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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| chucknorrisman Triglot Senior Member United States Joined 5449 days ago 321 posts - 435 votes  Speaks: Korean*, English, Spanish Studies: Russian, Mandarin, Lithuanian, French | Message 9 of 18 07 November 2010 at 4:19pm | IP Logged |
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When I tell people I teach myself Lithuanian, 1/2 of the people ask "why would you study that?" and the other 1/2 ask "what's Lithuanian?". I only got welcomed from the few Lithuanians I know, though.
1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Cainntear Pentaglot Senior Member Scotland linguafrankly.blogsp Joined 6012 days ago 4399 posts - 7687 votes Speaks: Lowland Scots, English*, French, Spanish, Scottish Gaelic Studies: Catalan, Italian, German, Irish, Welsh | Message 10 of 18 07 November 2010 at 4:24pm | IP Logged |
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I always find the best way to minimise resistance or resentment is to start by sounding as little like a typical learner as possible.
If there's resistance, it's usually down to a stereotype, and you have to make sure you don't match the stereotype at all. Things like using "please" correctly (English speakers tend to overuse "por favor" in Spanish, but underuse "prosze" in Polish, for example) and being able to pronounce certain presumed "difficult" sounds set you out as one of the "good guys". 8 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Teango Triglot Winner TAC 2010 & 2012 Senior Member United States teango.wordpress.comRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5557 days ago 2210 posts - 3734 votes Speaks: English*, German, Russian Studies: Hawaiian, French, Toki Pona | Message 11 of 18 07 November 2010 at 6:40pm | IP Logged |
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This reminds me of a time when I tried to learn some Serbo-Croat back in my teens. Truth is...I fancied this beautiful Croatian refugee and simply wanted to ask her out and impress her with a few phrases. Things didn't turn out quite how I'd planned on the day, and truth be told, she just laughed at my abysmal attempt to speak her wonderful language, and all my mates consequently poked fun at me for the next several months by shouting "Zdravo!" to me across the street and winking (haha, very funny guys!).
After all this though, she told me not to bother learning any more Serbo-Croat, and of course I did get a lot of stick for trying from my mates, but I also got to walk her home in the end and meet up later, so it wasn't a total disaster after all... ;) History repeated itself several years later, when I was as keen as mustard to learn Ukrainian. I picked up a course and started learning a few starter phrases off the Internet. However I was swiftly and mercilessly discouraged by my Ukrainian friends within next to no time. They all simply ridiculed any attempts to start speaking the language (even though a couple of them are ironically EFL teachers now) and I was persistently hit with the same old "Why would you ever want to learn Ukrainian? You should learn Russian instead, it's much more useful!". Hence, here I am...on my path to Russian now instead. So far, everyone's been very encouraging (although I realise I probably still sound like a complete plank), and I would love to reach basic fluency in this language one day soon. And of course I still love all these other Slavic languages, regardless of the discouragement over the years. So maybe I'll return one day, after a little success with mother Russian, and give them a go anyway...! >o< Edited by Teango on 07 November 2010 at 6:50pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| BartoG Diglot Senior Member United States confession Joined 5448 days ago 292 posts - 818 votes Speaks: English*, French Studies: Italian, Spanish, Latin, Uzbek | Message 12 of 18 07 November 2010 at 6:40pm | IP Logged |
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I found this in France at times, mostly in Paris. And who can blame them? On these forums, we have discussed "language banditry," here for example:
http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?T ID=13595 The phenomenon involves having your time "mugged" by people who want to practice their English. I think there's also a form of "culture banditry" out there too: People want to go to France or Italy and "be" French or Italian, but not really. What they really want is for a country or a culture to be like Disneyland, where they can experience a bit of local culture till they get tired, and then they want to be able to fall back on the familiar and they get cranky. I learned in France, quickly, that if I walked up, head held high and issued a loud, cheery Bonjour, I got English back no matter how good my accent. Eyes a little lower, smile a little more restrained, manners a little more personal and suddenly everyone spoke French to me: I didn't necessarily pass for French, but I did pass for someone who at least halfway