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Being Multilingual: One negative aspect | ||
Tags: Time to learn | Multilingual | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| JasonE Groupie Canada Joined 5071 days ago 54 posts - 78 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: French | Message 9 of 32 12 March 2011 at 9:55pm | IP Logged | ||
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I hear ya LinguaMan. In my own case, general intellectual development usually wins out over language learning.
Both are important to me, but right now there are just so many interesting subject areas that I would like to sample that my time for learning a second language necessarily gets reduced. If I had spent all the time that I devoted to general learning to learning french, I have no doubt that I would have achieved at least basic fluency by now. I'm fine with that however, because I'm happy with what I have learnt, and I'm confident that at some point I'll be ready to change gears and ramp up my language study at the expense of more general learning in english. When that time comes around I know that I will have built up a solid foundation with which to work with, thanks to the small, but regular, amounts of language study that I'm doing at present. I've toyed with the idea of learning latin for a while now, but I've come to the decision that I'm just not very interested in the Romans or anything they've written, so spending hours upon hours to learn latin is just not worth it for me. Anything that I want to know about them to further my intellectual growth I can glean from english writings or translations. Some people just like languages for their intrinsic interest, and for them, that is enough reason to learn them. I on the other hand have interests in particular fields, and can only see myself learning a language if it furthers that interest. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Solfrid Cristin Heptaglot Winner TAC 2011 & 2012 Senior Member Norway Joined 5335 days ago 4143 posts - 8864 votes Speaks: Norwegian*, Spanish, Swedish, French, English, German, Italian Studies: Russian | Message 10 of 32 12 March 2011 at 10:24pm | IP Logged | ||
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Every little thing you spend your time one, is a "no" to everything else. Yes, I guess that if I spent less time on languages I could learn economics or geography. Theoretically. In practise I would probably be watching "The Vampire Diearies" or "Lost" with my kids, which would not exactly equal an intellectual challenge.
Besides, I can think of few things that bring me as much joy as learning languages does, and knowing languages broadens my mind in ways no book could. I am never sorry that I spend so much time on languages. I am just sorry I cannot spend even more. 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| tommus Senior Member CanadaRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5867 days ago 979 posts - 1688 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Dutch, French, Esperanto, German, Spanish | Message 11 of 32 12 March 2011 at 10:52pm | IP Logged | ||
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I prefer to think of language learning as a multiplier rather than a "this" in place of "that". The multiplier effect starts to work when you get to the point that you can at least read (and better listen) effectively in a second language. Then you can read about and study science in L2, culture and geography in L3 and maybe history (or whatever is most appropriate) in L4, etc. Those are all things you might not do enough of in L1 because you are spending too much time in front of the TV or otherwise wasting your valuable time. And the multiplier effect is giving you knowledge and experience in things that you just cannot get in L1.
Language learning is time well spent, and it often is one hell of a lot of time. 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| darkwhispersdal Senior Member Wales Joined 6041 days ago 294 posts - 363 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Ancient Greek, French, Italian, Spanish, Russian, Mandarin, Japanese, Latin | Message 12 of 32 12 March 2011 at 11:15pm | IP Logged | ||
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I can't see how it stifles you from being well informed since I started learning languages I am far more well informed than I've ever been as I can access news in more than one language. I'm more interested in current affairs and world history than I had been previously, my writing in English has improved massively as I have a better appreciation of the language after studying others.
