Category: Language learning

Learning varieties of Chinese

By Simon

The other day I was talking with a lad from Hong Kong. We were speaking mainly in Mandarin, with odd bits of Cantonese thrown in from time to time – I speak Mandarin fluently, but only know a little Cantonese. I asked him how he had learned Mandarin, and he said that he had just picked it up through listening and speaking, and that it wasn’t too difficult. I’ve heard similar stories from other people from Hong Kong and Macau, and suspect that it is easier for Cantonese speakers to pick up Mandarin than it is for Mandarin speakers to pick up Cantonese or other varieties of Chinese. This is partly because Mandarin is phonetically and grammatically somewhat simpler than the other varieties, and also because there are far more Mandarin speakers, and media in Mandarin is far more common.

Have you experience of the relative difficult/ease of learning different varieties of Chinese?

Brezhoneg

By Simon

This month I will focusing mainly on Breton (Brezhoneg). I’ve been learning it, on and off, for a year now and can make some sense of written and spoken Breton, though my speaking and writing lag behind quite a bit. I have been using Le Breton sans Peine, which I’ve nearly finished, though I can’t say that I’ve internalised everything. This month I am working through Colloquial Breton. I want to try to improve my productive knowledge of the language, and will try to write something every day on my other blog, Multilingual Musings – I haven’t quite managed this yet as when writing Breton I have to look up most of the words and check the grammar. With practise my writing will become more fluent, I hope, and this will help with speaking, as I see this kind of writing as a way to practise using the language I would use in conversations. I would also like to learn a few Breton songs, and am open to suggestions.

Are any of you studying Breton? Are there any Breton speakers reading this blog?

Wikitongues

By Simon

I came across a very useful channel on YouTube this week: Wikitongues, which is a collection of videos of people speaking many different languages, including many lesser-studied/known languages and dialects such as Gullah, Luxembourgish and K’iche’ Mayan. The videos I’ve seen so far mostly seem to involve people talking about their native languages and cultures. There are no subtitles on the videos, which would be very useful.

Their aim is to build a collection of videos in as many languages as possible. To find out how to take part I think you can contact them via their website Wikitongues.org.

Frequently-used words

By Simon

One piece of language learning advice that is quite widely preached is that you should concentrate on learning the most frequently -used words in a language at first, before learning less common words. By doing so you should have enough words to be able to understand and talk about everyday kinds of things. The advice on how to learn the words varies. I tend to absorb them through extensive reading and listening, but others like to use flash cards.

I was thinking about this today and realised that the words and phrases that I use most frequently might not be the same as the ones you use. We will probably have a shared core of words, but beyond that the list for each of us is likely to be different. Lists of frequently-used words are available for a variety of languages and are useful, but it might also be useful to think about what you as an individual most often talk about and to learn how to say those things in the language(s) you’re learning.

One way of finding out which particularly words and expressions you use most often would be to record your conversations for several days or even a week, and then to analyse the recordings. If you have a recording function on your phone, or a small recording device, this could be done discretely. As well as finding out which words and expressions you tend to use, you would also find out the typical topics you talk about. Once this has been done once, the results can be used for any language you’re learning.

Have you ever tried anything like this?

Attitudes of minority languages speakers to learners

By Simon

A friend of mine posted an interesting question on Regional, Minority & Indigenous Languages group on Facebook:

“Has anyone ever experienced rejection or hostility from a minority group for learning their language?”

This generated a lot of discussion.

Sometimes when I speak Welsh to people in shops in Bangor they will reply in English. I don’t know why they do this, but it is a but frustrating. That is the only negative experiences I’ve had with speakers of the minority languages I speak or am learning (Welsh, Breton, Irish, Manx, Scottish Gaelic and Manx).

I have only met a few young Breton speakers, and they were happy to talk to me in Breton, but I understand that many older native speakers of Breton are not willing to talk to learners, partly because they find them difficult to understand as they speak a standardised form of Breton with lots of neologisms.

If you are studying or have learnt any minority/endangered languages, have you had any problems with being accepted by their speech communities?

