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Babel No More / Mezzofanti’s Gift | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Lessons in Polyglottery |  | |
| ProfArguelles Moderator United States foreignlanguageexper Joined 7253 days ago 609 posts - 2102 votes  | Message 1 of 149 11 July 2009 at 12:12am | IP Logged | ||
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A serious study of polyglottery is underway! The book is being written, not in any nebulous sense, but under concrete contract with a major publishing house and with a fixed 2010 date of issue. The author, Michael Erard, Ph.D., has previously published a book entitled: Um...: Slips, Stumbles, and Verbal Blunders, and What They Mean. He is now researching a project called Babel No More to investigate polyglots and the upper limits of language learning ability.
You can learn about Dr. Erard’s project by visiting his website. There, you will find a detailed survey about language learning habits and abilities. If you are a polyglot, I urge you to take the time to complete the questionnaire. I have had the privilege of introducing Dr. Erard to my father, to my friend and former colleague, Professor Jerry Decker, and to our own Moses McCormick. I think it would be wonderful if Mr. Iversen, Mr. Simcott, Ms. Meyer, and indeed all of the polyglots on this forum would also take his survey. His book is the first serious treatment of polyglottery, and it would be good for his data to be as comprehensive as possible. He is very much aware that there are different polyglot personalities, and if you represent one that he has not yet encountered and you signal that you are willing for him to do so, he may want to contact you personally. I have just posted a video that he filmed of me discussing my current study habits. Let us all help him to produce an authoritative work that will win for all polyglots the acknowledgment for their efforts that is so often elusive! To do this, again, please visit Dr. Erard’s site and fill out his language learning survey: Babel No More. Alexander Arguelles Edited by Fasulye on 18 July 2013 at 7:20pm 5 persons have voted this message useful | |||
 jeff_lindqvist Diglot Moderator SwedenRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6906 days ago 4250 posts - 5711 votes Speaks: Swedish*, English Studies: German, Spanish, Russian, Dutch, Mandarin, Esperanto, Irish, French Personal Language Map | Message 2 of 149 11 July 2009 at 1:03am | IP Logged | ||
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Thanks for the links, Professor!
Jeff Lindqvist 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Woodpecker Triglot Senior Member United States Joined 5808 days ago 351 posts - 590 votes Speaks: English*, Arabic (Written), Arabic (Egyptian) Studies: Arabic (classical) | Message 3 of 149 11 July 2009 at 3:01am | IP Logged | ||
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Thank you, professor. The article on the website was an interesting read, and your video was very entertaining. I am eager to read about the findings of the study. This is definitely a worthy subject.
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| ronp Heptaglot Newbie Australia ronpeek.blogspo Joined 6091 days ago 33 posts - 74 votes Speaks: English, Dutch*, German, Flemish, Italian, Spanish, French Studies: Norwegian, Mandarin, Esperanto, Finnish, Macedonian, Hindi, Greek, Indonesian, Lithuanian, Basque, Portuguese, Russian, Arabic (Written), Sign Language Studies: Turkish, Swahili | Message 4 of 149 11 July 2009 at 12:34pm | IP Logged | ||
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Dear Professor Arguelles (and others),
Thank you for your post and the video. I would also recommend completing the survey. I did so a while ago after contacting Michael Erard in relation to my own research and personal interests in polyglots and polyglottery. There are not many studies on polyglots (even fewer in English) and I applaud his efforts in this regard (good systematic research on polyglots is even rarer than polyglots...) I recently commenced a part-time PhD, which also looks into this area (www.ronpeek.blogspot.com), but it is still very early days. However, I hope to report back on any findings in the future and perhaps contact some of you as well. Meanwhile, have a go at Erard's survey. I found it very insightful and learned a few things about myself as well. Kind regards, Ron Peek Edited by ronp on 11 July 2009 at 12:36pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
 Fasulye Heptaglot Winner TAC 2012 Moderator Germany fasulyespolyglotblog Joined 5844 days ago 5460 posts - 6006 votes 1 sounds Speaks: German*, DutchC1, EnglishB2, French, Italian, Spanish, Esperanto Studies: Latin, Danish, Norwegian, Turkish Personal Language Map | Message 5 of 149 11 July 2009 at 3:09pm | IP Logged | ||
