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How do polyglots do it? | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| culebrilla Senior Member United States Joined 3797 days ago 246 posts - 436 votes  Speaks: Spanish | Message 25 of 159 08 January 2014 at 4:29am | IP Logged | ||
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The real issue, speaking very bluntly but truthfully, is that the general public doesn't distinguish quality from quantity.
Try this: spend 1,000 hours each on 10 languages. They can even be somewhat related languages. Let's say English, Spanish, French, Italian, German, and a few more indoeuropean languages. That is 10,000 hours total. And make sure that they are quality hours. No multi-tasking. You are spending those hours concentrating on learning, studying, or practicing the languages. You will be ok in 10 languages and be able to express yourself relatively well. But let's not delude ourselves and say that we will be as good as somebody that has lived, say, 10 years 100% immersed in a single language. In the other corner let's have somebody spend 10,000 hours on ONE language. The person will not know everything about the language and most likely won't be as good as a 30 year old native speaker that has spent their entire life speaking the language. But they will be pretty darned good at the one foreign language they have worked on. And the variables have to be the same. In both examples the two people have equal aptitude for languages, start learning at the same age, same learning strategies (Although time is really the most important one. A lot of people here hate classes but good classes DO exist. Also, taking 4 hours of classes a week is nothing. You don't put in work out of class you won't be good at the language) If the 10 language polyglot goes to the press and shows off their solid but certainly not near-native abilities, the press will go bananas. They will shower the person with praise and adoration and exaggerate their language level by saying that they are as good as a native speaker. On the other hand, the one language specialist will be met with silence. "Big deal, brah. You know one language. The other guy knows 10, like, really well!" Ignorant people (i.e, people that don't speak the languages or have never learned one to a high-level) will not be able to tell what is good or bad. If somebody goes up to another person and says, "I played a round of golf after 10 hours of practice and shot a 200. Then, I swam 10 laps and did each 25m lap in 60 seconds. Finally, I ran 800m in 4 minutes!" Conversely, if somebody spent the same amount of time on just one sport and did 800m in, say, 3 minutes, people that don't know the sports won't really understand what it means. Quality matters, people. Note: people that spent a LOT of time on many things get darn good at many things. World-class decathletes are good enough that they can beat a very good High School varsity athlete in EVERY SINGLE EVENT. In the 100m, they are good enough to get a Division 1 college athletic scholarship. They suck at distance, though. Overall, that is pretty good. Completing a race or playing a sport at a very low level? Not so impressive. Finally, there are exceptions to every rule. Is there some person that is 5X as fast in terms of hours in learning languages? Probably. What is the percentage of language learners that are so far to the right of the bell curve that you have to crane your neck to its extremes? Pretty darn low. None of the famous polyglots that have posted videos I've seen are prodigies. They just either have spent a lot of time with the languages (Luca, Mr. Simcott) or have a level appropriate for the time they have spent with their languages. And please don't say that polyglots have some "revolutionary" way of learning. It indirectly says that specialists are bumbling, inefficient dolts that just study conjugation tables all day and learn esoteric language that is not used in the street. People that dedicate themselves to just one or two things in life can be very efficient in learning too. Edit: everything was in bold. Edited by culebrilla on 08 January 2014 at 4:38am 12 persons have voted this message useful | |||
 Iversen Super Polyglot Moderator Denmark berejst.dk Joined 6503 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 26 of 159 08 January 2014 at 9:49am | IP Logged | ||
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Unlike Tarvos I find that Culebrilla has some good points, and the comparison between very proficient or nearnative learners of one language is relevant. But I can't see that dodgy knowledge of 10 languages make the media go berserk, and if you are so good at one language that you almost can compete with the natives on their own turf then you just become invisible. What fun is that?
