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IQ needed to be a hyperglot | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Polyglots |  | |
| luke Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 7204 days ago 3133 posts - 4351 votes  Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Esperanto, French | Message 25 of 164 22 June 2006 at 11:40am | IP Logged | |||||
Thoughtful, well-organized posts with correct spelling are the norm in this forum. There is an edit button so one can fix posts if there is a clearer way to express one's ideas. The topic is interesting, but the carelessness of your posts detracts from the discussion. Edited by luke on 22 June 2006 at 8:47pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| lady_skywalker Triglot Senior Member Netherlands aspiringpolyglotblog Joined 6889 days ago 909 posts - 942 votes Speaks: Spanish, English*, Mandarin Studies: Japanese, French, Dutch, Italian | Message 26 of 164 22 June 2006 at 11:57am | IP Logged | |||||
I hope that last statement is not directed at us! Anyway, while I think a high IQ or simply a gift for languages can be a factor in determining whether or not someone can be a hyperglot, perhaps it is possible with a lot of hard work (and time).
I don't really follow what you mean with this. If someone does not have a background in Romance languages and has never studied French, you can't expect them to be able to pick up any French book and understand it. English speakers might have some idea of some of the words thanks to a shared etymology but I'd expect someone will only be able to fully understand what they're reading once they are familiar with French grammar and have a good vocabulary. Likewise, I would not expect someone who has never studied Japanese or Arabic to just pick up a book in those languages and read them. Saying they will never be able to understand them is another matter as anyone can learn either language with some hard work. But to say that they can't read it while they are unfamiliar with the language is nothing controversial. Sorry if I missed the point of your argument. I'm just saying that being able to understand a language in its written or oral form needs some context and some familiarity with the language or related languages. I agree that knowing a language might give you some insight into a related language. As you mention, knowing one or two Romance languages might help you be able to read or at least get the gist of something said or written in another Romance language. However, sometimes the similarities are a little overstated. Knowing Portuguese does not necessarily mean you will understand Romanian perfectly. You might have an idea of what is being said but there'll be words and phrases that you are unfamiliar with. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| CaitO'Ceallaigh Triglot Senior Member United States katiekelly.wordpress Joined 6856 days ago 795 posts - 829 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, Russian Studies: Czech, German | Message 27 of 164 22 June 2006 at 2:57pm | IP Logged | |||||
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I think he's trying to say he's white, male and therefore fits on some extreme end of the bell curve. No argument from me! :)
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| frenkeld Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 6942 days ago 2042 posts - 2719 votes Speaks: Russian*, English Studies: German | Message 28 of 164 22 June 2006 at 3:17pm | IP Logged | |||||
The relevant criterion is mutual intelligibility. I've heard it can be considerably less than spectacular for some pairs of Romance languages, especially in spoken form. However, I do have the impression that those who already know two Romance languages would have a much easier time with the third, but then, you have to learn that second one first. :) Edited by frenkeld on 22 June 2006 at 11:21pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| sigiloso Heptaglot Groupie Portugal Joined 6778 days ago 87 posts - 103 votes Speaks: Spanish*, EnglishC2, PortugueseC1, Galician, French, Esperanto, Italian Studies: Russian, Greek | Message 29 of 164 23 June 2006 at 7:40am | IP Logged | |||||
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Skywalker: I said two hours, meant no-literary books. In those two hours with a dictionary you get the whole system of relational words (semantically void, the whichs, howevers, although), which run along surprisingly similar metaphorical roads across many languages. You get too the not many relevant semantic words for the topic you are reading in. If you add this to the great amount of latin, some english, plenty not far away from the other language you know, to the many the context makes clear, you find that the few elements remaining don't prevent you from reading happily lengthy books, and you can do this with dozens of languages. The problem is nobody will tell you in university, pricks, and you just dont do it, because you believe you can't do it, but you can. It was just an example of undue psychological constraints preventing us from flying far, I want you to fly with me.
Caitocellaight: I was serious when I said that I dont fare well in IQ tests. I just try to have the "cojones" to look honestly for truth in whatever topic I look into, beyond my own fears, desires, and circumstances: do you have them? And above all: groupal considerations are irrelevant for a given individual. Should I be mocked for being from a country with lower average IQ than Japan? Should you harass me as potentially retarded,autistic and suicidal because I am male? From your posts, you are brilliant, and that's it, I don't care the rest. But: knowing what psychology of individual diffferences have to say, spawn a lot of interesting theories in our minds: spatial Asian intelligence-their writing systems, african IQ-gramatical simplicity of patois, crioulos, pidgins, Chinese ethnically compact high IQ population-time bomb chinese language, etc.etc. Now I am off for sure. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| lady_skywalker Triglot Senior Member Netherlands aspiringpolyglotblog Joined 6889 days ago 909 posts - 942 votes Speaks: Spanish, English*, Mandarin Studies: Japanese, French, Dutch, Italian | Message 30 of 164 23 June 2006 at 8:42am | IP Logged | |||||
So in 2 hours I could understand the Koran or Georgian literature or a Korean newspaper? I don't think so. It would take significantly more time than that to even figure out how to look up those words in a dictionary. I honestly don't know what you're trying to get at with your latest posts. That we're all capable of learning another language? Of course we are...with a bit of work. It isn't a case of picking up a foreign language text and reading through it. You need to know a lot more than just how to look words up in a dictionary, not to say anything of figuring out the context those words are in. I don't believe I have any 'psychological constraints' in my language learning, more a lack of time and, sometimes, motivation. Some of us do have other more pressing concerns in our lives and learning a new language should not be a race anyway. I prefer to savour the experience. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| CaitO'Ceallaigh Triglot Senior Member United States katiekelly.wordpress Joined 6856 days ago 795 posts - 829 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, Russian Studies: Czech, German | Message 31 of 164 23 June 2006 at 1:13pm | IP Logged | |||||
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Actually, in Kató Lomb's book, How I Learn Languages, she talks about using a dictionary to learn a language. Her system sounds quite similar to what Sigiloso is talking about.
One of Kató Lomb's Ten No's to Learning a Language is:
I can relate this to what Sigiloso is saying. Of course, no professor ever told me I couldn't learn a language in this way, but they never said it was possible, either. What I've noticed, in what language courses I've taken, is that the teachers take the philosophy that we can ONLY learn from them. It's also the fault of the students, because they go to class with the expectation that they're going to learn in this class and this class alone. And so they never really do learn how to speak, and they blame this on their own lack of ability. I think this is what Sigiloso is saying. Or at least one of the things he was saying.:) I don't know, what might make African languages, or Creoles and pidgin languages "simplistic" is what makes them beautiful to me. All languages to me are beautiful. They're what link us together has human beings. When you start throwing gender, IQ and race into the mix, we start dividing people up and that is just no fun at all. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| patuco Diglot Moderator Gibraltar Joined 7014 days ago 3795 posts - 4268 votes Speaks: Spanish, English* Personal Language Map | Message 32 of 164 23 June 2006 at 4:55pm | IP Logged | |||||
I remember my language teachers in school actively encouraging us to read from native sources and watch TV in those languages. Sorry, but I've got to stand-up for my profession, even though I don't actually teach languages :) 1 person has voted this message useful |
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