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The plight of polygots? | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Polyglots |  | |
| shreypete Pentaglot Groupie Czech RepublicRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5960 days ago 90 posts - 93 votes  Speaks: English*, Hindi, Telugu, CzechB1, SpanishB2 Studies: GermanB2, FrenchA2, Dutch, Swedish | Message 1 of 9 23 May 2008 at 7:15pm | IP Logged |
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A thought recently just came across my mind and it's quite a valid one. Many people spend so much learning so many languages. The problem is that don't they start forgetting the languages that they haven't really been in touch for a long time? I don't know what it feels like to have learned a language fluently but forgot it due to a time gap (as it realistically isn't possible to practice all the languages that one learned at the same time) but I can imagine that it would be an awful experience. What are your thoughts on this?
I ask because I want to learn about 8 languages but if and when I do become fluent in all my target languages, I don't want to regret the fact that I'm forgetting some of the languages due to the time gap of study... 1 person has voted this message useful | |
 jeff_lindqvist Diglot Moderator SwedenRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6721 days ago 4250 posts - 5710 votes Speaks: Swedish*, English Studies: German, Spanish, Russian, Dutch, Mandarin, Esperanto, Irish, French Personal Language Map | Message 2 of 9 23 May 2008 at 7:57pm | IP Logged |
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Many (e.g. Professor Arguelles) have said that you don't have to spend hours per day to maintain your languages. As low as 15 minutes is possible, provided that you know what you need and "do the right thing", and after you have reached a satisfying skill level. The stronger your base is, the less you will forget.
This is slightly related to what it takes to study several languages. There has been a lot of threads on this topic. You're probably not a complete beginner in all eight langages, so you could most likely come up with a suitable study approach to get most out of it. "Worst" case scenario would be to study eight languages totally from scratch, one at a time until "fluency" is reached, no maintenance of the other languages... This would take forever. I know, this sounds absurd, and I think don't think that any learner would deliberately "avoid" maintaining at least some (aspects) of the other languages (be they reading, listening, writing or speaking). Just a few thoughts. Hopefully some of our polyglots here will chime in. Edited by jeff_lindqvist on 23 May 2008 at 7:57pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| TheElvenLord Diglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5892 days ago 915 posts - 927 votes 1 sounds Speaks: Cornish, English* Studies: Spanish, French, German Studies: Portuguese, Mandarin | Message 3 of 9 24 May 2008 at 6:42am | IP Logged |
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I don't suppose maintaining languages has to be boring or time-consuming.
If you get an email-pen-friend, you can speak the language with them in small chunks of text. You can listen to an audiobook or a podcast or the news in the language. You can read a little of a book each night in that language. TEL 1 person has voted this message useful | |
 Iversen Super Polyglot Moderator Denmark berejst.dk Joined 6515 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 4 of 9 24 May 2008 at 7:02am | IP Logged |
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I stopped any systematic language training in 1981 when I had finished my degree in French and Literature because I didn't see how I could get a satisfactory job at the university level (the only one I cared about). At that time I could speak around ten languages and read a couple more. During the next 25 years I did nothing active to keep them alive except travelling. When I restarted my language studies on a totally private basis in 2006 I found it surprisingly easy to relearn my 'lost' or 'corroded' languages, so I know that it can be done. On the other hand I now find it idiotic not the keep my regained languages alive, and for that purpose I do everything from television watching to word lists (and yes, travels). And I agree that even a small amount of time like 15 minutes per day is enough to keep contact with those languages. But to be really comfortable with them you need more time. And besides: if you know a language then you should use it to read books, speak to people and other things, - otherwise it was a waste of time to learn it in the first place.
