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Maximum limit and The Rule of Seven | ||
Tags: Number of Languages | Polyglot | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| reineke Senior Member United States https://learnalangua Joined 6261 days ago 851 posts - 1008 votes  Studies: German | Message 9 of 12 01 April 2007 at 7:18pm | IP Logged |
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Thanks a bunch! Extremely helpful! I see a big problem and a great hole in Mr. Trimnell's research regarding the maximum number of languages a mortal man can learn at a reasonably high level of proficiency. This "reasonably high" (my text) is exactly the problem. He's looking at lists of translators and their working languages! Being able to translate efficiently and professionally from one language to another is just about the highest skill one can attain, and a well educated bilingual person will easily get lost in the task. It's a bit of an insult to the profession really. Being a professional translator goes too much above and beyond the "call of duty" of being extremely proficient in a language. And three working languages is a whole lot! He found it common. I'd immediately multiply that by two for non-translating purposes. Professional interpreting requires an additional set of skills and is extremely demanding. A quick wit is here as important as being a native speaker and a good translator. A very proficient person would be able to read without any difficulty, produce written text that is not going to get him fired or be sneered at, watch tv, discuss issues and events or anything else he is familiar with with relative ease. Basically function as a normal, reasonably well educated native speaker of that language (with a bit of an accent and perhaps an awkward turn of phrase).
Edited by reineke on 01 April 2007 at 7:20pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Zhuangzi Nonaglot Language Program Publisher Senior Member Canada lingq.com Joined 6842 days ago 646 posts - 688 votes Speaks: English*, French, Japanese, Swedish, Mandarin, Cantonese, German, Italian, Spanish Studies: Russian | Message 10 of 12 05 April 2007 at 8:30pm | IP Logged |
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I can honestly say that I am very fluent in English, French, Japanese and Mandarin, and despite seldom using the languages quite fluent in Swedish, Spanish and German. People who hearn me in Cantonese and Italian are also impressed. I am currently studying Russian and Korean. If I had the time and wanted to add to my numbers I am sure that I could learn to be fluent in Portuguese and bring my Russian and Korean up to fluency withut influencing the languages I already know. I have even found that learning more languages makes me better at the ones I already know.
I refresh my languages by reading and listening before I have to use them. This is rarely necessary for the first four above. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| autodidactic Bilingual Triglot Senior Member United States tinyurl.com/cunningl Joined 6437 days ago 100 posts - 110 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish*, French Studies: Russian, Japanese, Kazakh | Message 11 of 12 05 April 2007 at 9:31pm | IP Logged |
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English, Spanish, French, Arabic, Russian, Portuguese, Italian. Looks like I've got the right number down.
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| reineke Senior Member United States https://learnalangua Joined 6261 days ago 851 posts - 1008 votes Studies: German | Message 12 of 12 05 April 2007 at 10:45pm | IP Logged |
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At 5, I do not feel burdened. I also find that there's plenty of time to use these languages (my laziness is another story). I do feel that seven might be the right number. Maybe I'm mistaken.
I am beginning more and more to lean toward Spanish and Japanese rather than Russian and Portuguese. The first one shouldn't be a problem. The second ahem I'm not sure but it's doable. I'd love to learn Japanese. The question is should I make a "sensible choice" and go for the other two as I could acquire them more easily. I have worked out a few tables covering general usefulness questions and a few personal ones and Japanese comes out on top over both Portuguese and Russian. I do feel that Japanese would put a definite stop on any further expansion. Edited by reineke on 06 April 2007 at 12:08am 1 person has voted this message useful |
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