FrenchLanguage Senior Member Germany Joined 5738 days ago 122 posts - 135 votes
| Message 1 of 36 24 March 2010 at 5:00pm | IP Logged |
Hey,
I've been wondering something:
Who on here was the fastest to ever learn a language from scratch (until they achieved fluency)? Not really trying to turn it into a competition or anything just curious (thus I dont have an exact definition...but please a normal language not an overly related language that makes it ridiculously easy to learn the new language - if something like that exists :D).
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Arekkusu Hexaglot Senior Member Canada bit.ly/qc_10_lec Joined 5383 days ago 3971 posts - 7747 votes Speaks: English, French*, GermanC1, Spanish, Japanese, Esperanto Studies: Italian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Romanian, Estonian
| Message 2 of 36 24 March 2010 at 5:05pm | IP Logged |
What is "fluency"? You'll have to define that pretty clearly before you can even begin to look for an answer.
The same person would also find a HUGE difference between learning alone, at home, and actually living in an immersive situation, where a few months would suffice.
Edited by Arekkusu on 24 March 2010 at 5:08pm
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delectric Diglot Senior Member China Joined 7183 days ago 608 posts - 733 votes Speaks: English*, Mandarin Studies: German
| Message 3 of 36 24 March 2010 at 5:36pm | IP Logged |
I hear Esperanto can be done in 3 months with intensive study. Though not sure if this
counts as a foreign language.
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vb Octoglot Senior Member Afghanistan Joined 6424 days ago 112 posts - 135 votes Speaks: English, Romanian, French, Polish, Dutch, German, Italian, Spanish Studies: Russian, Swedish
| Message 4 of 36 24 March 2010 at 9:11pm | IP Logged |
There used to be an informal month-long challenge at Oxford Uni called the 'language race'. It involved learning languages from scratch and might be a good place to start.
Daniel Tammet supposedly learnt Icelandic in a week.
Tho' I can imagine it being hard to prove that he didn't know some of the language before he started.
Edited by vb on 24 March 2010 at 9:17pm
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Arekkusu Hexaglot Senior Member Canada bit.ly/qc_10_lec Joined 5383 days ago 3971 posts - 7747 votes Speaks: English, French*, GermanC1, Spanish, Japanese, Esperanto Studies: Italian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Romanian, Estonian
| Message 5 of 36 24 March 2010 at 9:20pm | IP Logged |
vb wrote:
Daniel Tammet supposedly learnt Icelandic in a week.
Not that it wouldn't be hard to prove that he didn't know some of the language before he started. |
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I remember seeing a show on that on youtube. He did something similar with German. Note that during that week, he had a full-time teacher, but still. That guy has a supermemory and is, in principle, autistic, except that he has become a fully functional adult.
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vb Octoglot Senior Member Afghanistan Joined 6424 days ago 112 posts - 135 votes Speaks: English, Romanian, French, Polish, Dutch, German, Italian, Spanish Studies: Russian, Swedish
| Message 6 of 36 24 March 2010 at 9:29pm | IP Logged |
Language race:
After just 12 weeks' language learning in total, she was fluent.
More precisely, it looks like she was at the intermediate level after the language race:
Maria Liakata, native of Athens, working on her Ph.D. in computational linguistics at the University of Oxford, England, studied Intermediate Ukrainian and Modern Ukraine
Edited by vb on 24 March 2010 at 9:36pm
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Arekkusu Hexaglot Senior Member Canada bit.ly/qc_10_lec Joined 5383 days ago 3971 posts - 7747 votes Speaks: English, French*, GermanC1, Spanish, Japanese, Esperanto Studies: Italian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Romanian, Estonian
| Message 7 of 36 24 March 2010 at 9:35pm | IP Logged |
I'd love to be able to devote 3 months solely to the learning of a language.
*dream*
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vb Octoglot Senior Member Afghanistan Joined 6424 days ago 112 posts - 135 votes Speaks: English, Romanian, French, Polish, Dutch, German, Italian, Spanish Studies: Russian, Swedish
| Message 8 of 36 24 March 2010 at 9:44pm | IP Logged |
Arekkusu wrote:
I'd love to be able to devote 3 months solely to the learning of a language.
*dream* |
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Break own leg to get time off work?
Tammet Icelandic link here.
Edited by vb on 24 March 2010 at 9:54pm
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