Living LCDD 14 Paya Kuna. LCDD 14 Paya Kuna

Appenxix N 317 The endurance of the family is based on the tolerance of the weaker member. This is often the wife, because the stress load of the wife is much greater than that of the husband. She has to carry dual roles of family and work. Then, in addition, the effect of living in a different culture is a far greater stress in her carrying out her role as wife and mother, than on the husband in his role as bread-winner and family man. Desire, or willingness, to live among people of a different culture does not enable one to escape most of the pressures of culture stress. Excessive stress often results in one or more of a vast selection of physical disorders. In summary: Deal with culture stress, or it will deal with you

b. Time

In setting up your daily or weekly schedule, be flexible enough to avoid frustration and disciplined enough to achieve success. Try to fit your daily schedule to the cultural pattern of the people. For instance, have your time for visiting in the late afternoon and your time for study and planning in the morning when the people are away in their fields. Any daily schedule should include: 1 Time with the people Time spent in visiting is not only good for your relationship with the people, but can be valuable language-learning time. 2 Study time Time needs to be set aside for memorization, processing information, planning and preparing for ―talking‖ on your visits. 3 Other work time This includes teaching and medical programs, etc. 4 Family time There is a real need, because of demands by the people, to guard against neglecting the family. Here, you can use the Kuna cultural pattern to good effect. For instance, you can have family fun on your own at the river, swimming and playing it is cultural to respect a family ‘s privacy. You can also have family time by extending the time it takes to eat your meals it is cultural to leave and stay away while people are eating. 5 Your “own” time You husband or wife need time to be on your own for quiet reflection, etc. 6 Living time Living away from the city takes more time for chores, maintenance, etc. This fact has to be recognized and planned for. The above list is not in order of importance or priority. All the items need to be included. None can be left out.

c. Planning your contacts with people

Plan what the contact is going to be: a visit, or work party, or meeting, etc. Based on the type of contact, think of what opportunities there are likely to be for hearing or speaking or learning in Kuna. In view of the opportunities that are likely to be available, think of what learning devices you will be able to use: 1 Hearing 1. Tracking 2. Active listening 3. Passive listening 2 Talking 4. Conversing and speaking 318 Language Learning 3 Investigating 5. Questioning 6. Recording and writing what is said. Having decided which learning devices you will probably be able to use, in addition to the general use of tracking, talking, etc., think of what special features of the intonation, sounds, and grammar you need to concentrate on. In view of what features you want to concentrate on, think of what topics you think it would be helpful to steer the discussion or conversation towards, if given the opportunity. Assuming that you have an opportunity to steer the conversation, think through how you will achieve this. Now that you have decided what you need to do, write it down and familiarize yourself with it. Then think through the whole contact, writing down what you need by way of greeting; establishing topic; your contribution by way of conversation; some of the ―sustainers‖ you will probably need and closures. Plan what you intend to do when the conversation winds down. If it is a planned activity, make sure all the necessary preparations are made. Plan your exit.

d. Plan your investigation of Kuna

In planning further investigation of Kuna, there are several factors to be taken into account: 1 Need If you have a situation in which you can ‘t express yourself correctly, cropping up several times in a row, then this is the logical area to investigate next. For instance, if you have difficulty in expressing when an incident willdid take place, then it would be good to investigate time phrases and clauses. 2 Variations Try to systematically work through the variations of what you have discovered under 1 above. For instance, after having discovered how to say: ―Yesterday, I....,‖ systematically think through ―tomorrow,‖ ―day before yesterday,‖ ―day after tomorrow,‖ ―three days ago,‖ ―in three days‘ time,‖ ―last week,‖ ―next week, ‖ etc., and try to find out the forms for these. 3 Relationships After dealing with pressing problems, work through a list of universal grammatical relationships 139 and see which ones you can handle. Next, make a list of what would appear to be the most useful for you to use. Then use this as a basis for your investigation.

e. Process

Plan for the following stages in investigation: 1. gather data 2. hypothesize guess what the grammar rule is 3. check your hypothesis 139 Some books dealing with grammatical universals from which you can extract a list: Beekman, John Callow, John 1974. Translating the Word of God. Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan Publishing House. Chafe, Wallace L. 1970. Meaning and the structure of Language. Chicago, Illinois: University of Chicago Press. Grimes, Joseph E. 1975. The Thread of Discourse. The Hague: Mouton. Longacre, R.E. 1976. An anatomy of speech notions. Lisse: The Peter de Ridder Press.