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Choosing a dialect from day 1 | ||
Tags: Dialect | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| 1e4e6 Octoglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4288 days ago 1013 posts - 1588 votes  Speaks: English*, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Norwegian, Dutch, Swedish, Italian Studies: German, Danish, Russian, Catalan | Message 9 of 45 01 September 2013 at 1:43am | IP Logged | ||
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It obviously depends. Living in Manchester, there are many immigrants here, especially
from the EU. So if they wanted to become a waiter, lecturer, I do not see any sense in them trying to learn American English or Australian English, along with their respective slangs and accents, if they want to settle in the UK. I think even trying to learn British English with a badly pronounced Manc accent would make more sense than that. But from what I experience here, most immigrants learn British English if they move to the UK. At least, so far I have not encountered anyone in Manchester who is from Portugal or the Netherlands who tries to use a Boston or Melbourne accent, or saying something like their "trunk" (boot) is broken. Probably proficiency should be reasonable, but it does not make much sense if someone from Norway, Poland, Singapore, etc. who wants to move, especially permanently, to, for example, Barcelona, learns Chilean Spanish with a Valparaíso regional accent, and starts to use vo(s) with friends in Barcelona. Edited by 1e4e6 on 01 September 2013 at 1:58am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Cavesa Triglot Senior Member Czech Republic Joined 5007 days ago 3277 posts - 6779 votes Speaks: Czech*, FrenchC2, EnglishC1 Studies: Spanish, German, Italian | Message 10 of 45 01 September 2013 at 3:39am | IP Logged | ||
1.Arabic is quite a special case. It is known for much larger differences between the standard and dialects and in betweed the dialects than we are used to when it comes to the european languages. Another special case is "Chinese" which was decided to be one language by the chinese governement. Doesn't matter it makes as much sense as saying whole Europe speaks various dialects of European. 2.Why no specialize? Sometimes you just don't get the resources and unless you are moving to the area, it matters a lot. It is easy to get everything from the basic textbook up to tv series and literature in either British or American English. Even though Australian might prove to be a challenge. You can go the pure way quite comfortably for European Spanish or the Latinamerican (even though it may be harder to specialize among the individual latinamerican dialects) or for either European and Brazilian Portuguese.. You cannot go the pure way for Quebec French because all the material for it expects you to already know the standard. So while you can surely specialize later, you won't get any single beginner Quebeqois textbook (until Arekkusu finishes his). You can't specialize that much in various dialects of German. Sometimes, you'll get specific Swiss German resources (such as Pimsleur) but good luck on finding the whole path. Not a single one of my 3 or 4 beginner (or some are A0-B2) courses even mentions there are various dialects. And I don't think you'll get enough audio just for Austrian German for exemple. Or I highly doubt you will get all the resources to learn a single Italian dialect. And that's all just the big european languages. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Tsopivo Diglot Senior Member Canada Joined 4469 days ago 258 posts - 411 votes Speaks: French*, English Studies: Esperanto | Message 11 of 45 01 September 2013 at 7:31am | IP Logged | ||
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I am glad someone addressed this, I was wondering if I was the only one. I would not go as far as saying that it does not make any sense but that is certainly something that surprised me a lot when I first arrived on Htlal. I had never encountered a single person who purposely chose a dialect for the language they were learning before that. Yet, it seems a fairly frequent discussion here with people asking whether they should learn Quebec French or French French, which particular dialect of Spanish they should go for or arguing over American English versus British English. It had never crossed my mind that someone would do that.
I don't think it's necessarily a bad thing though. I would not do it myself (I am happy with input from any native country provided the content is engaging, I talk with any willing native - it's just for the more formal study that I will probably stick to only one dialect) because I don't really notice the accents but I can see the point if the person is aiming for a native-like pronunciation, if the person is moving to a particular country or if the dialects are very different for example.
On the contrary, I would say it is easier to not restrict yourself to one dialect in a lot of cases. For example, I started learning English in school where the teachers spoke the British variant (with a French accent) and later went to be an au pair in UK so I started with a very (French) British accent. In uni, we started having native teachers but some came from the US and some from UK. After that, I went to Australia for about a year, met a Canadian there, followed him to Montreal and started watched more and more American (and some British) TV shows and movies. In those conditions, it would have been very challenging to focus on one dialect. My boyfriend lives in Quebec so it would make sense for him to go for that dialect but even then, it is not that easy to focus on that variant. For instance, his main and favourite resource so far is Harry Potter books and audio books but those are in the French variant. If he were to focus on the Quebec variant only, he would have to keep looking for another resource and it probably would not fit him as well. Edited by Tsopivo on 01 September 2013 at 7:32am 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Cavesa Triglot Senior Member Czech Republic Joined 5007 days ago 3277 posts - 6779 votes Speaks: Czech*, FrenchC2, EnglishC1 Studies: Spanish, German, Italian | Message 12 of 45 01 September 2013 at 2:11pm | IP Logged | ||
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I actually know some people who had actually started discussing which dialect of English or Spanish to learn before they could put together a sentence. I think they are just the more severe cases of a larger and similarily infected group: people who publicly and lenghtily worry about the proper accent before they learn even the very bare basics of pronunciation properly.
