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| bouda Senior Member United States Joined 5601 days ago 194 posts - 197 votes  Speaks: English* | Message 89 of 160 13 August 2009 at 3:31pm | IP Logged |
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Oh, that's good to hear, because that's what I looked under first. I did see that verb
you mentioned but wasn't sure whether I was correct in pinpointing it because the way the translator of my text worked it in is a little different, and I didn't know whether he was more correct or if Google Translate was more on the point. Of course, translators are never exact in both word and connotations, but I wasn't sure which of the two he was focusing on. Here's the phrase in Arabic as given in the text: محافظة على أثر جمال مندثر And here's the translator of my English text (obvs not word for word): ... still had vestiges of her former beauty. Looks like مندثر was rendered as 'former.' Unfortunately my high point in my Ancient Greek career was probably in high school too! For some reason, I've been a little emotionally distanced from Ancient Greek for the last year or so. I put it down to see if my love for it would suddenly flare up again, but so far all that's happening is that I'm forgetting everything. Oh well. Classics major friends have threatened to write letters using exclusively Ancient Greek to me so perhaps I'll be forced to look at it again. I don't really have any motivation to return to it in the near future, though. There are so many other languages, ancient and modern, that I want to look at! 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| snovymgodom Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5729 days ago 136 posts - 149 votes Speaks: English*, Russian | Message 90 of 160 13 August 2009 at 7:44pm | IP Logged |
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Yeah, that does make more sense than relics. It's definitely used as an adjective here.
I hear you about looking at other languages. I just feel slightly guilty about abandoning Ancient Greek since I was so into it during high school. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| bouda Senior Member United States Joined 5601 days ago 194 posts - 197 votes Speaks: English* | Message 91 of 160 14 August 2009 at 1:52am | IP Logged |
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I don't know why I'm not as interested in Ancient Greek now as I was in high school; I
was very excited about Greek plays in particular during my sophomore year, for instance. But I guess why doesn't matter too much as I'm probably not going to go back to it for a while, anyway. I'm much more interested in China and the Middle East and the road in between. Reading your blog has started a burgeoning curiosity about Russia, too, although that'll have to wait a while until my Arabic gets better! 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| bouda Senior Member United States Joined 5601 days ago 194 posts - 197 votes Speaks: English* | Message 92 of 160 14 August 2009 at 1:55am | IP Logged |
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I think I'm going to read every chunk twice in Arabic from now on - that is, two days
in a row before moving onto the next chunk. My experience of this morning showed me that rereading, with a bit of a distance, would really help me with comprehension - as I was typing up the phrase, I was wondering to myself why I was so incredibly confused before! Edited by bouda on 14 August 2009 at 5:36am 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| bouda Senior Member United States Joined 5601 days ago 194 posts - 197 votes Speaks: English* | Message 93 of 160 14 August 2009 at 5:52am | IP Logged |
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It's frustrating to me that I'm making little headway in terms of listening
comprehension. Perhaps "frustrating" is the wrong word; because I recognize the near- inevitability of the situation (aside from the issue of simply having studied for only a short while, I have no native speakers to practice with for another month, only recordings, and I KNOW that I could be putting more time into that), I'm not genuinely frustrated so much as mildly, illogically, selfishly irked. I think part of the issue is that I usually do not learn languages in order to speak in them. I learn languages because I want to read texts in the original Chinese/Ancient Greek/Arabic/whatever. Sometimes I am successful, sometimes I am not. But as a result of this tendency, I often begin reading things I want to read very quickly and grow passable reading comprehension skills very quickly as well, all the while bypassing the whole listening bit. Solution is probably just to listen more and more actively. Edited by bouda on 14 August 2009 at 5:58am 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| bouda Senior Member United States Joined 5601 days ago 194 posts - 197 votes Speaks: English* | Message 94 of 160 14 August 2009 at 6:11am | IP Logged |
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edit editing
2) How does one go about determining what makes a language "easy?" Certainly learning Chinese will be different for an native English speaker than for a native Cantonese speaker. 3) How "easy" is Chinese, anyway? Some things that strike me as difficult off the top of my head: all the various particles including le, the tones, the character system, measure words, Classical Chinese (I know, I know - we're talking about modern Mandarin), the influence of Classical Chinese on formal and literary writing... it's true that you don't have to deal with, say, gender or the jussive mood, but I don't think these last few years were a complete breeze in terms of grammar, either. ETA: I should add that I don't consider myself advanced in Chinese (although I have high standards of fluency). However, I also don't think that I reached my current intermediate level through twiddling my thumbs. Edited by bouda on 14 August 2009 at 3:27pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| bouda Senior Member United States Joined 5601 days ago 194 posts - 197 votes Speaks: English* | Message 95 of 160 14 August 2009 at 4:13pm | IP Logged |
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Anki w/Arabic - 55m.
I realized that I define fluency differently for myself than I do for other people. When I am considering whether someone else (not a native speaker of lang in question) is fluent, I first establish whether they are learning a language I am learning. If they speak a language I know, they must be better than me for me to consider them fluent (because I don't consider myself fluent). If I do not know the language in question or if my own grasp of that language is very basic, I try not to judge. ETA: I should appendix to this post that I really do not care that much about the fluency level of other people. If you are happy with your level of fluency, that's all that matters. I know people who go around like they're the fluency police or something - I aspire not to be one of those people, although, if it looks like you are serious about learning and I believe I can help, I may give you corrections (though rarely in actual conversation unless we are in a tutoring/lang exchange situation). In terms of my own fluency, I have several basic goals that must be met before I consider myself fluent (though not native-level): - I can pick up any well-known work of literature and understand enough to be able to write an analytical essay on it, all without use of dictionary, both in L2. - I can pick up any newspaper and understand enough to have detailed discussions on the news with native speakers, both in L2. - Corollary: I can speak on the topics I generally like to speak about (basic conversations, literature/film discussion, the news) without having to pause except for rhetorical purposes or fumble for words and while using advanced vocabulary. - I can write quickly and by hand (as opposed to typing characters online, for instance), I can write well, and I can write "creatively." Edited by bouda on 15 August 2009 at 7:21am 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| bouda Senior Member United States Joined 5601 days ago 194 posts - 197 votes Speaks: English* | Message 96 of 160 14 August 2009 at 10:52pm | IP Logged |
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Took a break from struggling with Arabic today and thought I'd cheer myself up by doing
some Chinese instead. Easy and relaxing, right? Perhaps if I had followed my usual summer vacation schedule - watch a few movies, read a few books - but on an impulse I decided to spend my morning translating a Classical Chinese poem instead. Well, the comprehension bit wasn't that bad, although I haven't checked against other translations yet so I don't know if I'm interpreting it correctly/"correctly," but the translation part? I never fail to be impressed by translators worldwide every time I attempt this exercise. It's so hard to strike that balance between meaning and beauty in any endeavor, much more so when you don't even have the freedom of choosing any word you want. Here are some preliminary notes/attempts for the first third of the poem (be warned; very rough indeed!): The tombs of Nanshan - why such grief? Ghost rain scatters across empty grass. Changan - night, mid-autumn, and before the wind, how many people aging? 1 person has voted this message useful |
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