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What loosens your tongue? | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| FatBlackCat Diglot Newbie Canada Joined 4428 days ago 4 posts - 8 votes Speaks: Russian*, English Studies: French, Norwegian | Message 17 of 38 08 January 2013 at 3:08am | IP Logged |
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Two things often do it for me:
1. Being stressed. 2. Feeling comfortable and interested (having had a drink can help). I'm not sure whether these two methods have much in common (removing one's inhibitions, perhaps?). I'm thinking, rather, that they work in different ways: the former is about effective usage of knowledge and skills that you have, the latter is about fun and creativity. A short story to illustrate the first point: I was in Italy, running rather late trying to make it to the airport near Bologna; I was driving a hire car that needed returning, too. Then I made the wrong turn and got a bit lost. My only hope of success, I thought, was to ask for directions from a man in the street. Conveniently, there happened to be one in the wee hours of the morning, but he only happened to speak Italian. Asking and understanding directions isn't a particularly sophisticated type of discussion, I know, but I was still surprized just how smoothly it went. Ordering a meal was about my level in Italian on that trip. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6596 days ago 9753 posts - 15779 votes  4 sounds Speaks: Russian*, English, FinnishC1, Latin, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Danish, Romanian, Polish, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Croatian, Slovenian, Catalan, Czech, Galician, Dutch, Swedish | Message 18 of 38 08 January 2013 at 4:52am | IP Logged |
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Books loosen my tongue. Like, if I've been reading something it's easier for me to speak at my true level, with as few mistakes as I can manage. This is what really matters to me; rage also works but it removes the worry while *increasing* the number of mistakes.
Alcohol (and sometimes just nice food) is relaxing without that increase, but it also doesn't really improve the accuracy. 4 persons have voted this message useful | |
| mick33 Senior Member United States Joined 5923 days ago 1335 posts - 1632 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Finnish Studies: Thai, Polish, Afrikaans, Hindi, Hungarian, Italian, Spanish, Swedish | Message 19 of 38 08 January 2013 at 9:43am | IP Logged |
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The things that loosen my tongue in any language are good food, pleasant company or passion for something. Edited by mick33 on 08 January 2013 at 9:44am 3 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Zimena Tetraglot Groupie Norway Joined 4591 days ago 75 posts - 146 votes Speaks: Norwegian*, English, German, Spanish Studies: Czech, Mandarin | Message 20 of 38 08 January 2013 at 7:38pm | IP Logged |
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I have to agree with what was said earlier in this thread: Feeling comfortable. If I feel safe and comfortable with the setting and people around me, I speak much more easily. This applies even to my native language, but it gets double obvious in foreign languages.
Also, passion helps a lot - ask me about something that really means a lot to me, and it'll be a lot easier for me to talk to you about that thing... and especially so if I think that you're honestly interested in what I have to say about it, not just asking me to get me to talk :D 3 persons have voted this message useful | |
 jeff_lindqvist Diglot Moderator SwedenRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6908 days ago 4250 posts - 5711 votes Speaks: Swedish*, English Studies: German, Spanish, Russian, Dutch, Mandarin, Esperanto, Irish, French Personal Language Map | Message 21 of 38 08 January 2013 at 7:50pm | IP Logged |
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Exactly! There's nothing like having a conversation about something you like, you can relate to etc. I can speak for hours with some of my colleagues, but there are some with whom I have almost nothing in common. Not much talking there... (and that's in my native language).
3 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Eternica Triglot Newbie United States Joined 5071 days ago 24 posts - 74 votes Speaks: Cantonese, English*, French Studies: Hungarian, Spanish | Message 22 of 38 08 January 2013 at 10:37pm | IP Logged |
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Marijuana.
Before any anti-weed absolutists rain their wrath down on me, this is by no means a post condoning the usage of such a substance of nature. However, there are scientific studies that suggest (of course, this does not mean "prove") that the interactions between THC and the brain are conducive to increasing creativity. From personal experience, I become more creative with my thoughts. Not only that, but I actually become less inhibited (like what alcohol does), so this may also play a factor. Also, I don't know about you guys, but when I speak English or Cantonese, my native languages, the words actually "feel" meaningful and "native" to me. No matter how fluent I am in a foreign language (though admittedly, I haven't gotten anywhere above B2 in any foreign languages I've studied), words in a foreign language always feel "artificial" to me. I always need to exert a little effort from the part of my brain in order for L2 languages to "make sense" to me. I've always wanted to start a discussion on this topic, but I wasn't quite sure if anyone had the same idea. Anyways, under the influence of cannabis, these words actually feel "natural" to me, like every word means exactly what it sounds like. I was having a deep conversation with my French friend about ignorance/intolerance of cultures. Since I was a bit intoxicated, I ended up understanding and "feeling" every single word my friend said during the two minutes of discourse. I was crying at how much his message affected me on a personal level from the words alone. In addition, through relaxing the tension in my body, words were able to leave my mouth quite fluently without much effort or pause. Admittedly, I may be barking up the wrong tree, as indeed, he basically read my mind as to what I wanted to say and it is quite easier to understand words that you yourself would say, but this is my experience. If the above doesn't convince anyone, here's are two more digestible corollaries for an answer: 1) Lack of inhibition. 2) A creative state. Outside of fine dining situations, I'm quite strongly anti-alcohol, but I understand that such a drug can loosen your inhibitions, which helps bridge your thoughts with the necessary vocabulary/grammar of the L2. As for the creative state, what I find is that keeping an open-mind and just letting yourself "explore" the various nuances of certain words/expressions (because after all, many words/expressions have too many nonsynonymous meanings attached to them) helps out tremendously. Without any guilt in making errors, you'd be surprised to how creativity can help you navigate a language (there was a thread here on English expressions that a native would never come up with which shows how non-natives bypass obstacles to successfully and creatively communicate). 3 persons have voted this message useful | |
| renaissancemedi Bilingual Triglot Senior Member Greece Joined 4357 days ago 941 posts - 1309 votes Speaks: Greek*, Ancient Greek*, EnglishC2 Studies: French, Russian, Turkish, Modern Hebrew | Message 23 of 38 09 January 2013 at 8:25am | IP Logged |
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Just an observation: you refer to marijuana as a substance of nature, and to alcohol as a drug. I don't agree, but let's not start an argument. I just wanted to point it out.
I have already posted on this thread, so I will not repeat myself. But I can tell you from first hand experience, that the best way to overcome shyness, inhibitions while speaking a foreign language, or being unable to think in that language, is to work with yourself. Because whatever makes you relax and talk, can't always be available. Besides, just because marijuana loosens a person's tongue, it doesn't mean that what comes out of their mouth is worth the trouble. 5 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Al Diglot Newbie United States Joined 6504 days ago 30 posts - 39 votes Speaks: English*, German | Message 24 of 38 09 January 2013 at 11:19am | IP Logged |
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The two things that do it for me are drinking and being around people who don't speak English. It is almost impossible to be shy when you have to speak the target language or you don't communicate.
1 person has voted this message useful |
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