knew how to behave in France. I think Cainntear hits the nail on the head about not being the stereotypical learner. People are naturally wary of strangers, and you can't be more of a stranger than when you're from another country and neither speak the language nor blend in in the culture. It raises the question of what you're doing there - and what you think the person you're talking to is there for. If I were a French person working in certain parts of Paris, I'd get awfully tired of being a prop for people playing "Look Honey, I'm French!" and a life-size bit of realia for high school tour groups. If you find yourself getting brushed off, ask yourself, "Am I interested in this person for himself? Or because I want to practice a language?" If, deep down inside, you can see that the second part plays an awfully big role for you - or even if you think you might have done something, somewhere along the line, to give the other person the impression that this might be the case, you have your answer. Which means you'll have to grin and bear it and put up with the brush-off until you've invested enough time and energy on their terms to convince them you see them as a full and real person and that you're not grateful to have someone to practice with, you're grateful that your language skills give you the opportunity to talk to them. 9 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Teango Triglot Winner TAC 2010 & 2012 Senior Member United States teango.wordpress.comRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5557 days ago 2210 posts - 3734 votes Speaks: English*, German, Russian Studies: Hawaiian, French, Toki Pona | Message 13 of 18 07 November 2010 at 6:47pm | IP Logged |
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"Language mugging" - hilarious! I experienced this in Germany all the time (once they find out I'm not German, my number's up). Thanks BartoG, I'm definitely going to use this phrase in future. :) Edited by Teango on 07 November 2010 at 6:51pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Jinx Triglot Senior Member Germany reverbnation.co Joined 5694 days ago 1085 posts - 1879 votes Speaks: English*, German, French Studies: Catalan, Dutch, Esperanto, Croatian, Serbian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Italian, Spanish, Yiddish | Message 14 of 18 07 November 2010 at 8:41pm | IP Logged |
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I've experienced this a few times, and the one response that's always worked for me is "I just like it." Maybe coupled with a shrug. There's not much people can say to that.
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| nogoodnik Senior Member United States Joined 5570 days ago 372 posts - 461 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Modern Hebrew, Biblical Hebrew, Russian, French | Message 15 of 18 07 November 2010 at 9:34pm | IP Logged |
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I've had this problem with Armenian on a few occasions. I think they feel that their culture is something that belongs to them and they've worked really hard to preserve it and they don't want to share it with random outsiders.
A couple of my friends have had this problem with Yiddish as well, and probably for the same reasons. I sympathize with the mentality but it is frustrating for a learner. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
 Iversen Super Polyglot Moderator Denmark berejst.dk Joined 6704 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 16 of 18 07 November 2010 at 10:04pm | IP Logged |
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I have not met hostility when I have spoken to local people in the local languages during my travels, though in a few cases people have asked me why I spoke their language - and I have also had a few conversations where I spoke the local language and the other person spoke English. However I normally don't try to do monolingual travels before I'm fairly sure that I can speak reasonably well AND understand the answers, and if I use a few expressions before reaching that stage I try to use them in an unobtrusive way. Otherwise people might - with reason - feel that I used them as language teachers or guinea pigs.
But I do recognize that there can be problems in some cases. For instance trying to imitate a dialect may not come down well with local folks if they suspect you are making fun of them and the way they speak. This may also extend to closely related languages. For instance I'm fairly sure I could do monolingual tour in Swedish, but not well enough to convince every Swede of my benign attitude. However if I meet one of those Swedes that simply don't understand Danish I'll use my broken Swedish rather than English because in that case it is clear why I do it. I have never ever heard anybody say that I shouldn't study their language. If it happened my reaction would certainly be to study harder. Edited by Iversen on 07 November 2010 at 10:11pm 1 person has voted this message useful |
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