Prof Arguelles, This project is interesting!!! You might not know me, because I haven't taken part in this subforum so far. As a polyglot I may be a good testperson. Sincerely, Fasulye According to this scientist's definition I speak enough languages to be called a "hyperpolyglot", but I myself feel much more comfortable with calling me a polyglot. I have just contributed in the survey and found it interesting to "take the test". Edited by Fasulye on 01 July 2010 at 6:47pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| JonB Diglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 6262 days ago 209 posts - 220 votes Speaks: English*, German Studies: Italian, Dutch, Greek | Message 6 of 149 12 July 2009 at 11:13am | IP Logged | ||
I agree. If a 'hyperpolyglot' is a person who has an advanced functional ability in 6+ languages, then (aside from Prof Arguelles) the only genuine and proven 'hypers' that I am aware of seeing on this forum are Ms Schittko, Mr Iversen, Mr McCormick and the gentleman who posts under the name 'Charlmartell'. You could certainly add Mr Steve Kaufmann to the above list - but I believe he no longer posts on this forum. (And I trust that Mr Simcott is also a true 'hyperpolyglot', however I myself cannot recall ever seeing him 'in action'.) It is, of course, very easy to claim advanced ability in 6 or 12 languages. I guess that there are very many posters on this forum who do that! But one should surely be able to show an actual use of the languages in order to qualify as a real 'hyperpolyglot'? The results of this very interesting survey could be corrupted if too many frauds start taking part! 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| michael erard Newbie United States michaelerard.com Joined 6111 days ago 24 posts - 106 votes Speaks: English* | Message 7 of 149 12 July 2009 at 3:18pm | IP Logged | ||
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All,
I thank Professor Arguelles for mentioning my book and furthering my research by pointing people to my survey. It's the first such survey of its kind, and I hope it will provide a stepping stone for researchers like Ron Peek. Among the places my research has taken me: I've been to Bologna, where I looked at the archives of Mezzofanti, and to Dusseldorf, where I saw what's left of Emil Krebs' brain, and to Chihuahua City in Mexico to visit a multilingual club whose motto is that everyone can speak 7 languages. I've been to south India to meet multilinguals. I've had my language aptitude tested and my brain scanned. I've sat in Professor Arguelles' library. Finishing the survey itself can require some time, but it doesn't have to be completed in one sitting. However, it is *extremely* important that people fill out the speaking self-assessments. It's important because there are hypotheses about the distribution of skills/abilities across the number of languages that I am trying to evaluate. I know it's annoying. But it's for a good cause. I recognize that you may use some languages only for reading or listening, but I didn't include these in the survey because 1) they hadn't been released yet and 2) would make the survey even more burdensome! (People tend to mention languages they only read in a comment form on the last page.) There is a fuller description of the book and survey at www.babelnomore.com, as well as an email contact form you can use to enter a drawing for a free copy of the book when it comes out. Thanks again Michael 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
 Iversen Super Polyglot Moderator Denmark berejst.dk Joined 6700 days ago 9078 posts - 16473 votes Speaks: Danish*, French, English, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, Swedish, Esperanto, Romanian, Catalan Studies: Afrikaans, Greek, Norwegian, Russian, Serbian, Icelandic, Latin, Irish, Lowland Scots, Indonesian, Polish, Croatian Personal Language Map | Message 8 of 149 12 July 2009 at 7:24pm | IP Logged | ||
I have now taken the survey, and I'm glad to hear that there are scientists out there who are genuinely interested in the phenomenon of polyglotism. I hope that Dr. Erard will publish his results soon (2010 will be fine!) so that we can at last get some real facts about accelerated language learning on the table. We can provide a lot of anecdotal evidence in a forum like this, but a systematic study by a competent and detached observer is quite another thing. I have also watched the new video of profArguelles, - and it was very interesting to see how many different materials you need to go through daily to keep scores languages languages alive and happy. This very lively presentation shows another side of Professor Arguelles than the standard format with his face in closeup. Mr.Simcott, who writes under the penname of Torbyrne on this forum, has shown his skills in several impressive videos on Youtube. Niels Johs. Legarth Iversen Edited by Iversen on 12 July 2009 at 10:28pm 1 person has voted this message useful |
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