First off I'd like to tell you that I'm a native Chinese (Cantonese) speaker. As you know, Chinese belongs to the Sino-Tibetian language family and English belongs to the Indo-European family. So there are not so many similarities in both languages. My question is if I want to learn another language *besides, English and Chinese*, say Italian. I tend to learn it through literal English-Italian translation just like I did in English (via English-Chinese translation).
1. Is it possible to learn a second language WITHOUT translation (norsk experiment really works?)?
2. Why am I apt to learn Italian based on my knowledge in English? If I were a German Speaker who wants to learn Italian, would I learn Italian based on my knowledge in English?
3. How do people of various tougues understand amongst themselves? (I know there is a prevailing theory that we intutively know things about language) But why can't I understand Japanese or Korean on TV?
Peace out.
1) Yes .. but it takes a long time to get started; most people start off learning via translation and this seems an acceptable and efficient "short-cut".
2) I couldn't answer for everyone, but I tend to learn languages based on my knowledge of second languages rather than my native language. Why? Because my second-language-knowledge is conscious, so easier to compare with the new learning; whereas my native-language-knowledge is unconscious so I don't think of the structure of it so readily.
3) I'm not sure I understand your question ... but I know Spanish and Italian speakers understand each other quite well, for example. It seems to be that you understand the languages that are very similar to the ones you already know.
but I know Spanish and Italian speakers understand each other quite well, for example. It seems to be that you understand the languages that are very similar to the ones you already know.
- That's quite right!
- You know urdu and hindhi are so similar languages when you are communicating, but both have totally different texts.
I was born in pakistan, my native language is urdu, but the thing is, i can watch indian movies, talk shows and etc and understand the whole conversations without any hurdles. The point is, i never ever take any hindhi classes, even a person who never listen to a hindhi word, and knows urdu language, he can understand the whole picture and conversations.
How is it possible?
infact my native language is composedby several langugaes such as hindhi persian sansikarrat and so on even though you can use the words of regional languages during speaking urdu such as punjabii shindhi phastoo
the point is the simplity of words: thats why urdu minimizes the sophistication of hindhi language it contains complicated words to remember and pronounce
the bottm line is indians say our native language is hindhi but speak totally urdu language except using one or two hindhi words even a person can transfer their meanings into urdu on the spot
you see the best point in our language is the absorption of words from different languages and it seems to me those words are a part of my language they come out in a flash without thinking like my other native words come out
here in our country ever person uses more frequently english words during speaing urdu because they come out naturally without thinking
a sweeper who never ever goes to school and gets any sort of primary education even he uses english words its amazing
he listens to english words from urdu speakers when they are using during speaking if i speak a sentence in urdu i will speak three words in english and five of my own native language
no disturbance of getting message a uniform tempo is present like we speak ouw own native languages through out and have a unifrom message
the bottom line is urdu is the most popular language after english
one hundred million people speak this language from india
fourteen million people from pakistan
same ratio from bangladesh
AND THE WHOLE WORLD SPEAK ENGLISH THATS WHY ITS CALLED INTERNATIONAL LANGUAGE
> But why can't I understand Japanese or Korean on TV?
As far as I know, Japanese and Korean are only distantly related to other languages. The most widely accepted HYPOTHESIS is that Korean and Japanese are related to the Altaic language group, which includes Mongolian and Turkish.
As you know, Chinese is a Sino-Tibetan language, so there is no reason you should be able to understand Japanese or Korean.
Kyle asked if it is possible to learn a second language without translation. Neil Gratton wrote that it is possible and that it takes a long time to get started.
I don't understand Neil Gratton's phrase "a long time to get started". I could start learning Spanish without translation as soon as I got hold of a Spanish piece of text. And this wouldn't take me "a long time".
About a week ago I started learning French without translation. And I've been learning Norwegian for over half a year without translation:
http://www.antimoon.com/norsk
Neil Gratton, are you aware of Norsk Experiment?
Can you REALLY understand all of the words the first time you read the catalog? If it wasn't in a close-to-English language! So would it be better if I learn a language that doesn't not relate to my mother tougue/languages that I already know or vice versa?
>Neil Gratton, are you aware of Norsk Experiment?
Yes, and as you state, it is an experiment. I'd like to see your long term results on it and its success with other learners before I passed serious comment.
I stand by my original statement. You can get started with a new language very quickly if you have a teacher or material that help you ... otherwise the first days or weeks involve a lot of stumbling and guesswork.
But still, children learn without translation to another language, and it will of course work ... but learning with translation provides us with a "short-cut" to help us get started.
Mohammed Asad khan wrote:
> the bottom line is urdu is the most popular language after english
> one hundred million people speak this language from india
> fourteen million people from pakistan
> same ratio from bangladesh
I beg to differ. English, though not the most widely spoken language in the world, is the most popular. The next most popular language would probably be French, followed by Mandarin.
Kyle wrote:
> But why can't I understand Japanese or Korean on TV?
Though english is my first language, mandarin chinese is almost another first language for me (as I learned it when I was very young). I also took some Japanese in university. I can tell you that it's because of the grammar that you can't understand Japanese TV. Sentence structure, as well as their honourific laguage system, is very different from Chinese. If they have subtitles in chinese characters, you should be able to guess at what they're talking about.