Edited by Iversen on 24 May 2008 at 7:03am 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| shreypete Pentaglot Groupie Czech RepublicRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5960 days ago 90 posts - 93 votes Speaks: English*, Hindi, Telugu, CzechB1, SpanishB2 Studies: GermanB2, FrenchA2, Dutch, Swedish | Message 5 of 9 24 May 2008 at 7:31am | IP Logged |
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I very much agree with Iverson. There are tons of beginners in this forums that start of by saying that I want to
learn 8-10 languages and while it's a great goal, it can impede their success in even mastering one language as they won't be as consistent (as they might get bored with the language and decide to move on to another one; it's more like a "jack of all trades" situation applied to languages, not effective in any way). The reason I posed my original question was because medical research is quite ambiguous on this point. There is one side of the argument that we tend to forget languages after a certain age. Long-term memory doesn't really mean that it exists throughout our existence as the axons/neuros of the neurons gradually get degenerated and hence, can't get stimulated. This is the very reason why it's recommended that people who haven't started learning even one language before will have a hard time learning it say, when they're 60 (but many do it!!!). But another piece of evidence says that as we become older, the telomeres in our chromosomes (during genetic cytogenesis) start becoming deleted (a similar affect happens when we smoke) and hence there's sort of an incomplete crossing-over of the chromosomes, hence a lot of the genetic material relating to memory and other aspects are "lost" or rather deleted. The other side of the argument is that people who've been learning languages for a long time have been using certain region of their brain (which is being constantly stimulated) and so it's harder to forget the languages that they've learned as the neurons in that region of the brain are constantly being stimulated. But of course, the reality is that if one doesn't allocate equal time for the languages he/she has learned, then it really wouldn't be very beneficial as they will have forgotten in a short time. I personally feel that learning a language should have a practical reason in that it can be used to speak to people, or if we're interested in reading the literature of that target language in it's original text and so on. Edited by shreypete on 24 May 2008 at 2:04pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Journeyer Triglot Senior Member United States tristan85.blogspot.c Joined 6680 days ago 946 posts - 1110 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, German Studies: Sign Language | Message 6 of 9 24 May 2008 at 1:02pm | IP Logged |
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I think in most cases you won't completely lose a language you have learned if you set about to refresh it years later. Personally, this is what I plan on doing. I have a list of languages I want to learn, and some certainly will be used more than others (Spanish vs. say, Lakota, but I don't fear I'll ever lose them totally.
I guess I more or less learn languages the way I read books: I might never use the information from them, but I don't consider it a waste of time to read them, because I learn for the pleasure of it and hope that I might even get a chance to use them someday. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| FrancescoP Octoglot Senior Member Italy Joined 5762 days ago 169 posts - 258 votes Speaks: Italian*, French, English, German, Latin, Ancient Greek, Russian, Norwegian Studies: Georgian, Japanese, Croatian, Greek | Message 7 of 9 13 August 2008 at 2:23am | IP Logged |
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This thread definitely brings up scary memories. There was a time when I really thought that the Homer Simpson axiom was true: the more you cram into a part of your brain, the more is pushed out of the other end... Experience proved it wrong, luckily. Still, I do perceive myself as some kind of anxious shepherd constanly running in circles around his herd to prevent single sheep from going astray. It's tiring and a little discouraging at times: you just brought one back, another threatens to leave. On the other hand I find that time teaches sheep-words to behave. Altough I found that fluency in speech may suffer from unuse and benefit from regular training, other abilities are more persistent. I might be in trouble if a norwegian friend called me on the phone and I haven't brushed up my active vocabulary for a long time, but I could read Ibsen anyday. Same with German, my major working language. Altough I have reasons to think that I ended up knowing every single damn entry on the dictionary, I might be lost for words minutes after coming out of the plane in Frankfurt.
I totally agree with the attitude of many superpolyglots: I will show you my skills, but give me a week to bring it all back. I find this point of view quite human and reassuring: you don't have to have everything on the tip of your tongue 24/7, that would be neurotic if you are past the 20 languages threshold, but still what you studied is there for you to reawaken, just take it out of the cardboard boxes... Perhaps I'm too young to know what it really means not to speak a language for say 20 years in a row, but here I can think of my austrian grandmother, whom I still hear switching effortlessly to perfect German after 60+ years spent this stide of the Alps. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Eduard Decaglot Senior Member Norway Joined 5837 days ago 166 posts - 170 votes 2 sounds Speaks: Dutch*, NorwegianC1, Swedish, Danish, English, German, ItalianB1, Spanish, Serbo-Croatian, French Studies: Portuguese | Message 8 of 9 13 August 2008 at 2:44am | IP Logged |
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I think it also has a lot to do with -how- you learn languages. Learning languages in a practical setting, having spoken and written them a lot will give higher retention rates than having learnt a language more superficially. And indeed, as Iversen says, as corroded as your language knowledge may seem, it is surprisingly easy to 'polish' it up and use it again.
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