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Not Being Fluent in any Language (Cost of | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| Gemuse Senior Member Germany Joined 3875 days ago 818 posts - 1189 votes  Speaks: English Studies: German | Message 1 of 26 17 June 2014 at 12:48pm | IP Logged | ||
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Not Being Fluent in any Language (Cost of Multilinguism)
I am not fluent in *any* language. I have also observed this among many of my peers. It usually goes like this: Parents speak L1 at home, but L1 is not really studied critically. L2 is spoken outside, and some critical study is done, but not a lot. Then L3=English comes in teen years which occupies more and more time, but school years end shortly and critical study of it stops. As a result, we have adults who are not very skilled in manipulating any language. This has been bothering me. It appears that there arent resources *for adults* which can take them from "ok, we can understand you" to "you now can now skillfully manipulate the language". Even worse, it seems people do not realize that they are not competent in any language. I did not till I started learning German. A hypothesis of mine is that this effect is worse when there are 3 or more languages at play. If English is only L2, then L1 is usually given a lot more study and practice time, leading to better competence. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| beano Diglot Senior Member United KingdomRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4415 days ago 1049 posts - 2152 votes Speaks: English*, German Studies: Russian, Serbian, Hungarian | Message 2 of 26 17 June 2014 at 2:29pm | IP Logged | ||
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Mind you, in poker, three jacks beats an ace high.
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| patrickwilken Senior Member Germany radiant-flux.net Joined 4326 days ago 1546 posts - 3200 votes Studies: German | Message 3 of 26 17 June 2014 at 2:30pm | IP Logged | ||
Without wanting to sound facetious, isn't that what libraries and bookstores are for? 6 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Jeffers Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4702 days ago 2151 posts - 3960 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Hindi, Ancient Greek, French, Sanskrit, German | Message 4 of 26 17 June 2014 at 2:31pm | IP Logged | ||
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When I taught in India, I noticed this among some Indian students, but especially among
ESL students from Korea. Their Korean was left at a childish level, I was told by an adult Korean, but I can tell you that many of them ended school with pretty poor English skills. As for the Indian students, this is also due to the fact that a lot of English is taught by people with pretty low English skills themselves. I accept, and love, that there is "Indian English"; particular uses that are common in India. That is a different thing. Signs abound for courses in "Advance English", which always makes me chuckle. However, if you speak even remotely as well as you write, Gemuse, then you are being far too hard on yourself. I am now a teacher in England, and I can tell you that I know many people, teens and adults, who could not manage to write as well as you. Edited by Jeffers on 17 June 2014 at 2:35pm 6 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Via Diva Diglot Senior Member Russian Federation last.fm/user/viadivaRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4027 days ago 1109 posts - 1427 votes Speaks: Russian*, English Studies: German, Italian, French, Swedish, Esperanto, Czech, Greek | Message 5 of 26 17 June 2014 at 3:16pm | IP Logged | ||
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Even the case of some L1 and ESL aka English as L2 isn't perfect everywhere.
Our government successfully turned the process of actually studying Russian in school into "try to pass the test" game, when students drill a number or rules, learn to write a very standard composition and that means they know the language good. I find these compositions with its strict scheme awful and despite my school grades I generally failed it because I did not achieve its main goal (but passed with quite a good mark because of knowing spelling rules and stuff). Students are getting lazier, teachers are getting confused and the level of actually knowing Russian good is falling. Speech is drowning into simplifications, mistakes and dirt. The language is degrading. (Yeah, I'm pessimist.) Now add English to the mix. Most of schools just doesn't have teachers who are able to actually explain pronunciation rules and stuff. There is not much of understanding that English is important because in Russia it mostly just isn't. The very perspective of dealing with English which so radically different comparing to Russian seems unnecessary to a lot of people here. I actually tend to think that if you have more languages to play with it's easier. Sweden, Netherlands are great in showing that. Not that I've been there, but I think I don't even have to study Swedish or Dutch to be a tourist there because the level of English's integration is high (I'm not talking about small towns, of course). The more experience with languages you have the easier is the actual studying. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Gemuse Senior Member Germany Joined 3875 days ago 818 posts - 1189 votes Speaks: English Studies: German | Message 6 of 26 17 June 2014 at 3:48pm | IP Logged | ||
Ms Diva, I was just reading a post from a guy in the Russian bloc who was lamenting that he was not fluent in any language. He is a talented guy, and I am quite certain his lack of language manipulation skills will hold him back.
I speak way worse that I write. And for writing, it takes me time to write, and I have to incorporate several edits. Even with this attention, I come across like a 11 year old boy. Your comment actually highlights one of the reasons for my dissatisfaction with the current situation. People will comment to the L2 learner that "Your English/russian/L2 is better than some of the people I know", the learner feels good and goes on his/her way. What the learner really should hear is "Your English/russian/L2 is worse than 80% of the native speakers, and is only better than 20% of native speakers". Folks, the bottom 20% cannot use the language well. Edited by Gemuse on 17 June 2014 at 8:49pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Bao Diglot Senior Member Germany tinyurl.com/pe4kqe5 Joined 5559 days ago 2256 posts - 4046 votes Speaks: German*, English Studies: French, Spanish, Japanese, Mandarin | Message 7 of 26 17 June 2014 at 6:02pm | IP Logged | ||
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"But surely I am better than the bottom 20%!"
? Seriously, if there's a job to be done, the question is whether you can do the job at hand reliably, not whether somebody else who is not actually there might have done better, or even if you could have been that person, if just you had done something differently beforehand. Because, either you know how to do it, or you don't. (Or you kludge your way through it.) Some people are really inflexible when it comes to their language use, but because they learnt a standard variety and the others learnt a dialect at home, they manage just fine while the ones speaking dialect struggle when trying to communicate with others outside their community. Which group is 'better' at the language? I think there's different kinds of being good at a language. Some people are great poets or narrators, and other people are great orators or communicators. Most people are neither, though. And what might be most important, people might not improve their linguistic skills because they don't need to, because they don't believe they can improve, or because doing so would have a negative impact on their social relationships in their immediate environment. It doesn't matter whether I think this is good or not, it's simply reality. Of course I can judge people (and sometimes do so to boost my ego, but it wears off quickly and then I realize that I'll never be as good as some people I know, especially those raised as bilinguals, and both states of mind make it less likely for me to actually work harder), but it doesn't mean they have to live according to my world view. (Sadly. It'd be so great if everyone did.) 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| patrickwilken Senior Member Germany radiant-flux.net Joined 4326 days ago 1546 posts - 3200 votes Studies: German | Message 8 of 26 17 June 2014 at 7:22pm | IP Logged | ||
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Do a Google search for 'Functional Literacy' to get some shocking reading.
From the Literacy Project Foundation website (referring to US citizens):
Edited by patrickwilken on 17 June 2014 at 7:25pm 3 persons have voted this message useful |
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