However the main problem with the comparison is that all languages known by one person aren't either good or soso or rotten - they are distributed on a kind of ladder. The best ones may very well be nearnative, and at the bottom there are some that you wouldn't want to demonstrate to the public (or at least you shouldn't). The decathlete mentioned by Culebrilla is a good illustration of the claim that you may have a high level in several languages and maybe even surpass most learners who have concentrated on just these languages. And then the question is what you would have gained by restricting yourself to those languages. At least I prefer seeing some specialized learners overtake me on their chosen language if the alternative is to drop a number of languages which I actually can use for reading and listening and monolingual trips (like my recent trip to the Netherlands) - plus all those languages where I still have some way to go before they become really usable, but which even at their current level give me a lot of good entertainment. It would be sad if ALL my second languages were mediocre or rotten, but for me it would be even more sad to limit myself to two or three just to push them a tad higher when that exercise would cost me all the others. But maybe the specialist really are francophiles or dedicated sinophiles or whatever and like it, and then the relevant choice for them is of course to find relevant activities within that language. Things aren't simply black or white in the language learning business. But the one thing that is certain is that your chances of becoming famous for your language learning achievements outside the language learning community are slim indeed, and you'd better find some other motivation for studying. Edited by Iversen on 08 January 2014 at 9:59am 16 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| s_allard Triglot Senior Member Canada Joined 5230 days ago 2704 posts - 5425 votes Speaks: French*, English, Spanish Studies: Polish | Message 27 of 159 08 January 2014 at 4:22pm | IP Logged | ||
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To follow up on Culebrilla's interesting post, I like Iversen see some good points. As for the intervening post, I
can't really comment because I didn't understand a thing. What I want to pick up on is the general obsession with the number of languages spoken and not on what one does with the languages. SometimesI I wonder if we forget that language is essentially all about communicating with other people. (I recognize of course that some people learn certain languages just for personal interest with no intention of actually using them actively.) My personal peeve is with the use of the word "to speak" multiple languages. When I hear that someone speaks X number of languages, I always wonder if that means "equally well." It never does. As we all know around here, speaking multiple languages usually means highly variable levels of skills in the various languages. But more importantly is the question, "what do you with these languages?" Are they trophy languages that one collects and displays from time to time? Or are they means of interacting with other peoples and cultures? Don't get me wrong. I'm not saying that there's anything wrong with collecting languages. It's just a very different pursuit from wanting to communicate in other languages. In the latter case, the number of languages is not a big issue. Quality is more important than quantity, 5 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Chung Diglot Senior Member Joined 6956 days ago 4228 posts - 8259 votes 20 sounds Speaks: English*, French Studies: Polish, Slovak, Uzbek, Turkish, Korean, Finnish | Message 28 of 159 08 January 2014 at 5:25pm | IP Logged | ||
This is starting to blur into a rehash or variation of these chestnuts: Ziad Fazah - does he exist? How many languages to be a polyglot? You are not a real polyglot if... Do you consider yourself a polyglot? Clugston challenges polyglots to debate Are we being too hard on the polyglots? Polygot under 18 Video of man who studied 120 languages Different Kinds of Polyglots Only gifted polyglots can learn 10+langs? Language classes do NOT work A class that "works"? We, who manage to focus on ONE language It's not that I don't see any value in culebrilla's post (or even nathdep's opening sentiment), as much as it ultimately smells like same-old, same-old. I might not be as crusty as tarvos in his response, but you know... my old age... 5 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| culebrilla Senior Member United States Joined 3797 days ago 246 posts - 436 votes Speaks: Spanish | Message 29 of 159 08 January 2014 at 6:48pm | IP Logged | ||
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To: Tarvos
