Unlocking Language Learning: How My Architecture-Trained Mind Makes It Easier

I'm just grateful that I have two such eternal professions, which go beyond anything human. Most people stay for at least 8 to 16 hours inside all kinds of buildings, which architects or builders designed. All languages form the basis of human relations that are filled with deeper emotions, curiosities, and practical information.

Indeed, I strenuously work towards both of them, but I thank that I shall never hope to have to strife to prove their relevance. Since age of hunter-gatherers, the human race has needed houses and languages.

I've already talked about how language learning principles have been steps toward becoming an architect. Now, I want to talk about how my 7+ years of cultured mind trained in architecture gives me a platform for learning languages.

Let me note that I am not licensed as an architect and do not intend to advertise architectural services in this article. I work in the same capacity as architects but am not attracted to the formalized route of professional licensure.

The following aspects of the architectural office experience contributed greatly to my ability to acquire languages:

An architectural design is never completely done

An architectural design project in a university could theoretically go on forever.

Even if you design the "perfect building," there will always be something new to be said by the professor. The professor will never respect you if you follow his advice to a hundred percent but will be even more critical of your design. The ideal way is to take the key points that apply to your design and defend your design decisions with a rock-solid justification.

In case you do not design what the client wants, you will not earn his respect. Clients feel that they pay you for your design intelligence, as they will live for those surprises that make them rethink their list.

Like this, clients in the professional world might end up doing a lot of changes. I learnt that when a client has more than 10 revisions, he is addressing some psychological issue which never gets sorted out by design.

A language too never gets fully resolved, just as architecture never quite gets there, and chipping away at it, one will have to do so at some level for life.

Even native speakers are always improving their writing or speaking craft. Acceptance of a journey which never slows down comes directly from the world of design and co

Old methods still have a viable role

Old Methods Still Have a Valid Function Little more than a decade ago, architects and draftsmen found themselves jobless because of CAD. Most of these former employees became my past bosses who still sketched out floor plans by hand to date. It was more of a philosophical decision, besides the clients appreciating their human relation with the drawings.

All architecture firms still hand draft at client meetings. In case a change arises, then rolling over trace paper and sketching makes it much easier than reissuing the drawing set, emailing it to the client, while waiting a few days for them to consider it.

Hand drawing also imparts an immediacy and human connection which no computer drafting can even hope to compete with.

India has the old methods still playing a role in language acquisition. All the learner podcasts being featured on YouTube these days, like LanguagePod101, are actually the same concepts that were recorded all the way back in the 1940s In this technique, a target phrase is uttered in the target language; the English translation is provided thereafter, followed by prompting for 2-3 repetitions with "out loud". It used to work back then and still does.

It never ceases to surprise me how easily the language comes to me during my speaking lessons. Something about the human connection makes neural connections stronger during language learning. Both hand-drafting and in-person speaking lessons play into the role of human connection.

It is unacceptable not knowing where to get the information

When a property developer client gives a blank plot to my firm and asks for building regulations for this parcel of land, I have to get this information. Even an online GIS database can only tell so much. I usually have to ring the city planners directly to arrange an on-site visit. The most important thing is to think of all the questions I can about this because getting a meeting with the city is incredibly slow!

If I have to get a fire code, building code, or zoning ordinance, I have to know to which book and chapter it refers.

It is also important to know how rigid the rules are. For example, there may be a 5' side setback required in the zoning ordinance, but this can typically be negotiable, depending on the construction. I constantly had to write a letter in Sydney, where I lived, arguing against a standard. These were usually very simple things, such as building a swimming pool on the property line. This type of letter was called a Clause 4.6 Variation letter. Why can I remember this still?!

I can empathize with giving up a foreign language because one doesn't have time or interest or motivation for it. But lack of resource was never a reason for giving up any language. It was never a reason to do so in either university and professional world.