Interested in learning other languages?

My housemate wants to learn arabic and is extremely jealous of my chinesepod. Add another vote to arabic in your poll, Ken.

so it´s getting more worse? poor me;-)

excuter

"I'm getting old..." ? LOL! You are just starting at age 20!

I even forgot the "r" in energetic, man I´m getting old...

@ Ken Carroll

I am 20 and I guess that´s young but about the enegetic thing... well I´m sure that much of it is lost through to much consum of TV (once I have the time I sure get it back by joining an other Chen taiji group.My old one broke up after our practiseleader didn´t have the time to drive about an hour just to teach us for one hour and drive back home after that anymore)

Henning,

No. I definitely didn't find good textbooks, but I worked with what I could get my hands on. There were plenty of rote Fahne, for sure.

Ken,

you actually found good German Chinese textbooks and tapes?

Beyond the bleached "Besuch beim Kombinat Rote Fahne" type?

I usually find myself taking my ipod with me to the WC hehe.

@ RonInDC

everyone, no matter what interrested in learning something or doing what ever will loose concentration even if only for some minutes after a while. How long you are able to keep up your concentration depends on factors like: how trained is your concentration, how is your actual hydrationlevel, how noise is it around you...

so the best thing you can do when you loose concentration is having a break and walk around five minutes, drink something fluid (no alkohol ;-) ) and visit that silent place with WC written on the door ;-)

We're seriously considering other languages. It would be really interesting, but there are no final decisions yet. I'll let y'all know, of course.

@Ron, I think it would be well possible to learn more than one language at once. The obvious difficulty is the time demands, but I think there would be huge advantages. Successful language learning is about finding your style and developing good habits. That can be applied to 2 languages as well as just one. I think the contrasts could also be really illuminating/memorable, and add great insight. I actually tried this when I first encountered Chinese - I approached it through a series of German textbooks and tapes so as to get the double whammy. (Ah, to be young and energetic again!)

Oh man! There is already an 'arabicpod.com'. Someone is already using that domain name.

I meant learning chinese, and then learning a new one [after I finish Chinese]. I would get too confuzed if I learned 2 or 3 languages all at the same time!

I'm just learning Chinese at the moment, but would love to start learning another language. Speaking even two languages is still looked down upon amongst certain peers, which incidentally is what spurred me onto learning a second language. More languagepod.com :)

If he does make an arabicpod.com, I'll sure use it!

Italiana raises an issue I've been wondering on for a long time. Perhaps, Ken, as a language expert, you might have educated answers. Does learning multiple languages as opposed to sequentially work? I sometimes get in a little rut with Chinese and need a short break. If I alternated between two languages, wouldn't that keep the mind stimulated and foster good learning?

谢谢

Like Henning, Chinese will keep me busy for quite a few more years, by which time I will probably have forgotten my native French (can't properly spell it anymore, speak/write too much English).

re: f1b1, it's not just Alzheimer's patients and languages, I've long experienced this with medicine which I hardly ever practice, I pretty forgot it all now except the basics of anatomy and physiology. Well, it may just be early Alzheimer after all :-(

Hi Ken,

I just read your interview in The Economist, it seems that the sky is the limit for you. With this in mind and your talk of Arabic, are you planning to launch Arabicpod.com?

Gravel

Also, an interesting but depressing sidenote. When I worked with Alzheimer's patients, they tended to lose their languages in the order that they learned them. For instance, most of the patient were Jewish Poles, who first lost the ability to speak English and reverted to German, then as their disease progressed they lost German and spoke only Polish.

Phoebe

It's easier to learn 2 or 3 or 4 languages in high school, I did French and German (and of course English) , and learned Italian in my early 20's. I say go for it, Italiana.

As I get older my capacity for learning decreases inversely in proportion to my enthusiasm. Like Henning, I plan to make learning Mandarin a lifetime hobby. If I were 30 years younger I'd try Vietnamese.

Phoebe

Shame the "other" option doesn't add custom options like it did in previous polls, I think that would give more accurate results.

Arabic is winning over there! Can this be true?

Italiana,

You're young and the world is at your feet. Go for it.

Im gunna bring it on

Italiana,

It's so great to see your enthusiasm for languages. Keep it up. Just give Henning's post some credence. But, since you are a high schooler, I'm sure you will be able to gain facility with several languages if you persist through the years to come : )

Isnt that rated 'R'?

Excuter, Kung Fu Hustle is definitely one of my favorite films.

The great thing about watching DVD´s is you can choose the audiolanguage and the subtitlelanguage as well. That realy helps to polish language skills up. (what a pitty, my version of kungfu hustle has not mandarin but cantonese chinese wich I don´t understand)

And of course I take it serious or else I wouldnt be on here all day, everyday posting questions like crazy.

Watch me do it, henning. :)

italiana,

http://dict.cn/ says:

顾此失彼: [ gù cǐ shī bǐ ]

1. unable to attend to everything at one time

More information in the Chengyu dictionary:

http://www.chinese-tools.com/chinese/chengyu/dictionary/

Learning a language seriously is a long-time and time consuming commitment. I for myself decided to learn Mandarin and will stick with it. This keeps me busy for several decades.

...either that or they're trying to hack a hairball.

Hey how come only 7 people voted for Italian?? Jst kidding. I was listening to some Hebrew and when they talk it sounds like they are "coughing" some of the words, hehe.

Hey franch-

What does 顾此失彼 mean?? I cant figure it out...

After I learn Hindu, Mandarin, Arabic [polish my] spanish, and learn speech-reading (all this summer), Im going to start german probably.

Italiana,

Hindi is an interesting one, probably not much use in India as most people speak english, and if they can't speak english they probably can't speak hindi either. However, it is practically identical to Urdu which is spoken in Pakistan, Iran, Afganistan, and other central asian countries in one form or another.

Most popular/spoken laguages in the world:

#1...Mandarin Chinese

#2...Hindu

#3...English

#4...Spanish

#5...Arabic

Ihope you're not going to 顾此失彼 gù cǐ shī bǐ too much Italiana... (I guess we're all doing so in some measure though ;-) )

I also wish to learn Arabic, Hindu, [polish my] spanish, and english speech-reading. Are you going to be making a site for any of those?? Xiexie, Ken!

TaiPan,

I hope it's going to be the last part!

Cheers.

Arabic, huh?

Ken, is Praxis secretly an arm of the CIA...? ...MI6? Are you running a Charm School here? Are these mythical Chinesepod meet-ups just ways for you to select the best and brightest for one of your "practice plans", or one of your "mobile beta tests"...?

...or is this just the best damn language school on earth?