Twitterizing

By Simon

Today I finally got round to signing up for Twitter, something I’d considered for a long time, but didn’t do anything about – this is often how I do things, or rather don’t do them. I’ll be tweeting as @Omniglossia as someone else is using @Omniglot. I plan to use to as a place to post sentences that I’ve put together in languages I’m learning. I try to make them memorable by adding unusual, silly and funny elements along with the ordinary words I want to remember. Your corrections, comments and suggestions are always welcome. I’ll also use it promote stuff going on elsewhere in the Omniglot realm.

Do you use Twitter as a tool for learning languages and/or for practising languages?

Learning vocabulary

By Simon

There are some interesting tips on how to learn vocabulary (including my own little contribution) on SmartLanguageLearner.com. Do you use any of these methods? Or do you have your own ones?

Since I wrote my contribution to that blog, I’ve been thinking about this and realised that constructing sentences using words I’m learning might help them to stick in my memory, especially if the sentences include unusual, silly and/or funny words and create interesting images and associations. For example, if I want to learn words for furniture I might picture each piece of furniture with an animal in, on, under, behind or in front of it – there’s a camel on the chair, a tiger under the table and a fox in the fridge. These should be a bit more memorable than ‘the cat sat on the mat’ and will help me learn animal names, and prepositions, or the equivalents. I could also expand the sentences to add verbs and adjectives I want to remember. Maybe Dr Seus books in languages I’m learning would help as well.

I forgot the elephant!

By Simon

The elephant I forgot

A few days ago after the Bangor Languages Learners’ meet up, I was talking to one of the other members of the group and suddenly exclaimed, “I forgot the elephant!”, and hurried back into the café to retrieve it. As he commented, it’s not a phrase that often comes up in conversation. The elephant in question is a small white one from Morocco that usually lives on my mantelpiece, but which had taken up temporary residence on the table in the café where we met so that people who hadn’t been to the group before could find us. When we left the café I forgot to take the elephant, and only remembered when I went outside.

Many people suggest that you should focus on learning the most frequently-used words of a language first, and only learn the less common ones later, if you really want to. However, I like to learn both frequently-used words and obscure words because you never know when you might need them.

Do you focus exclusively on frequently-used words, or do you like learning obscure and unusual words as well?

Can you imagine a situation in which you would say “I forgot the elephant!” or something similarly unusual?

Which language next?

By Simon

As today is the 1st October it’s time to change my focus to a different language on my Multilngual Musings blog – but which one? During the past three months I’ve focused on Irish, Scottish Gaelic and Manx – a different one each month – and have found the exercise of writing something and recording it every day very useful for my proficiency in them. While my knowledge of each of these languages has improved, there is still plenty more to learn.

As for the next language to focus on – I could continue the Celtic theme and choose Welsh or Breton, or go for one of the other languages I want to brush up, such as German, Chinese, Japanese, Esperanto, French or Spanish. I feel confident writing in Welsh, and fairly confident in French, but the it would be a struggle with the others, which is one reason why I’m doing this as I need the practice.

Have you undertaken any language-related project like this? If so, how successful have they been?

Cultural Immersion

By Simon

When learning a language it helps if you can immerse yourself as much as possible in it. It also helps if you immerse yourself in the culture of the people who speak the language. One if the first things you learn might be the words to use to greet people, for example, but do you know whether to shake their hands, bow, kiss their cheeks, or do something else when you greet them? Do you know which topics of conversation are acceptable and which are best avoided? Do you know how close to stand to someone and how to take turns in conversation? These are all important parts of culture that differ from country to country, and even within countries. Some language text books touch on things like this, but few go into any depth.

There are books and websites that explain the cultures and etiquette of particular countries – I find the Culture Shock! series of books interesting and useful. You can also learn about culture, at least to some extent, by watching films and TV programmes, but the best way is probably to spend time in a country or region where your target language is spoken and to be observant, and to ask questions about any cultural practices that puzzle you.

You might end up adopting some of the cultural practices, even ones that seemed really strange at first. For example, after spending time in Japan I started taking off my outdoor shoes and putting on indoor ones when arriving home, and being prepared to do so elsewhere. This habit has become so ingrained that it feels somehow wrong to wear outdoor shoes inside.

Do you try to learn about culture as well as language? If so, how do you go about it?

Have you adopted any habits or customs from other cultures?