4 ms·

I speak 7 (4 acquired as a child, 1 in school, and 2 as an adult) and I find I'm able to understand understand cultural nuances better, which helps me to bridge

by wenc 4y ago

I speak 7 (4 acquired as a child, 1 in school, and 2 as an adult) and I find I'm able to understand understand cultural nuances better, which helps me to bridge cultural gaps and have multi-perspectival views on most things. (this is quite apart from the unproven Sapir-Whorf hypotheses stuff about language influencing thoughts -- it's not like that at all). Having multiple languages simply gives me affinity for multiple cultures and helps me pay attention to certain details that are easily missed by people not of that culture. Being able to live between cultures isn't necessarily something that is prized by many, but having been an outsider in every culture I've ever lived in, this ability has helped me become a chameleon and blend into new cultures (corporate cultures, community cultures etc.) in order to feel a sense of belonging. So the benefits for me are purely sociological -- I agree that being multilingual confers little advantage in terms of performing executive tasks (which is what the linked article was testing).

oblio 4y ago
You've probably invested thousand of hours in learning all of those languages. Some just by circumstance/luck (maybe something like this? mom speaking 1 language, dad speaking another, both speaking a common language, the place you were in having another secondary language), some through your own efforts. As always, the real question we can't really test is: what could you have done with probably literal person-years of study/research/leisure time, instead?
- GoblinSlayer 4y ago
  There's a post nearby where people are said to spend their time watching braindead youtube videos. My niece does that too.
  - oblio 4y ago
    You do know that within that spectrum there are thousands of useful and fun activities, right? It's not "learn a million languages or be a meth head".
    - olddustytrail 4y ago
      Why don't you share some of the amazing skills you've acquired through not learning languages?
      - oblio 4y ago
        I speak 3 different languages, 2 at C2 level and 1 at ~B2 level. I understand 2 more at about B1 level. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_European_Framework_of_Reference_for_Languages https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_European_Framework_of... Remember, always attack the idea, not the person.
        deleted 4y ago
        [deleted]
        olddustytrail 4y ago
        So you haven't actually learned any great skills through avoiding learning languages? Why do you think that bolsters your idea?
        oblio 4y ago
        Because Mister Offensive Tone, I know that there are trade offs to everything and sacrifices to be made with each choice. And I am not convinced that all that time I spent learning those other languages was spent wisely. I have also noticed by moving to a country which is hyper focused on everyone learning many languages that it creates a ton of resentment and loss of other abilities, for example reduced STEM skills. So the opportunity cost is real.
        GoblinSlayer 4y ago
        Right, learning many languages is subject to diminishing returns. European languages look barely distinguishable to me, so learning them would be a waste of time.
- scrollaway 4y ago
  The investment you’re talking about is likely minimal. They only acquired two as an adult. There is time being spent there but learning a language is a fun and rewarding activity, which tends to become easier the more of them you know. I speak 5 and had gotten used to being the exception; then I moved to Brussels and it’s normal here to meet people who speak even more, far more fluently than I do. I was at this board game Meetup and met this young Ukrainian kid the other day. 13 years old. She was speaking fluent Russian and would switch to perfect French to speak to us, while following the conversation we were having in English. Her mom mentioned she speaks Ukrainian, and that her lessons are in Dutch at school. 13 years old - damn. Anyway yeah when you have a good technique and some experience, learning a new language can be much quicker, and very passive.
  - oblio 4y ago
    There are different levels of investment and different level of expectations, and I say this as someone that speaks 3 languages (Romanian, English, French) and understands a few others at a basic level (German, Italian, Spanish). Children have a very limited vocabulary and tend to make a lot of mistakes (grammar, word usage and pronunciation mistakes) and those mistakes are easily overlooked, especially by adults, since we tend to try to encourage them. Not the case for adult learners. The second difficulty level is <<cultured>> native speaker. This is massively more difficult since you need to advance from maybe a basic 5-10-15k words to probably 20-40-60k words. The investment level for C2 (proficiency according to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_European_Framework_of_Reference_for_Languages https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_European_Framework_of_R...) is in the thousands of hours per language, including a ton of deliberate study. To give you an example of C2, for Romanian you need to be at least a well educated high school student and really understand finer details of Romanian grammar. A native Romanian speaker who hasn't finished at least high school at a good high school is probably a bad C2, despite being a native speaker (or more likely a decent C1). Now, you obviously don't need to be at the highest level for every language you know, but the gap in effort between levels is huge and people underestimate that. Most people that speak multiple languages are probably somewhere around B1-B2 at most of them. Even purely bilingual kids that learned both languages from birth have idiosyncrasies monolingual native speakers notice, for example.

