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How many words for conversation? | ||
Tags: Number of words | Conversation | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
 Iversen Super Polyglot Moderator Denmark berejst.dk Joined 6501 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 65 of 100 11 August 2011 at 10:03am | IP Logged | |||||
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Please note that I didn't refer to Lauder in my last message - I have apparently remembered his descriptions and examples of connectors and associated them with the term 'chunks' which around the same time was discussed here at HTLAL. But it seems that this just was my own rationalization of the situation. Which again means that the word 'chunk' for me since yesterday has become worthless - I would speak about phrases or expressions or word combinations instead. The one time where I have used it since yesterday I wrote "chunks (whatever that is)" as sort of goodbye to the word as a meaningful entity.
But using 'connectors' about expressions consisting of (one or) several words which can function as mere fillers or as constructive elements in a dialogue doesn't solve the problem. I did a google check of examples where the word 'connector' has been used about language yesterday, and the tendency is that 'connectors' are equated with one word conjunctions and to some degree adverbs, often under the name "sentence connectors" - and this is not the same thing as Lauder's short phrases which you can use to win time or to turn the discussion in a certain direction. OK, a 'sentence connector' can consist of several words (as "on the other hand" in the Wikipedia article about particles), and then we are getting close to Lauder's kind of connectors, but most of the examples in that article are isolated words, not chunks (whatever that is). 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Bao Diglot Senior Member Germany tinyurl.com/pe4kqe5 Joined 5564 days ago 2256 posts - 4046 votes Speaks: German*, English Studies: French, Spanish, Japanese, Mandarin | Message 66 of 100 11 August 2011 at 2:10pm | IP Logged | |||||
It is. But the connection between its parts isn't as strong as with the other examples you mentioned. I'm under the impression that you were referring to units of words that carry a meaning or are used in a way that can't be inferred from its compounds, without necessarily being idioms. For example, "Have a good day!" is a parting greeting, and if you don't understand it as such, you won't understand that sometimes it is used to mean "I don't want to talk to you anymore." or even "Get lost." Even though fixed expression is the way people might expect the idea of a fixed expression to be expressed, it doesn't carry any meaning other than the combination of its parts. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| maydayayday Pentaglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5017 days ago 564 posts - 839 votes Speaks: English*, German, Italian, SpanishB2, FrenchB2 Studies: Arabic (Egyptian), Russian, Swedish, Turkish, Polish, Persian, Vietnamese Studies: Urdu | Message 67 of 100 12 August 2011 at 12:22pm | IP Logged | |||||
Sorry Doitsujin I cannot identify a word list but I'll keep looking. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| AriD2385 Groupie United States Joined 4648 days ago 44 posts - 60 votes Speaks: English* Studies: French | Message 68 of 100 18 August 2011 at 5:33pm | IP Logged | |||||
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On an intuitive level, I believe the requirements for conversational proficiency to be relatively limited. Many people learning foreign languages are already educated (perhaps highly so) and therefore have a standard in their minds of obtaining a command of the foreign language that is comparable to their command of their native language. However, the mastery an educated person has over their own language and the mastery an uneducated person has of their own language will be very different--sometimes vastly so. There are plenty of people in countries all over the world who live and work in society who may be functionally illiterate in their native tongue, or if not illiterate, confine their conversations to familiar, everyday topics. Therefore it's not surprising to me at all that a Spanish soap opera would have such a limited vocabulary. It's popular entertainment that reaches to the lowest common denominator.
Of course this is not to say that people shouldn't surpass that, but to converse with people and understand what's going on around you doesn't take a tremendous amount when you're simply dealing with day to day life. Intellectual discussions, technical matters, and so forth are something else. 4 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| s_allard Triglot Senior Member Canada Joined 5228 days ago 2704 posts - 5425 votes Speaks: French*, English, Spanish Studies: Polish | Message 69 of 100 18 August 2011 at 9:49pm | IP Logged | |||||
Very well put. Indeed, I went to a Spanish language meetup a few days ago and in the course of the three hours of our meeting, I had the opportunity to experience this exact phenomenon. In fact, everybody including the native Spanish speakers was very impressed when I used a somewhat rare word (plasmar) that suddenly came to mind. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Barrabbas Newbie Joined 5859 days ago 9 posts - 9 votes Studies: German | Message 70 of 100 19 August 2011 at 4:47am | IP Logged | |||||
I once had the opportunity to speak to a doctor from India who was working at one of the local hospitals here in New York. We spoke about some of the Hindu deities; when India was occupied by the British; monotheism; and some other stuff. After a while I noticed something peculiar. His vocabulary was pretty good, but the better parts of it were related mostly to medical terminology. His medical language was of course better than mine, but my overall vocabulary was better than his. So I decided to go all out and bring up Kant's 'categorical imperative', with the expressed purpose of debating with him abstractly. He couldn't respond. Then, I recited some material from The History of the World that I had memorized a few years ago, and again he couldn't respond. He was fluent enough to become a doctor (an ear, nose, and throat doctor by the way, an otolaryngologist), but not fluent enough to discuss Kant or to comprehend some stuff I rattled off about Newton and the Pope. What does all this mean? To me it means that if you are incapable of discussing at least a handful of topics (even in a low brow manner, but in a way that demonstrates cultural understanding), in a specific language, then you must not be "fluent", yet we know that "fluency" is a relative term. On the other hand, can we say that the good doctor is "fluent" when it comes to medicine, but not "fluent" when it comes to philosophy? It all depends on how strict ones definition of "fluency" is. One does not need to pass the verbal on the SAT to be "fluent", yet if one wants to land a decent job with a good salary, it becomes clear that a certain level of language proficiency is necessary. In the end "fluency" is like pornography... you know it when you see it, or hear it as the case may be. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| AriD2385 Groupie United States Joined 4648 days ago 44 posts - 60 votes Speaks: English* Studies: French | Message 71 of 100 19 August 2011 at 5:49am | IP Logged | |||||
My guess would be that the doctor either was not familiar with the texts you mentioned, or he hadn't mastered the words necessary to connect the concepts in Kant or the History of the World with those in his native language. Either way, I would not say that his failure to do so means that he ought not be considered fluent--at least not on that basis alone. Familiarity with the concepts as well as the words used to convey the concepts makes a big difference, and you can even be a native speaker and still have areas with which you are unfamiliar and uncomfortable. Honestly, you could probably try the same thing by engaging some native speaking strangers on the street and still get the same blank stares. I would consider a native speaking 10 year old to be "fluent" in their own language because they can express what they want and need to express without difficulty, can engage in conversation, listen, and read without effort. There will always be more to know--more vocab, finer points of grammar, and greater reading comprehension, but it seems the question is whether the person can easily live and work in society, able to clearly communicate without effort. Edited by AriD2385 on 19 August 2011 at 5:55am 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Iversen Super Polyglot Moderator Denmark berejst.dk Joined 6501 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 72 of 100 19 August 2011 at 10:21am | IP Logged | |||||
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There are many aspects of Indian lore which I haven't heard about so I would have trouble discussing them. And sports or child care would also be bad subjects to choose. But speaking fluently is different from speaking correctly, and both are different from having a vast cultural background which permits you to speak about all kinds of subjects. I would still say that the Indian doctor was fluent, but with a restricted range of topics. Beside it is debatable whether an Indian person needs to know about Kant to be considered a cultured person. Is Kant more 'universal' than Pāṇini? Edited by Iversen on 19 August 2011 at 10:25am 1 person has voted this message useful |
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