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It hurt me being multi-lingual | ||
Tags: Native Language | Difficulty | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Cultural Experiences in Foreign Languages |  | |
| kowalskil Newbie United States Joined 4983 days ago 5 posts - 16 votes Speaks: English | Message 1 of 49 25 September 2010 at 3:54pm | IP Logged | ||
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Does being multilingual help or hinder our intellectual development? I met many people who believe that
learning foreign languages helped them. But that has not been my experience. My first language was Polish--my father and mother spoke Polish at home. That was in Moscow, before my father was arrested in 1938, when I was 7 years old. After that it became Russian, even with my mother. In 1944 it became Polish again-- in a Polish orphanage near Moscow, and in Warsaw, where I lived between 1946 and 1957. Then it became French, for seven years. And it has been English, since 1964. Language and thinking are interconnected; they are probably part of the same thing. I rarely have a chance to speak other languages I know; my wife and daughter are American born. But several days ago I started reading something in Polish, for about two hours. After that I started making spelling mistakes, such as "jes" instead of "yes," "Moskow" instead of "Moscow," and "Wladimir" instead of "Vladimir." I am fluent in French and English but my vocabulary, in each of these languages, is limited. What I know was 100% sufficient in my professional work (to teach and to conduct research in physics). But it is not sufficient to appreciate poetry, or to read some books. Limited vocabulary means limited thinking ability. That is what I think, on the basis of my experience. Ludwik Kowalski, http://csam.montclair.edu/~kowalski/life/intro.html 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Cainntear Pentaglot Senior Member Scotland linguafrankly.blogsp Joined 5820 days ago 4399 posts - 7687 votes  Speaks: Lowland Scots, English*, French, Spanish, Scottish Gaelic Studies: Catalan, Italian, German, Irish, Welsh | Message 2 of 49 25 September 2010 at 5:05pm | IP Logged | ||
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Why are you complaining about limited vocabulary in your 3rd and 4th languages? If you were not multilingual, you wouldn't have any vocabulary in French or English. You would have spent your entire life through Russian or Polish, and you would not be able to work in an American university.
Your multilingualism let you choose your own path -- I can't see how that hurt you. Edited by Keith on 26 September 2010 at 12:57pm 16 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| lingoleng Senior Member Germany Joined 5107 days ago 605 posts - 1290 votes | Message 3 of 49 25 September 2010 at 5:49pm | IP Logged | ||
His natural development in Polish was interrupted when he was seven. Six years of Russian have not made him a new Pushkin. And he clearly writes about his limitations in English and French. I can see how it hurts him. (As a side note: whenever I read about people trying to educate their children in Esperanto or Latin just for the sake of an ideological polyglottism I have dark thoughts similar to what Mr. Kowalski describes. In his case it was fate which guided the process, a different matter, of course.) 9 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| kowalskil Newbie United States Joined 4983 days ago 5 posts - 16 votes Speaks: English | Message 4 of 49 25 September 2010 at 6:13pm | IP Logged | ||
For example, not being able to appreciate poetry. Perhaps this has something to do with the fact that I switched to French when I was 25, and to English when I was 33. I did not study these languages systematically above the introductory level. The rest came from being immersed. I am not complaining; I am sharing what I think-- limited vocabulary means limited thinking ability. That topic is worth discussing. Ludwik Kowalski, http://csam.montclair.edu/~kowalski/life/intro.html 8 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| fireflies Senior Member Joined 4990 days ago 172 posts - 234 votes Speaks: English* | Message 5 of 49 25 September 2010 at 6:26pm | IP Logged | ||
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You could always study a bit of vocabulary in the language you would like to know better. Maybe you could take a language course since you are at a college.
1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Bao Diglot Senior Member Germany tinyurl.com/pe4kqe5 Joined 5575 days ago 2256 posts - 4046 votes Speaks: German*, English Studies: French, Spanish, Japanese, Mandarin | Message 6 of 49 25 September 2010 at 6:27pm | IP Logged | ||
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Interference in spelling is something you have to blame on English orthography, not on your lack of skills.
Also, your feeling of being hurt by being multilingual, it sounds like it's mostly an attitude problem. I just picked up reading Poe, you see. I do understand his tales, but there are many words and word usages I have never encountered before, some which I have to guess and others I simply don't understand. But, you see - those tales are more than 150 years old, written in a language that is not my own, written by a man who lived in a world I do not know. It's a wonderful adventure to learn to understand them, to understand the customs of his time, the world view that might reveal itself! Of course I feel a bit ashamed that I have to acknowledge that he is a challenge for me, I'd rather be more intelligent and knowledgeable ... 5 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Cainntear Pentaglot Senior Member Scotland linguafrankly.blogsp Joined 5820 days ago 4399 posts - 7687 votes Speaks: Lowland Scots, English*, French, Spanish, Scottish Gaelic Studies: Catalan, Italian, German, Irish, Welsh | Message 7 of 49 25 September 2010 at 6:31pm | IP Logged | ||
The vast majority of the population don't like poetry. 6 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| kowalskil Newbie United States Joined 4983 days ago 5 posts - 16 votes Speaks: English | Message 8 of 49 25 September 2010 at 6:43pm | IP Logged | ||
And going to a dictionary, each time an unfamiliar word is encountered, is a burden. It interrupts the process in which we are engaged. Fortunately, as you confirm, we often can guess from the context. Ludwik Kowalski, http://csam.montclair.edu/~kowalski/life/intro.html 1 person has voted this message useful |
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