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Benny Lewis | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Polyglots | ( Topic Closed) |  |
| Wulfgar Senior Member United States Joined 4458 days ago 404 posts - 791 votes  Speaks: English* | Message 97 of 164 29 April 2012 at 9:49am | IP Logged | ||||||||
That's my opinion too. It looks like Benny's article failed to convince you that Chinese is as easy as the other languages.
Most agree that Mandarin is more difficult than Spanish (for a native English speaker, level playing field, etc, etc). Incidentally I got more confirmation that Benny's level at the 3.25 month video was A2. My Chinese language partner reviewed his video today, and I asked her what she thought his level was. She said it wasn't bad, but it probably would have been better if he'd been in an intensive program at a private language school for the same amount of time (I told her he'd put in 900 hours over 100 days - my best guess). I told her about the European scale, and said I was at B1, and wanted to estimate what his level was. She said that because his sentences were short and often truncated, and because he used very little vocabulary, he was not very close to B1. 6 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| irishpolyglot Nonaglot Senior Member Ireland fluentin3months Joined 5420 days ago 285 posts - 892 votes Speaks: Irish, English*, French, Esperanto, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, German, Sign Language Studies: Mandarin | Message 98 of 164 29 April 2012 at 2:03pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
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I noticed that you never answered the question of what wasn't truthful in my article.
From several pages back:
I'm sure this friend of yours had no coaching or influence whatsoever from your own particular opinion... a very scientific assessment indeed. I'm bored with this A2 vs B1 argument. Anyone else? There is only one reason I see to keep arguing endlessly that I'm wrong about everything. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| fabriciocarraro Hexaglot Winner TAC 2012 Senior Member Brazil russoparabrasileirosRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4502 days ago 989 posts - 1454 votes Speaks: Portuguese*, EnglishB2, Italian, Spanish, Russian, French Studies: Dutch, German, Japanese | Message 99 of 164 29 April 2012 at 5:31pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
Well, I wouldn't see it that way. I had almost no knowledge of the Chinese language prior to Benny's challenge, besides the crazy "kanji" system and the tonal approach of the language. His journey with Mandarin made me realize that it is, indeed, a tough language to get by, no one doubts that, but also that it's manageable. I didn't know any of the example he gave in his text, like the "bottle-open-tool". He showed me that, in its own way, Chinese makes sense, and that was something far from what I imagined before. It's made me also want to learn Chinese someday, after I "finish" with my Russian, Dutch and French. Not only this last text, but his whole journey and the video made me realize that Chinese isn't "impossible" at all, and it's also not the way I figured before, so I can say it certainly inspired me. Since that was his main goal with the article, I'd say "mission accomplished". Edited by fabriciocarraro on 29 April 2012 at 5:33pm 6 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Gorgoll2 Senior Member Brazil veritassword.blogspo Joined 4933 days ago 159 posts - 192 votes Speaks: Portuguese* | Message 100 of 164 29 April 2012 at 9:22pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
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I cannot talk about his other languages, but his Portuguese is almost perfect, along
with his Spanish and Italian. Therefore I think Benny is a quite good polyglot. Edited by Gorgoll2 on 29 April 2012 at 9:23pm 5 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| tmp011007 Diglot Senior Member Congo Joined 5856 days ago 199 posts - 346 votes Speaks: Spanish*, English Studies: French, Portuguese | Message 101 of 164 30 April 2012 at 1:20am | IP Logged | ||||||||
old news..
btw, are you talking about the chinesepod ad?
I don't know about his Italian, french and German skills, but his Spanish and portuguese ones seem to be quite good -at least his "speaking" p.s. weird.. this forum automatically capitalize the first letter of Italian, German and Spanish but what about french and portuguese?.. weird software Edited by tmp011007 on 30 April 2012 at 1:27am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Wulfgar Senior Member United States Joined 4458 days ago 404 posts - 791 votes Speaks: English* | Message 102 of 164 30 April 2012 at 7:49am | IP Logged | ||||||||
I did answer your question. I won't be answering any more posts from lucky charms, since I assume this is also you. I suppose the name should have tipped me off.
You continue to discuss it, so I will too.
There was definitely coaching. I didn't want to mention it. After reading several posts saying you were B1, I thought I might have been wrong in my assessment. I wanted to give you the benefit of the doubt, and coach her in a way that would give you an advantage, rather than disadvantage. So I told my partner you had accomplished something amazing for 3 months. You had reached a pretty high level, probably higher than mine. As I said, she disagreed with me. I didn't read the link you posted. There is nothing wrong with criticizing things that you have written as long as the criticism falls within the rules of the forum. 4 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Lucky Charms Diglot Senior Member Japan lapacifica.net Joined 6736 days ago 752 posts - 1711 votes Speaks: English*, Japanese Studies: German, Spanish | Message 103 of 164 30 April 2012 at 8:06am | IP Logged | ||||||||
You can't be serious. What a half-assed way to try to discredit someone. It doesn't exactly take a detective to see I've been a member of this forum for almost 7 years (since the year the site was created, way back when there were only a handful of members and the admin and ProfA were the most prolific posters) and have hundreds of posts about a language Benny has never studied. That's quite a cover-up effort, only to ruin it all by choosing a vaguely Irish-related name, don't you think, Wulfgar? ...or should we call you by your real name Steve Kaufmann, since there can't possibly be more than one person with an opinion different than mine (/sarcasm)? I thought I was quite polite and friendly in asking you what you meant about Benny's article being untruthful. If it didn't come off that way in print, I'm sorry, but that's how I meant it. I like hearing different opinions and I'm not the type to argue with someone just for the sake of being right. So even though I was skeptical that there were any misleading statements or mistruths in the article (which again, so closely matches my own opinion on the matter), I decided to give you the benefit of the doubt. After all, "untruthful" is quite an allegation, which I thought you would have a good reason to make. Considering your reaction, I'm now beginning to think you don't have any reason, but I'm still waiting anyway. EDIT: You said that you've already answered, but you've only made comments on Benny's level (which I'm in no position to judge). Maybe this is what you meant about the article being untruthful? But the article is not about Benny's level; it's about Chinese being more accessible than its reputation. Was there anything specific in the article that you disagreed with? Edited by Lucky Charms on 30 April 2012 at 8:35am 17 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| tractor Tetraglot Senior Member Norway Joined 5240 days ago 1349 posts - 2292 votes Speaks: Norwegian*, English, Spanish, Catalan Studies: French, German, Latin | Message 104 of 164 30 April 2012 at 9:11pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
Even weirder:: It capitalises the Spanish word Italiano. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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