Dude, you're not a very diplomatic person. I will admit that some of my posts aren't as polished as those of some heads of states in their address to the media. However, you really need to chill. If somebody says something you get really wound up. I'd really hate to measure your blood pressure. Good day. Personally, regardless of what any post may seem to indicate, I do not get wound up. That is why I said that people "indirectly" imply that specialists are inefficient dolts. Nobody said that but it was implied. Benny Lewis says many times that he will try to reach a C1 level in speaking in three months of immersion with unstudied language. That is very misleading to beginners who may think that it is possible. Judging by the comments on some articles, though I haven't seen his website in ages, that is actually what the masses think. It is misleading when somebody has studied or practiced a language a lot before the quest. He lived in Spain for a year and took many years of German in school, for example. Not all of those "inefficient" years of German will be for naught. I never said that OTHERS should have high standards. I only said that there is a difference between quality and quantity. Going to put it in very clear language for you. People that focus on one or two tasks and spend the same global amount of time on something will be better than generalists that spread themselves thin. Assuming all other variables are equivalent in the experiment. The person (decathlete) that is a generalist is every bit as amazing as the specialist. (Swimmer Michael Phelps or sprinter Usain Bolt) But please realize that quality matters in measuring somebody's accomplishments. I am a terrible golfer and only took a few summers of lessons. I also am a terrible tennis player and would have only made the junior varsity HS team since our team sucked. However, just because I can participate in these doesn't mean much. Similarly, I can learn a tourist level of X languages and it would be very presumptuous if I equated my accomplishments with good polyglots like the aforementioned people or Iversen. Edit: I'm sorry if my posts are inflammatory to you and I'll try to decrease the intensity of my posts if they upset you. I only ask that you do the same. To Chung: I think these types of threads are important because a lot of beginners may get the idea that you CAN become incredibly good (Luca/Simcott good) in very little time. The media, and some polyglots (looking at you Benny Lewis) DO give that impression. In the vast, vast majority of cases it is time that matters most. In this I agree very with Steve Kaufman and the 10,000 hour rule. There are exceptions to that rule and issues with the research. For example, you don't just magically become super good at something right when you cross 10,000 hours. It is obviously a continuum of competency. And some people DO reach equivalent levels faster, even with the same teaching or techniques employed. Most people that are advanced in anything respect the work that is needed and know that a few months of work isn't really all that much compared to people devoting many thousands of hours to something. FYI: I actually spend a lot less time on this site than people may think. I type extremely fast, one the far, far right of the bell curve. Another example of the difference between quality and just participation. In other things, like singing, I am most likely far, far below average. Another edit: actually Tarvos, you are a pretty mean guy. You use words such as "nonsense", "What the hell", "captain obvious", "I'm sure we all have you to thank for not noticing before! ", "have a cookie" "Look at me, I am Culebrilla, I have High Standards! You should also have High Standards cos I say so!" I invite you to post a video of yourself speaking English and to see your accent that is so good that nobody would mistake you for a non-native speaker. You are the arrogant one. Who is more arrogant? The person that spends thousands of hours with something and in most of his posts is very self-deprecating? Or the person that says that he is some awesome polyglot and is unmistakable for a native? You really are not very nice. Edited by culebrilla on 08 January 2014 at 7:07pm 4 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| tarvos Super Polyglot Winner TAC 2012 Senior Member China likeapolyglot.wordpr Joined 4507 days ago 5310 posts - 9399 votes Speaks: Dutch*, English, Swedish, French, Russian, German, Italian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Romanian, Afrikaans Studies: Greek, Modern Hebrew, Spanish, Portuguese, Czech, Korean, Esperanto, Finnish | Message 30 of 159 08 January 2014 at 7:20pm | IP Logged | ||
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No, you are right, diplomacy is not something I do very well.
