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Is translation bad? | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Learning Techniques, Methods & Strategies |  | |
| Bao Diglot Senior Member Germany tinyurl.com/pe4kqe5 Joined 5757 days ago 2256 posts - 4046 votes  Speaks: German*, English Studies: French, Spanish, Japanese, Mandarin | Message 25 of 28 08 November 2010 at 5:23pm | IP Logged | |||||
Iversen and Jinx and me would be examples for thought != language. I really want to read up on the topic rather than rely on anecdotal evidence. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Bakunin Diglot Senior Member Switzerland outerkhmer.blogspot. Joined 5121 days ago 531 posts - 1126 votes Speaks: German*, Thai Studies: Khmer | Message 26 of 28 08 November 2010 at 5:34pm | IP Logged | |||||
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I'm currently learning Thai without any systematic translation to my mother tongue or English. It's an experiment
based on ALG ideas (automatic language growth), but I try to adapt the approach as an independent learner. One of the basic ideas of ALG is to get a lot of exposure to authentic experiences that include visual clues and language. The student is supposed to look, listen, guess at the meaning, and move on. In doing this, the meanings of words are never really nailed down but grow in layers. Meaning establishes itself by observing the circumstances in which words are used. Sometimes my guesses are wrong, but that doesn't matter; it's a self- correcting process. I started out using a textbook for the first three months or so, and then I went through a podcast phase where I read up on the stories I listened to, so my experiment is not 100% pure. However, I'd say that about 90% of my current vocabulary of colloquial Thai has been acquired without translation by watching TV (documentaries, kids programs, do-it-yourself tranings, travel shows etc.). I'm in the intermediate stages, so I'm not in a position yet to really compare this approach in terms of efficiency against others I pursued earlier, but a few things are already clear: 1) the vocabulary uptake rate with this approach seems to be at least as good as with earlier translation- and study-based approaches; the reason for this is probably that this kind of learning is a parallel process as opposed to studying, which is serial, and that I get much more input; 2) in contrast to studying a language (eg., learning words, working through a text, etc.), it's very difficult to measure progress; it's key to adopt an attitude that allows language learning to happen without the psychological need to measure progress; 3) when I understand Thai, I understand it immediately; there is no analysis involved. I don't have to think, I just understand. This is something I have never experienced before, not even in English which I am quite fluent in, and it's a very exciting feeling; 4) translation is difficult; there's a lot of Thai that I understand perfectly but wouldn't be able to translate without further reflection; I actually think that's great, but other might disagree and value the ability to translate more. I know too little about psychological and biological language learning mechanisms to position myself on the question whether learning through translation is irrevocably bad or can be fixed later. But based on my current experience with Thai I'm convinced that learning without translation can be achieved quite easily, and maybe even more efficiently, than learning with translation. Based on how much more enjoyable it is to learn a language without studying, I can't see myself returning to any translation- or study-based approach for the languages I'm learning or maintaining. Edited by Bakunin on 09 November 2010 at 5:57am 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Lucky Charms Diglot Senior Member Japan lapacifica.net Joined 6940 days ago 752 posts - 1711 votes Speaks: English*, Japanese Studies: German, Spanish | Message 27 of 28 09 November 2010 at 1:47am | IP Logged | |||||
I saw this article as evidence for just the opposite. Mr. Lubbock is initially afraid that losing language will equate to the loss of thought, but this is ultimately not what happens.
@Bakunin Very interesting experiment! Please keep us updated. My take on this debate is that some words have for all intents and purposes a 1:1 correspondence in different languages - banana, car, and reconciliation have been given as examples in this thread - and the quickest way to understand the meanings of these words is via translation from L1. Eventually, the meaning will be connected to the L2 word automatically without the need to translate through L1. It seems almost counterproductive to go about this in roundabout ways like monolingual dictionaries, etc. in these kind of cases. Even when there isn't a 1:1 correspondence, sometimes translation can be helpful. For example, making a point to remember that the Germans say 'to house' (for our 'at home'), and that the Japanese say 'don't need' to refuse an offer for a second helping is fun and easy, and, far from interfering with my L2 fluency, even helps prevent common mistakes sometimes. But there are many phrases which need to be connected to a concept, situation, feeling, or something like that because they will be awkward and time-consuming to translate from L1. For me, 頑張る is just 頑張る, and よろしく is just よろしく - none of this 'try one's best' and 'please treat me well' nonsense. Trying to translate something like よろしく or どうも into English is not only time-consuming, but harmful, I think. The meaning of these words = the situations in which they're used. It's best with such complex concepts to resist the temptation to translate, and to hold back from forming conclusions about their meaning until you've encountered them in a variety of contexts. By the way, I think it's a mistake to assume that translating is optimal for all beginner vocabulary, and understanding 'within the language' is preferable for all advanced vocabulary. I think it has more to do with concrete concepts shared between languages vs. more nebulous concepts which tend to be expressed in ways unique to their respective languages, which is unrelated to the difficulty level of the vocabulary. To this day, I can't translate the very basic Japanese 'yoroshiku', 'doumo', 'wa', 'desu' into English (and trying do understand these through English would invariably have held me back), and conversely, there are advanced but concrete words like 浸食 'erosion, corrosion' (Splog's 'reconciliation' was also a good example) which are easily equated with their English counterparts at first, and the 5% differently-shaded nuance can be fleshed out over time with repeated exposure (in fact, as Splog said, it would probably hold one back to have to 'relearn' this concept and all the associations from scratch just for the sake of avoiding English). As in many aspects of language learning, it seems that a flexible, adaptive approach (and right now I'm feeling frustrated that I can't convey 融通がある properly in English!) that does the most expedient thing in each case would serve one better here than a 'purist' approach in either direction. To answer the question posed in the thread title: No, translation isn't bad, in cases where it's the easiest and most expedient thing to do. Over-translating is bad, though: forcing English onto concepts that were never meant to be in English. Edited by Lucky Charms on 09 November 2010 at 3:10am 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| mrwarper Diglot Winner TAC 2012 Senior Member Spain forum_posts.asp?TID=Registered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5217 days ago 1493 posts - 2500 votes Speaks: Spanish*, EnglishC2 Studies: German, Russian, Japanese | Message 28 of 28 09 November 2010 at 8:11am | IP Logged | |||||
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My final comment on thought vs. language: when I say that thought != language I mean it as a general case, i.e. that thoughts do not necessarily always include language. Obviously, thoughts can be non-linear while language production/reception is bound to be, so thought is of a more fundamental nature.
But of course, as Iversen and others pointed out, thoughts can contain language (and many other elements that --as opposed to thoughts themselves-- we can properly describe, like images, etc) and I'm sure that greatly enriches our minds.
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