Reflection: Story of your life

1.How are the aliens’ language and communication styles in the story different from human language (oral, pictographic, phonetic, etc.)?

The aliens have two communication systems. They use linear spoken language like humans. However, unlike human, they use a nonlinear writing system to express multiple things at the same time.

2. How does the physical structure of our body inform the way we communicate? How about the aliens?

We face the front, and our eyes are on the top of our body, so we tend to see things from their centers. What’s more, we only have to eyes to form a 3-D vision, so we can only focus on a small part of one thing at one time, and we have to realize things in linear order, so our spoken and written languages are both linear. The aliens’ bodies are symmetric from the center and have one organ in the center to see and talk, so their written language is nonlinear.