuse my ‘which’s with ‘that’s and frequently use worn out idioms like â€Å"I find that,† â€Å"like the plague,† or â€Å"bets are off† in my writing. The search for synonyms consumes most of the time it takes to write a paper or prepare a talk. In an effort to encourage language learning, my parents bought me an electric typewriter when I was seven years old, which I used to punch out colorful sidebars on dinosaurs and spaceships or just plain nonsense. Occasionally I made mistakes during production which were then transferred to an eraser unit, which needed periodic replacement. So I took out the old cartridge and its contact film. On it were random letters, digits, and symbols that the mechanism picked up every time I hit ‘backspace.’ Then I called everyone into the living room and announced that I created a new language, reading the strip of film with made-up sounds. The only problem was that nobody except I had any idea what I was saying and quit trying to decipher my code. A seven-year-old’s pride welled up inside me as I discovered that I knew something that no one else did, even if it was silly and imaginary. This was the inner voice I was looking for, a chaos where I found order. At times I still find myself scribbling cryptic messages to myself in seemingly random arrangements of symbols in the middle of drawings of power lines, factories, and bridges when I do not know what to say in English. Writing has always been the one activity I find the most difficult, since I constantly have to sift the objects in my head and then search for the right words that not only accurately describe what I am thinking, but also conform to accepted conventions. My situation reminds me of an old cartoon from a Dave Barry book with male and female brains side by side. The male brain is connected to a complicated apparatus of distillers, pumps, pipes, and a tiny faucet at the mouth dripping out words one at a time, while the female brain is attached to a big giant hose gushing forth words without restraint. I find myself having a bit of both qualities. It is often difficult to say what is on my mind, and it sometimes takes a lot of mental wrestling to get a point across. But when I am excited about what I am talking about, I forget about grammar and structure and just let everything pour out, bad ‘l’s and all. Research Papers on Approaching Language as a Method of Communication - Communication's EssayStandardized TestingThe Spring and AutumnMind TravelBook Review on The Autobiography of Malcolm X19 Century Society: A Deeply Divided EraQuebec and CanadaAssess the importance of Nationalism 1815-1850 EuropeHip-Hop is ArtAnalysis Of A Cosmetics AdvertisementComparison: Letter from Birmingham and Crito

How to Change a Column Size or Type in MySQL

How to Change a Column Size or Type in MySQL Just because you made a MySQL column one type or size doesnt mean that it has to stay that way. Changing the column type or size in an existing database is simple.​ Changing a Database Column Size and Type You change a column size or type in MySQL using the  ALTER TABLE  and  MODIFY commands together to make the change.   Lets say, for example, that you have a column named State on a table named Address and you previously set it up to hold two characters, expecting people to use 2-character state abbreviations. You find that several people entered entire names instead of 2-character abbreviations, and you want to allow them to do this. You need to make this column larger to allow the full state names to fit. Here is how you do it:   ALTER TABLE address MODIFY state VARCHAR(20) ; In generic terms, you use the ALTER TABLE command followed by the table name, then the  MODIFY command followed by the column name and new type and size. Here is an example:   ALTER TABLE tablename  MODIFY columnname  VARCHAR(20) ; The maximum width of the column is determined by the number in parentheses. The type is identified  by VARCHAR as being a variable character field. About VARCHAR The VARCHAR(20) in the examples can change to whatever number is appropriate for your column. VARCHAR is a character string of variable length. The maximum length- in this example  it is 20- indicates the maximum number of characters you want to store in the column. VARCHAR(25) could store up to 25 characters. Other Uses for ALTER TABLE The ALTER TABLE  command can also be used to add a new column to a table or to remove an entire column and all its data from a table. For example to add a column, use:   ALTER TABLE table_name   ADD column_name datatype To delete a column, use:   ALTER TABLE table_name   DROP COLUMN column_name