4 ms·

Yes, the converse applies, at least with the caveat that the week estimates are pretty much bullshit, and the map in general is very speculative. In foreign lan

Yes, the converse applies, at least with the caveat that the week estimates are pretty much bullshit, and the map in general is very speculative. In foreign language teaching, you will typically speak of L1 and L2, L1 being your native language, L2 being the language you're picking up. The typological distance (linguistically) between languages plays a major role in acquisition, both positively and negatively. A positive L1 transfer is something the learner can infer about the target language from their own, while a negative L1 transfer is something they assume about the target language based on their own, but it's wrong. Overall, positive L1 transfer in closely related languages will overwhelmingly outweigh negative transfer, but be a lot more tricky when the languages aren't closely related typologically. Note that typological similarity often coincides with distance in the historic sense, but isn't the same thing. For example, both Thai and Chinese are tonal isolating languages (same typological features) but aren't related at all. Also, Russian and Bulgarian, for example, are very closely related, but have a vastly different grammar, making Russian harder for a Bulgarian speaker than, say, for a Polish speaker.

gajomi 9y ago
I pretty much agree with most everything you write, but just want to add the caveat that this is all a function of relative competence or learning stage in an L2 language. That is to say, some languages that may be relatively easier to partially acquire then to fully master and visa versa. A case in point, and dear to my heart at that by way of experience, is the relative difficulty for an L1 English speaking in forming simple grammatically correct sentences in German and Mandarin, respectively. Whereas there is no question that Mandarin is the harder language to master (especially if we are talking about literacy), the high degree of analyticity relative to German makes forming sentences from words rather intuitive for the English speaker (even if English isn't quite as analytical as Mandarin in it's core modules). In other words, at least from the perspective of grammar, the beginnings of Mandarin are much easier than the beginnings of German, despite typological similarity even in inflections for plurality and the like shared between English and German.
laurieg 9y ago
The negative transfer that Japanese people are faced with when trying to learn English is really a incredible. Not only do they have a huge number of mis-leading false friends and corrupted loan words (for example the word for plug socket is "consent") but a lot of the core grammar concepts of English do no exist in Japanese. Plural/singular, subject verb agreement, perfect tenses. And on top of that the Japanese language has many fewer sounds than English. Most Japanese people will never be able to discriminate between L and R, or have a good command of all the Japanese vowels.

gajomi 9y ago

I pretty much agree with most everything you write, but just want to add the caveat that this is all a function of relative competence or learning stage in an L2 language. That is to say, some languages that may be relatively easier to partially acquire then to fully master and visa versa. A case in point, and dear to my heart at that by way of experience, is the relative difficulty for an L1 English speaking in forming simple grammatically correct sentences in German and Mandarin, respectively. Whereas there is no question that Mandarin is the harder language to master (especially if we are talking about literacy), the high degree of analyticity relative to German makes forming sentences from words rather intuitive for the English speaker (even if English isn't quite as analytical as Mandarin in it's core modules). In other words, at least from the perspective of grammar, the beginnings of Mandarin are much easier than the beginnings of German, despite typological similarity even in inflections for plurality and the like shared between English and German.

laurieg 9y ago

The negative transfer that Japanese people are faced with when trying to learn English is really a incredible. Not only do they have a huge number of mis-leading false friends and corrupted loan words (for example the word for plug socket is "consent") but a lot of the core grammar concepts of English do no exist in Japanese. Plural/singular, subject verb agreement, perfect tenses. And on top of that the Japanese language has many fewer sounds than English. Most Japanese people will never be able to discriminate between L and R, or have a good command of all the Japanese vowels.