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Schliemann method - has it been emulated? | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Learning Techniques, Methods & Strategies |  | |
| Cainntear Pentaglot Senior Member Scotland linguafrankly.blogsp Joined 6002 days ago 4399 posts - 7687 votes  Speaks: Lowland Scots, English*, French, Spanish, Scottish Gaelic Studies: Catalan, Italian, German, Irish, Welsh | Message 9 of 30 16 July 2010 at 1:17pm | IP Logged | |||||
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Schliemann was clearly an obsessive. All archaeologists are very particular and patient in their work, but he was pretty exceptionally single-minded.
Most people aren't, and it is a "stubborn fact" that most kids have an attention span that's insufficient for this. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Ocius Triglot Senior Member United States Joined 5581 days ago 48 posts - 77 votes Speaks: English*, German, Ancient Greek Studies: French, Latin, Sanskrit | Message 10 of 30 16 July 2010 at 6:48pm | IP Logged | |||||
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I did a little of this with Ancient Greek, but it was in addition to more "formal" study. For example, while working
through Sophocles' Oedipus Tyrannus, I memorized large portions of the Greek text after translating (mostly portions where the grammatical structure or vocabulary usage was abnormal). For the relatively little amount of memorization that I did, it seemed to do a lot of good. I'd like to try it with a new language at some point but, for the time being, I just don't have the time or the will. Despite that, I do use the method of memorizing portions of text in Ancient Greek and German still, and intend to use it for my French, Latin, and Sanskrit once I become more advanced. I firmly believe that such memorization (of authentic texts) -- even if it is not as intense as Schliemann's method -- does help solidify the grammatical structures and vocabulary usage more than simply reading or learning from a textbook. Edited by Ocius on 16 July 2010 at 6:52pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Romanist Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5273 days ago 261 posts - 366 votes Studies: Italian | Message 11 of 30 16 July 2010 at 10:07pm | IP Logged | |||||
That's a fair point - I can't see large numbers of kids being dragooned into doing this by their language teachers! :-0 But how about adult learners? (Especially real hardcore language enthusiasts like many of the folks who post here at this forum?) I do wonder whether Schliemann's ideas receive less attention than they deserve? 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| OlafP Triglot Senior Member Germany Joined 5426 days ago 261 posts - 667 votes Speaks: German*, French, English | Message 12 of 30 16 July 2010 at 10:46pm | IP Logged | |||||
I've been thinking about it for quite some time, and I'll probably give it a try this autumn with Russian. It will be one particular book and no other: Nietzsche's Zarathustra. I know large parts of the original version by heart, because I've read it so often. The language is quite special: short sentences, often with repetitive parts for dramatic reasons. It just sticks in memory without any further ado. Of course, most of the puns get lost in any translation, but the Russian version still is quite impressive, much more so than any English or French version I know. Russian is actually the language for this book. I bought an audioversion at Priviet.com, so I don't have to worry about stress, which is a bit tricky in Russian. The reader Irina Erisanova is doing a great job with this difficult text and it's a joy to listen to the recording. I will probably listen to it so often that I will end up knowing large parts by heart anyway. At the moment I focus on Swedish, though, because I'll spend some days in Sweden at the end of September and I want to get the best out of it. My Russian remains on standby until October. Edited by OlafP on 16 July 2010 at 11:01pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| William Camden Hexaglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 6263 days ago 1936 posts - 2333 votes Speaks: English*, German, Spanish, Russian, Turkish, French | Message 13 of 30 17 July 2010 at 1:35pm | IP Logged | |||||
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I have my doubts about whether Schliemann was as good at memorising long passages of text in a short time as he claimed he was. His interests, including languages, had a rather obsessive quality, as has been noted.
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| Romanist Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5273 days ago 261 posts - 366 votes Studies: Italian | Message 14 of 30 17 July 2010 at 2:34pm | IP Logged | |||||
My understanding is that most of Schliemann's letters and diaries have survived for posterity, and that it is known from these that he really was able to read and write about 10 languages at a very high level. What possible motive could he have had for hoaxing people about his learning methods? (As far as I know, he wasn't trying to sell the method, or to exploit it for personal gain, was he?) And if he had merely wanted to 'show off' about his accomplishments, he would hardly have stated that it was all down to a simple method which anyone could repeat! Therefore I'm not sure whether there can be any very good reason to doubt that he was telling the truth... 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| William Camden Hexaglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 6263 days ago 1936 posts - 2333 votes Speaks: English*, German, Spanish, Russian, Turkish, French | Message 15 of 30 18 July 2010 at 3:44pm | IP Logged | |||||
According to Robert Payne's 1959 biography of Schliemann, he claimed to have disguised himself as a Muslim and visited Mecca, rather like Burton. There is no evidence other than his word and Payne thought he imagined the whole thing. According to David Traill's biography published 1995, Schliemann claimed to have been received in the White House by President Millard Fillmore in 1850. There is no evidence for this, other than Schliemann's claim. Telling tall stories about his accomplishments was, in my view, something Schliemann did, and I wonder whether the rapid memorisation of text falls into this. He was fluent in 10 languages or so, and there is plenty of evidence for that. But claims that he could memorise huge chunks of text in a short space of time may be gilding the lily, to say the least. 3 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Doitsujin Diglot Senior Member Germany Joined 5311 days ago 1256 posts - 2363 votes Speaks: German*, English | Message 16 of 30 18 July 2010 at 5:10pm | IP Logged | |||||
BTW, Burton is also not exactly without his detractors and troubles. According to the following article he has been accused of plagiarizing another translator's work when he wrote his own translation of 1001 Nights. He also seemed to have had a weird kind of humor, because only in his translation of 1001 Nights there's story called "How Abu Hassan brake wind," which definitely doesn't exist in the Calcutta edition of 1001 Nights that he based his translation on.
Schliemann might have embellished some of his achievements, but I'd rather be skeptical about his trip to Mekka than his memorizing skills, because memorizing whole books is not such an unusual feat. After all, trained actors do it all the time. Edited by Doitsujin on 18 July 2010 at 5:13pm 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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