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| BaronBill Triglot Senior Member United States HowToLanguages.comRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4476 days ago 335 posts - 594 votes  Speaks: English*, French, German Studies: Spanish, Mandarin, Persian | Message 1 of 10 12 April 2014 at 7:50pm | IP Logged | |||||
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Hi, I recently wrote a blog post about 32 lessons that language learning has taught me over the years. It's been quite popular on Facebook and Reddit so I thought I might share it here and see what you think.
Did I miss any big ones? Do you guys disagree with any of them? 32 Lessons That Language Learning has Taught Me I'd love to get some feedback from you guys (and girls). 4 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| luke Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 6992 days ago 3133 posts - 4351 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Esperanto, French | Message 2 of 10 12 April 2014 at 8:13pm | IP Logged | |||||
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Good job. Most of them are not very controversial, except, #25, "there is no such thing as a "hard" or
"easy" language.. In the bigger context, perhaps it's fine.. But for someone not sure whether to start Spanish or Japanese, there is a difference. 3 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| BaronBill Triglot Senior Member United States HowToLanguages.comRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4476 days ago 335 posts - 594 votes Speaks: English*, French, German Studies: Spanish, Mandarin, Persian | Message 3 of 10 12 April 2014 at 8:20pm | IP Logged | |||||
Right there I might have to disagree. If a first-timer was super-motivated to learn Japanese and was fascinated with the culture and willing to put forth the effort, he/she would (I think) have a much easier time with Japanese than with Spanish (assuming no real intrinsic interest or motivation towards Spanish). Granted there are elements are every language that may be more difficult or simple to grasp for some people (depending on the native language) but my point is not to worry about any of that stuff because motivation and passion are the most important elements (to me anyway). Edit: Super bad spelling. Edited by BaronBill on 12 April 2014 at 8:23pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| 1e4e6 Octoglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4077 days ago 1013 posts - 1588 votes Speaks: English*, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Norwegian, Dutch, Swedish, Italian Studies: German, Danish, Russian, Catalan | Message 4 of 10 12 April 2014 at 8:51pm | IP Logged | |||||
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I assume that this only applies to Anglophones, but people who start by being bilingual
or otherwise multilingual, either by choice or (more likely) by compulsory primary and secondary education, especially in Europe, already have less languages that are "difficult" compared to a monolingual, especially a monolingual Anglophone. Someone who is 15 years old and speaks French, Dutch, German, and English from attending schooling in Belgium or the Netherlands probably would have to redefine "hard", as more languages might be easier for them. However, I as a monolingual Anglophone at 13 years old, found Mandarin (supposedly a hard language) easier than French (supposedly easy) in general whilst starting both simultaneously, even taking account the writing system, despite having no background in any language. I had less problems pronouncing Mandarin, even with its tones, than French with its nasal and silent sounds. At one point, my written and reading comprehension was even better than my French one, despite often not even studying Mandarin very much. The only reason my French superceded my Mandarin at present is that I compeltely abandoned Mandarin in 2007 because I lost all interest, but decided to continue French. And I still have some big problems pronouncing French. It probably depends more on personal strengths and weaknesses more. When I did my maths degree for undergraduate, I found partial differential equations easier than number theory and probability, where I had problems, although the former is supposedly more difficult. Edited by 1e4e6 on 12 April 2014 at 11:01pm 3 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| tastyonions Triglot Senior Member United States goo.gl/UIdChYRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4452 days ago 1044 posts - 1823 votes Speaks: English*, French, Spanish Studies: Italian | Message 5 of 10 13 April 2014 at 2:43am | IP Logged | |||||
Number 5 on the list:
I've definitely experienced this a lot. The most off-hand mention of language learning can incite me to want to talk someone's ear off about it, even if it's one of my fellow university students who is probably taking the class just to fulfill a requirement. :-) 3 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Jeffers Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4696 days ago 2151 posts - 3960 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Hindi, Ancient Greek, French, Sanskrit, German | Message 6 of 10 14 April 2014 at 10:46am | IP Logged | |||||
At least you're a student. You sort of have an excuse to learn languages. People assume it's part of your "career track". Try being a middle-aged adult learning a language which has nothing to do with their work, just because they want to. In that sentence, I am "they". People assume it's a tiny effort on my part. I think if they knew how much time I gave to language study, they would consider putting me away. Very occasionally, someone is impressed with the idea that an adult would learn a foreign language. But they are either odd themselves (or just being polite!) 4 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| hjordis Senior Member United States snapshotsoftheworld. Joined 4973 days ago 209 posts - 264 votes Speaks: English* Studies: French, German, Spanish, Japanese | Message 7 of 10 15 April 2014 at 5:29am | IP Logged | |||||
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Very nice post, I sent it to my friend who wants to learn Spanish, but believes she
can't. I don't know if it'll convince her of anything, though! I'll keep an eye on your blog. (As a side note, ever since I got chromebook I have all these new characters on the international keyboard, but I have to be careful with *'ll or I end up with ĺ.) And yes, I have that problem blabbing on about languages too. In fact I do that with all my interests. I think most people find it interesting, but it starts to wear out my family sometimes. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| leosmith Senior Member United States Joined 6337 days ago 2365 posts - 3804 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Tagalog | Message 8 of 10 15 April 2014 at 6:33am | IP Logged | |||||
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First, it was a nice post, and I agreed with the majority of it. Here is my number seven for you:
8 - not even worth mentioning. People that come to forums asking which one to learn will most likely not succeed, because they don't have enough three. People that have a lot of three don't need eight. 10 - nope. Balance, balance, balance. 11 - nope. Method is very important. There are a lot of crazy ones out there, and ones that will just not fit a given individual. Many methods can work for a person, but many can fail too. 19 - true, but if you want, you can stop studying at some point. It's ok. 20 - bizarre statement which I've heard before. Sure, it's possible to invent a scenario in which this is true, but it's quite easy to disagree with as a general statement. 25 - nope. Again, you can make up a situation where this is true, but the general case isn't. Otherwise, the FSI chart would have the same numbers for all languages. 31 - huh? Why say one is more important than the other? Is it some sort of competition. Yay - go long term! 32 - it's not necessary to "create" fun. Sometimes it's fun, sometimes it isn't, just like life. 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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