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Polygots - a gift or just hard work? | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Polyglots |  | |
| administrator Hexaglot Forum Admin Switzerland FXcuisine.com Joined 7379 days ago 3094 posts - 2987 votes  12 sounds Speaks: French*, EnglishC2, German, Italian, Spanish, Russian Personal Language Map | Message 1 of 27 27 March 2005 at 4:53am | IP Logged |
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When people hear about real-life polyglots, they consider such linguistic achievements are coming from a gift rather than hard work.
I think the source of such assumptions that polyglots are 'savants' with a 'gift' or a 'genetic anomaly' is the fact that they challenge regular people's views of themselves. And yet, apart from Ziad Fazah, it seems that all polyglots I have been in contact with or read about do work a lot to acquire languages. They spend hundreds of hours studying languages. Of course after some point, new language come more easily than the first ones, but work is always needed. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| ElComadreja Senior Member Philippines bibletranslatio Joined 7241 days ago 683 posts - 757 votes 2 sounds Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, Portuguese, Latin, Ancient Greek, Biblical Hebrew, Cebuano, French, Tagalog | Message 2 of 27 27 March 2005 at 12:53pm | IP Logged |
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Well it also seems that many of these polygolts were forced into learning many languages. They had high motivation!
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| ProfArguelles Moderator United States foreignlanguageexper Joined 7259 days ago 609 posts - 2102 votes | Message 3 of 27 27 March 2005 at 11:07pm | IP Logged |
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It is not "just" hard work, but a great deal of effort is always involved. Talent without effort will yield hardly any results, whereas effort without talent will yield some, and a certain degree of talent plus great effort will yield the most. I don't doubt that certain individuals like Mezzofanti have a degree of talent similar to that degree of musical talent that is generally attributed to the likes of Mozart, in that they can parrot like children throughout their lives. However, from what I have studied of others (and that is a great deal), systematic effort is always the single most important factor. As far as I myself am concerned, while I do think I have some gifts in terms of not forgetting languages even if I don't use them, and in terms of not mixing them up even if they are similar, I know that the essence of my achievement is based simply upon the fact that I have studied systematically for thousands upon thousands of hours. Edited by Ardaschir on 27 March 2005 at 11:09pm 4 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Billy Newbie Joined 7184 days ago 15 posts - 15 votes | Message 4 of 27 28 March 2005 at 1:10pm | IP Logged |
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I know people who have been learning about cars since they were 5, or who know more than healthy amounts about Star Trek, or who, given a historical name of a person or battle or place, could recite hours' worth of relevant information. They're not especially talented or gifted. They're just incredibly interested and always have been.
I think polyglots are the same. I'm 16 and am learning four languages (two in and one out of school, the other a bit of both), with three taking on great amounts of success. The other, ancient Greek, was always interesting for me but I've been put off it slightly, partly because of my class messing about and my teacher not really being that great a teacher. I can't call myself a polyglot but I'm certainly a linguist-in-training, and it's because I've been interested since I was four years old. But history and geography - I have moderate amounts of knowledge in them but nothing I acquired from school because I hated the teachers, the teaching and the content. I had no interest at all but I've proved I can learn that sort of stuff if I am interested. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Raistlin Majere Trilingual Hexaglot Senior Member Spain uciprotour-cycling.c Joined 7155 days ago 455 posts - 424 votes 7 sounds Speaks: English*, Spanish*, Catalan*, FrenchA1, Italian, German Studies: Swedish | Message 5 of 27 27 April 2005 at 2:28pm | IP Logged |
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Of course Polyglotism is not a gift! It is the method of learning languages that is really important. For example: I learnt Italian in four months (no, I'm not like Ziad Fazah), yet my IQ is of 121 on a scale where average is 100. So I'm not that talented, yet I learn languages quite quickly.That shows it's no gift.
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| onebir Diglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 7166 days ago 487 posts - 503 votes Speaks: English*, Mandarin | Message 6 of 27 28 April 2005 at 5:29am | IP Logged |
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There are language aptitude tests - I'd guess the results of those wouldn't be perfectly correlated with IQ. [Which measures what precisely anyway? ;-)]
There's a paper on the subject here: www.tc.columbia.edu/academic/ tesol/Webjournal/Teepen.pdf and loads more comes up you you google "language aptitude and IQ". While I haven't had time to read that stuff, I make the 'poor correlation' claim partly because work with some very bright people who can't write a decent sentence in their native language... 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Jose.pm Newbie Joined 7166 days ago 12 posts - 13 votes | Message 7 of 27 29 April 2005 at 5:59am | IP Logged |
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Obviously, it is impossible to acquire a knowledge of several languages without hard word, whatever they say.
Anyway, it is also a fact that some people learn languages very fast, and others have many difficulties (I've had many English and French lessons at school and university and I know examples). I personally think that success is related to "intrinsecal motivation", that is, that you learn more effectively those things that you like per se, and not for any "practical" reasons. Maybe every person is inclined towards some area (sports, drawing, nature, music...). This is what the Theory of Multiple Intelligences say, so I guess polyglots have developed a big linguistic and logical intelligence. People also believe it is a gift because there are really few human beings able to speak more than five languages more or less fluently, but I think people underestimate themselves! But, between us, I like very much the thought of seeing myself as a "gifted person", that should improve our self-esteem ;-) !! 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Dave M Groupie United States bfmfightwear.com Joined 6929 days ago 56 posts - 63 votes | Message 8 of 27 10 December 2005 at 8:47pm | IP Logged |
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I know Ziad. He has natural God Given talent and he also works hard. It requires both.
It doesn't mater how much talent you have in anything it always requires repetition. In my professionn of martial arts no matter how talented you are you have to practice a technique 100's of times. In fact, the one's who are the most talented will suually drop out becuase it comes "too easy." Talent may make it easier but hard work is required and intensity too. Ziad's hour of study is more intense than most peoples 4 hours. His study sessions are fast paces and intense. he will derive more from that one hour than most people will lazily leafing through a book over a few hours. So intensity counts quite a bit too. 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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