While I think it doesn't matter much for most learners to choose a dialect from the day 1 (even though it of course matters later on), I thought which learning techniques would actually allow you to make such a choice. 1a Benny and his speaking with natives from day 1. The only method that would keep you in the dialect right from the beginning no matter the language and dialect. 1b Or moving to the country before learning and having no way back would probably work. 1c Tutor-native of the dialect would surely work under the condition he is your main and only resource in my opinion. Very few do that when they can make the beginnings much easier for both sides by following a coursebook or similar material. And if he were your only resource, you would need to spend a lot of time together. Really a lot. 2. Methods using native material from day 1. LR, some uses of television or movies, learning a language close to your own from native sources only. This one would already be much harder, unless you choose American/British English or one of the large dialects of Spanish. Vast majority of native material in European languages is either in standard variant or in one of the largest dialects so you would probably need to adjust your choice of dialect to what is available. And you would need to further subordinate your taste in culture to the options of what is available. But it still seems to be doable. 3.Courses, either classical or audio, as you main method. This one is actually the least flexible when it comes to dialects and beginners of the three. Beginner textooks usually teach only the most standard variant, sometimes with a few notes to important variations. The three exceptions (as far as the european languages and my knowledge go), for which you can get pure dialect courses, are American English, Latinamerican Spanish (usually undivided) and Brazilian Portuguese as those three are considered to be a separate standard and the importance of all three has probably outgrown their original european version. So, if you really want to, there are surely ways. But when it comes to vast majority of learners, I believe it is an unnecessary complication. You can learn to understand some of the dialects later and you will most likely never speak one like a native anyways. 5 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| iguanamon Pentaglot Senior Member Virgin Islands Speaks: Ladino Joined 5260 days ago 2241 posts - 6731 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, Portuguese, Haitian Creole, Creole (French) | Message 13 of 45 01 September 2013 at 2:42pm | IP Logged | ||
Many people here get a little too worried over dialects and accents. They needn't be so concerned. Time and time again, I'll see someone post something like "Well, I'll be learning Castillian Spanish so I'm not interested in Latin American Spanish resources". Don't get me wrong, there's nothing wrong with wanting to concentrate on a particular dialect, usage or accent. Where I disagree is doing it to the exclusion of anything that doesn't fit within that context. If you'll spend your time just learning the language, the dialects will fall into place with exposure. When I started learning Portuguese, I concentrated on the Brazilian variety on a macro level. In addition to my tutor from São Paulo (Paulista variety micro level), the DLI BP course, Pimsleur BP, Brazilian podcasts. I also used African Portuguese resources, Iberian Portuguese resources and even a book of Timorese Folktales. It hasn't hurt my Brazilian Portuguese at all because that's where I concentrate my efforts but as a bonus, when I hear European or African Portuguese, I can understand it. It isn't such a shock to the system as it would be if I hadn't got that exposure. If you are learning a widely spoken language, or a pluri-centric one, it is important to at least be familiar with the other varieties as much as possible. I'll leave the case of Arabic to others who are more knowledgeable, but I'd have no problem concentrating on Metropolitan French and also becoming familiar with African, Canadian and Caribbean varieties. Imagine, spending a few years learning Latin American Spanish, to the active exclusion of anything and everything Iberian, and suddenly you find yourself visiting Spain for a while. It happened to me and it was a shock to the system that took me some time to get over. I vowed, then and there in Madrid, to never let that happen again, and I haven't. So, have a concentration in a dialect or variety of a language but don't do it to the exclusion of others, at least be familiar with them. Edited by iguanamon on 01 September 2013 at 4:50pm 4 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| tarvos Super Polyglot Winner TAC 2012 Senior Member China likeapolyglot.wordpr Joined 4705 days ago 5310 posts - 9399 votes Speaks: Dutch*, English, Swedish, French, Russian, German, Italian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Romanian, Afrikaans Studies: Greek, Modern Hebrew, Spanish, Portuguese, Czech, Korean, Esperanto, Finnish | Message 14 of 45 01 September 2013 at 3:17pm | IP Logged | ||
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My dialect is "the one everybody is most likely to understand, plus the things that are
important where I'm travelling/living". So for French that was Belgium, for English it's the UK/Canada mostly, for German it's standard German (bit Northern), for Swedish it's more or less rikssvenska, for Russia it's as spoken in Siberia, for Romania it's Romanian, etc. etc. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Via Diva Diglot Senior Member Russian Federation last.fm/user/viadivaRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4232 days ago 1109 posts - 1427 votes Speaks: Russian*, English Studies: German, Italian, French, Swedish, Esperanto, Czech, Greek | Message 15 of 45 01 September 2013 at 4:29pm | IP Logged | ||
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When I was in middle grades of school I tried to choose language to study in future. I got interested in Finnish (because of Finnish hockey players, hehe), French and German. I added some Finnish course in "download later" list, burned CD with French Assimil and threw away German because of scary stories about its dialects.
Now when I'm actually trying to study German, I have no time to think about dialects. Of course, I'll remember that when I will try to translate Austrian German texts, but I think it's wrong to fix on one particular dialect from the very beginning even if you live in the area, where that dialect is using. Even if you prefer one dialect to another, you're somewhat narrowing your future knowing of language. I can't say for sure, but I think that in one of our English textbooks were texts with both AmE and BrE. Maybe marking could've scare students, but I doubt all will at all notice that difference without marking dialects. Well, of course, it's not the same for all languages, but for me it's very hard to guess: am I dealing with different dialects of just with different meanings? But, of course, all written above was just thoughts of beginner :) 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Tahl Diglot Newbie United States Joined 4286 days ago 26 posts - 44 votes Speaks: English*, Welsh Studies: Spanish, Finnish | Message 16 of 45 01 September 2013 at 5:41pm | IP Logged | ||
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In Welsh, you have to choose a dialect from Day 1, because a few basic words and grammatical structures
(including the words for 'he' and 'is' and the structure for expressing possession) differ between Southern and Northern spoken forms. Even the basic Welsh for Adults curriculum within Wales has two different sets of texts from the start. 3 persons have voted this message useful |
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