If anything learning languages increased my curiousity about everything and what time is not spent on languages is used to read books from my great book list, study a degree and practice martial arts. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Merv Bilingual Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5274 days ago 414 posts - 749 votes Speaks: English*, Serbo-Croatian* Studies: Spanish, French | Message 13 of 32 12 March 2011 at 11:23pm | IP Logged | ||
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Yes, I've faced this problem. Currently I am juggling finishing up David Copperfield by Dickens (I've read all of his
other novels), getting through Leviathan by Thomas Hobbes, completing the Spanish version of the Chronicles of Narnia (to build up Spanish vocabulary), listening to sermon series on the Book of Revelation (of the Bible) and transcribing it for future study, reading 2 books on Islamic fundamentalism, etc. If I could add more, I would be reading one each of textbooks in physics, math, biology, chemistry, and art history. Sometimes people have too many interests. You do what you can and learn to live with it. Only God knows everything and already our limited human knowledge is way beyond the capacity of assimilation for any single human being. We are even beyond the point of comprehensive understanding of one subject. There are no universal physicists, chemistry, biologists, or mathematicians anymore. You specialize in particle physics or nuclear physics or organic chemistry or biochemistry, but you can't even cover all of the branches of knowledge in your own limited field. It is disheartening, in a way, especially for those of us who aspire to be not only polyglots but also polymaths, or who just enjoy possessing knowledge about things because that knowledge is pleasurable (or powerful) in its own way. On the other hand, is it possible to get a good but still slightly superficial knowledge of many branches of knowledge? My answer is: yes, but it requires a lot of time and it will inevitably cut into time that could be used for career advancement, family time, etc. You can pick out 10 textbooks of physics (say, statistical mechanics, quantum mechanics, quantum field theory, solid state and condensed matter physics, electricity and magnetism, classical mechanics, fluid dynamics, optics, gravitation, and cosmology) and by going through them get a very good overview of the field of physics as a whole (I'm missing some things here, of course, such as plasma physics, biophysics, and string theory). In fact, that's what a PhD student in physics pretty much does. You could probably do the same for 5 or 10 different subjects. But even so you will likely never attain the level of knowledge necessary in even one of those subjects required to make a contribution in one of them. So it's best to focus on a few things, enjoy "the journey," and decide what you can really take with you after death. The answer to that last question is not much. Edited by Merv on 12 March 2011 at 11:26pm 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Shenandoah Newbie United States Joined 5028 days ago 30 posts - 59 votes Speaks: English* Studies: French | Message 14 of 32 12 March 2011 at 11:37pm | IP Logged | ||
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Language learning has exposed me to some topics I never would have even thought to
study in English. There are so many things to learn, I have only focused on a limited set. In my effort to study French, I will search for anything I can find to practice on, even if it's watching a TV show or reading some article that I never would spend the time on in English. Even with my still-extremely-limited abilities in French, I can learn about things I never dreamed I'd one day study. But that said, we all have priorities, and an individual's priorities are not necessarily "right" or "wrong." I would love to spend more time with the violin. People tell me if it was really important to me, I would find that time. They are right - at the moment learning the violin is less valuable to me than learning a language, and some of the other things I'm doing in my life. So it hangs on my wall, teasing me day in and day out, but only occasionally making it into my hands to play the same 3 or 4 pieces that I know so well. The same might be true for the OP and language learning at the moment. Perhaps learning about those other things is more valuable to you, and only you can answer that; and a lot of it's importance to you depends on your motivation for learning in the first place, as compared to your motivation for learning other things. Edited by Shenandoah on 12 March 2011 at 11:39pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| LinguaMan Diglot Newbie United States Joined 5076 days ago 20 posts - 34 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish | Message 15 of 32 13 March 2011 at 12:37am | IP Logged | ||
What I was trying to say was, if I'm studying a new language to attain a level where I can read and understand those subjects that interest me I could be learning about them through my native language or second language. Recently I've been reading about global crime in English. Now, if I spent time learning Italian or Russian in place of that then I feel it does stifle me from being informed about something I'm curious about. In other words, do I want to wait 3-4 years to read about global crime in Italian, due to building my vocabulary, or immediately read about it in my dominate language? That's my point. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| akkadboy Triglot Senior Member France Joined 5409 days ago 264 posts - 497 votes Speaks: French*, English, Yiddish Studies: Latin, Ancient Egyptian, Welsh | Message 16 of 32 13 March 2011 at 1:03am | IP Logged | ||
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I'd say that if you use your languages to read about the same topic, yes, waiting to be fluent and studying languages might be a waste of time (unless you're interested in languages themselves and linguistic matters of course).
But hopefully studying languages always give plenty of new, different subjects to read about. English enabled me to read about...pretty much everything actually, but especially about imperial China, a topic about which French books are rare. Yiddish made me far more knowledgable about Eastern Europa, Judaism, immigration and diaspora topics than I ever thought I would be. Persian and Turkish are a great gateway to Islam, central Asia or the importance of religion in modern societies. Breton made me think about the conflicting relationship between official languages and minority languages, about the idea of state violence and (artificial) reform of languages, etc. edit. And even if you read only about one topic, let's say global crime, by doing that in several languages, you're bound to get multiple point of view and to discover new aspects of the subject. A Russian newspaper can not deal with it the same way a French one does and so on. Edited by akkadboy on 13 March 2011 at 1:20am 4 persons have voted this message useful |
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