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Should we criticise language learners? | ||
Tags: Polyglot bashing | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Polyglots |  | |
| Torbyrne Super Polyglot Senior Member Macedonia SpeakingFluently.com Joined 5891 days ago 126 posts - 721 votes  Speaks: French, English*, German, Spanish, Dutch, Macedonian, Portuguese, Italian, Swedish, Czech, Catalan, Welsh, Serbo-Croatian Studies: Sign Language, Toki Pona, Albanian, Polish, Bulgarian, TurkishA1, Esperanto, Romanian, Danish, Mandarin, Icelandic, Modern Hebrew, Greek, Latvian, Estonian | Message 1 of 20 21 April 2011 at 9:03pm | IP Logged |
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First of all, I would like to say that I find constructive criticism as useful and healthy as anyone else. But what if this criticism is negative and not offering a constructive element? Instead it is just saying “this person is not doing this well” full stop.
I have said before on other threads that I am quite happy for this on my videos on YouTube. I made the decision as an adult language enthusiast to put my passion out there for anyone and everyone to see and comment on. In the same way that not everyone likes vanilla ice-cream, I am never going to please everyone. Recently I saw a YouTube video by Moses McCormick, whom I consider to be quite an engaging and enthusiastic language learner. In the video Moses discusses some comments he saw, which he felt discouraged language learners and that we, as a language-learning community, should perhaps not part-take in. He did defend people’s right to free speech and to voice their thoughts openly. I had the impression from the video that his issue is with language learners criticising negatively (and not in a constructive manner) other language learners, the example I believe was based on feedback he himself had received. Many people said that such people were negative, jealous or haters and should be ignored. A little way down the comments section I saw, amidst the positive feedback Moses received for the video, a note about the relationship between Steve Kaufmann and Benny (The Irish Polyglot). I understand from that comment that their relationship soured and became negative. This all went around in my head for a while and I now have to say that I disagree, in part, with Moses on his point that all language learners should always be positive to other learners. I do agree we should encourage each other as learners on equal terms. The dilemma for me is when a language learner becomes a business. In these cases the nature of that relationship changes between learners. One is now putting him/herself out there as a product to create revenue and to sell something. As a product, I feel it is fair for a language learner to comment on Moses, Steve, Benny or anyone else selling their language learning goods or ability to do so. They are in fact marketing and selling a service as a language expert, or at least someone in a position to offer advice. In such cases I don’t see why all criticism needs to be constructive or encouraging and I don’t see why people making such criticism should be simply labelled a “hater”. After all we don’t offer fully rounded criticism, ending on a positive for other courses and that is acceptable. We simply say what we think and move on. To my mind, this does make such learners fair game, as it makes Assimil, TeachYourself, Colloquial, Berlitz and any other language course fair game for simple negative, non-encouraging, non-constructive criticism. I have not written this on Moses’ YouTube video because I thought I would be shot down as a hater, which is not my point. I actually like Moses and wish him all the best and I agree with a lot of what he says in the video, particularly about encouraging language learners. I also agree that people out there learning is much more positive than a number of other activities they might do instead. These issues are not what I am debating. What does interest me is where the line in the sand is to criticise language learners and language experts selling something to the public. I would be interested to read what you think about this. 9 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Splog Diglot Senior Member Czech Republic anthonylauder.c Joined 5465 days ago 1062 posts - 3263 votes Speaks: English*, Czech Studies: Mandarin | Message 4 of 20 21 April 2011 at 9:36pm | IP Logged |
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Before getting into whether or not it is appropriate to criticise, I would like to clear
up what criticism actually is. This wikipedia article may be helpful. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Arekkusu Hexaglot Senior Member Canada bit.ly/qc_10_lec Joined 5177 days ago 3971 posts - 7747 votes Speaks: English, French*, GermanC1, Spanish, Japanese, Esperanto Studies: Italian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Romanian, Estonian | Message 5 of 20 21 April 2011 at 9:56pm | IP Logged |
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Whether you are actually selling a product or selling yourself by making outrageous claims -- even if it isn't for money -- it all falls in the same category for me.
I'm guilty of more than my own share of criticism on this site, but when I read something like "I've reached B1 in Russian after a weekend of MT", how could I possibly not be critical?!? The riskiest step is BY FAR recording a video. I've considered doing it many times, but I just know part of the response will be brutal. You were very courageous in doing so yourself. Everyone is entitled to an opinion with regards to languages because we all speak at least one, but in actuality, so few people have any idea what they are talking about. It follows that there are students everywhere who really have no idea of their actual level or who haven't ever tested their skills in the real world and if the only feedback they ever get is all roses and no thorns, they are bound to find disappointment sooner or later. Some comments are bound to discourage some learners. Even when you think you are making a positive, constructive remark you may still be hurting or discouraging someone. In the end, though, receiving criticism gives you a better appreciation of where you really stand. It would also be false to think that giving negative criticism is necessarily easier; more often than not, tougher, more negative criticism is much harder to give AND much more useful in the long run than easy, well-done-buddy comments. 4 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Bao Diglot Senior Member Germany tinyurl.com/pe4kqe5 Joined 5562 days ago 2256 posts - 4046 votes Speaks: German*, English Studies: French, Spanish, Japanese, Mandarin | Message 7 of 20 21 April 2011 at 10:58pm | IP Logged |
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Arekkusu, did you read Splog's link? I think he posted it exactly to point out that negative criticism does not mean problem-focused objective criticism, but criticism as a means to belittle the other person or their work.
I personally think it is one thing to express your annoyance and frustration with a product (or personality), and another one to actually give a critical evaluation of it. In a relaxed setting, with friends or family it usually doesn't hurt to mix those two up - they know you and if they actually are interested in the product itself, they are in a good position to figure out when you were overreacting, or if the product is faulty or just incompatible with you. But using the internet we still are at home, where we feel safe and use more or less our 'in-family' behaviour, and so we express our opinion to people who do not know us at all. That means that especially when it comes to sites like youtube, many people say things they should better not say, because they're useless, impolite or downright hurtful. This is very general, but I don't see why we should treat anyone without a certain basic respect. 3 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Cainntear Pentaglot Senior Member Scotland linguafrankly.blogsp Joined 5807 days ago 4399 posts - 7687 votes Speaks: Lowland Scots, English*, French, Spanish, Scottish Gaelic Studies: Catalan, Italian, German, Irish, Welsh | Message 8 of 20 22 April 2011 at 11:16am | IP Logged |
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I'm pretty much with Torbyrne on this one.
Put yourself on YouTube and you're telling people you're worth listening to. Your on-camera attitude has a lot to do with things too. If I watch one of Splog's videos, I might disagree with some of his suggestions, but I my disagreements are calm and considered, because his argument is calm and considered. He is well-prepared and has clearly thought a lot about what he's going to say. He is calm and friendly and doesn't tend to exaggerate. But many of the people on YouTube are not well-prepared, and their videos are often nothing more than stream-of-consciousness, litered with umms, ahhs, pauses and backtracking. They exaggerate and try to make authoritative statements, but as their argument is so incoherent there is no way to critically deconstruct it. And yes, some of them are using this sort of garbage to get money off people who are not well-enough informed to tell the difference between this type of BS and people who actually know what they're talking about. Oh, not to mention the guy who does "language videos" as a way of promoting some hair-loss snake oil.... 8 persons have voted this message useful |
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