The videos are on the tube. I got the diplomas to back that up. You can figure it out yourself, lad. I've no intention to enter into a contest with ya, so I'll keep it simple - I do not see the essence of posting what you do over and over again. I'm not sure why you do it, what you are trying to add, or how you're relating in anything the original post. Maybe there is value in quality over quantity. Maybe there isn't. Maybe they can coexist. But my question is the following; why does it matter exactly what the distribution is? Why should anyone care? Quality over quantity matters, because... what? Edited by tarvos on 08 January 2014 at 7:29pm 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Henkkles Triglot Senior Member Finland Joined 4053 days ago 544 posts - 1141 votes Speaks: Finnish*, English, Swedish Studies: Russian | Message 31 of 159 08 January 2014 at 7:58pm | IP Logged | ||
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To me it's always been clear that Benny the Irish Polyglot always aims high and sees what will come of it. He has never claimed he has been able or will ever be able to gain fluency or attain the skills necessary to pass a C1 exam in just three months. Also he has explained that his definition of fluency is in fact, his definition of fluency. He has explained this many times in his videos.
What comes to Luca, I think he said once (don't quote me on this) that he focuses intensively on one language for an entire year. This makes sense given his very high skills in a lot of the languages he speaks. If we assume that the Pareto principle applies to language learning (in my humble opinion it does, but this is not about that), and that ten thousand hours will get you closest to perfection that is humanly possible to obtain, we get the following data: Legend An hour; "hours" = an hour of time spent studying the language Fluency = [a word which escapes definitions] Proficiency = ability to use a/the language to varying degrees Hypothesis 10,000 hours = very advanced fluency, indistinguishable for an average native speaker in terms of proficiency If 20% of effort guarantees 80% of results, 2,000 hours will take you to 80% of that level I think we all agree that someone who has spent two thousand quality hours of study into any language is more or less fluent, even given the variance people have with the definition of the mentioned word. Musings If we were to represent this as a mathematical function, we would get this. Quite the crude image but it does shed some light to the task at hand. Sorry for the disclaimer, I felt it was necessary to avoid conflict. This particular curve probably best represents the learning curve of something relatively easy like Spanish or Norwegian. All curves are different and depend on the target and the language you begin with, but I think they all more or less reach the C2 at ten thousand. Now, if Luca were to get to "C1" in one year, he would have to study approximately five and a half hours a day. If Benny were to do the same (no I'm not saying he is trying to get to C1 in three months) he would have to study twenty-two hours per fortnight. As you and I both know, he would run out of time quite fast. That is why he is not aiming for C1 which would be ridiculous. Instead, he gets somewhere that would probably be considered between B1 and B2, which is a great idea. I have watched videos where he explains his routine and everything from his methodology to sleeping patterns, and if he gets eight hours of quality time with the language every day for three months, that amounts to 720 hours which is nothing to belittle. Conclusion It all boils down to what ratio people give to quality over quantity. There are no universal facts about these, there are people for whom getting to B2 in twenty languages is much more important than taking any one language to C2 or highly advanved proficiency. I see nothing wrong with that. I also don't see anything wrong with that if someone wants to devote their time to say, German and master German to its very core and spend those hypothetical ten thousand hours on that. However, if you think that your ratio is better or more important than anyone else's, my advice is to climb down from that ivory tower of yours. Post-scripti PS: I know the CEFR scale is overused and misleading, however, I found it to be the easiest way to convey the relative levels of proficiency and, sufficient it is to say, the CEFR stages represented here are not to be taken at face value. PPS: Please try not to be agitated and agitate others further on the basis of the posts of others. Could we all be polite even if someone says something that one would find utterly ridiculous? Edited by Henkkles on 08 January 2014 at 8:07pm 12 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| culebrilla Senior Member United States Joined 3797 days ago 246 posts - 436 votes Speaks: Spanish | Message 32 of 159 08 January 2014 at 8:08pm | IP Logged | ||
To make it VERY clear to you: 1. A person that is very advanced at something is much better at the ONE TASK than another that is an intermediate or beginner. 2. Reaching an advanced level at something is NOT, repeat, NOT, more of a LAUDABLE goal than reaching a a lower level in several things; they are equivalent if both people have spent the same amount of time on the tasks. 3. I did a youtube search and didn't find it. Please send a link. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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