by wenc 4y ago

oblio 4y ago

You've probably invested thousand of hours in learning all of those languages. Some just by circumstance/luck (maybe something like this? mom speaking 1 language, dad speaking another, both speaking a common language, the place you were in having another secondary language), some through your own efforts. As always, the real question we can't really test is: what could you have done with probably literal person-years of study/research/leisure time, instead?

GoblinSlayer 4y ago
There's a post nearby where people are said to spend their time watching braindead youtube videos. My niece does that too.
- oblio 4y ago
  You do know that within that spectrum there are thousands of useful and fun activities, right? It's not "learn a million languages or be a meth head".
  - olddustytrail 4y ago
    Why don't you share some of the amazing skills you've acquired through not learning languages?
    - oblio 4y ago
      I speak 3 different languages, 2 at C2 level and 1 at ~B2 level. I understand 2 more at about B1 level. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_European_Framework_of_Reference_for_Languages https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_European_Framework_of... Remember, always attack the idea, not the person.
      - deleted 4y ago
        [deleted]
      - olddustytrail 4y ago
        So you haven't actually learned any great skills through avoiding learning languages? Why do you think that bolsters your idea?
        oblio 4y ago
        Because Mister Offensive Tone, I know that there are trade offs to everything and sacrifices to be made with each choice. And I am not convinced that all that time I spent learning those other languages was spent wisely. I have also noticed by moving to a country which is hyper focused on everyone learning many languages that it creates a ton of resentment and loss of other abilities, for example reduced STEM skills. So the opportunity cost is real.
        GoblinSlayer 4y ago
        Right, learning many languages is subject to diminishing returns. European languages look barely distinguishable to me, so learning them would be a waste of time.
scrollaway 4y ago
The investment you’re talking about is likely minimal. They only acquired two as an adult. There is time being spent there but learning a language is a fun and rewarding activity, which tends to become easier the more of them you know. I speak 5 and had gotten used to being the exception; then I moved to Brussels and it’s normal here to meet people who speak even more, far more fluently than I do. I was at this board game Meetup and met this young Ukrainian kid the other day. 13 years old. She was speaking fluent Russian and would switch to perfect French to speak to us, while following the conversation we were having in English. Her mom mentioned she speaks Ukrainian, and that her lessons are in Dutch at school. 13 years old - damn. Anyway yeah when you have a good technique and some experience, learning a new language can be much quicker, and very passive.
- oblio 4y ago
  There are different levels of investment and different level of expectations, and I say this as someone that speaks 3 languages (Romanian, English, French) and understands a few others at a basic level (German, Italian, Spanish). Children have a very limited vocabulary and tend to make a lot of mistakes (grammar, word usage and pronunciation mistakes) and those mistakes are easily overlooked, especially by adults, since we tend to try to encourage them. Not the case for adult learners. The second difficulty level is <<cultured>> native speaker. This is massively more difficult since you need to advance from maybe a basic 5-10-15k words to probably 20-40-60k words. The investment level for C2 (proficiency according to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_European_Framework_of_Reference_for_Languages https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_European_Framework_of_R...) is in the thousands of hours per language, including a ton of deliberate study. To give you an example of C2, for Romanian you need to be at least a well educated high school student and really understand finer details of Romanian grammar. A native Romanian speaker who hasn't finished at least high school at a good high school is probably a bad C2, despite being a native speaker (or more likely a decent C1). Now, you obviously don't need to be at the highest level for every language you know, but the gap in effort between levels is huge and people underestimate that. Most people that speak multiple languages are probably somewhere around B1-B2 at most of them. Even purely bilingual kids that learned both languages from birth have idiosyncrasies monolingual native speakers notice, for example.