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The Neural Advantage of Speaking 2 Languages

scientificamerican.com

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Re: The Neural Advantage of Speaking 2 Languages

#11

Post by yannis »

My son is fully bilingual in Afrikaans(sort of a Dutch Dialect) and English. When he was a toddler he would speak fluently to his grandmother in Afrikaans and would turn in the same conversation and seamlessly talk to me or his mother in English. He kept this ability right into about the middle years in Elementary School. After that this ability somehow diminished and he would throw English words into an Afrikaans conversation or vice versa. He is thirteen now and speaks both languages very fluently (but the switching between the two languages now is more conscious). At the toddler stage it was as if his brain was combining the two languages into one.

From my own personal experience I noted that, there is a point when you start to think - in the new language and that is the real turning point. It also appears sort of in computer languages as well.

When people from different linguistic cultures mix they tend to develop their own language for example fanagalo [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fanagalo].

This paper from the Center for Applied Linguistics has some good pointers http://www.cal.org/resources/Digest/digestglobal.html as regards to languages and education.

Re: The Neural Advantage of Speaking 2 Languages

#12

Post by yannis »

patio11 wrote: post #8
ique wrote: post #3

Very interesting article. Can't help but to think about the differences in countries educational systems. I'm Swedish, here we start studying English in second (numbers and such) and third grade (start with words and grammar). And then study it all the way up and through high-school. Pretty much every Swede of a younger generation is fluent in English. Almost all people also spend several years in grades 6-9 studying…

I'm a big fan of bilingualism but if you're living in America and inclined to do business primarily in America, then the advantages of it are not so great next to the prodigious effort required to learn another language. Most Americans study Spanish, but then a) countries and people who speak only Spanish are not typically great economic prospects (compared to, say, Japan or Germany or what have you) and b) supposing…

There is one other advantage, being able to read in another language opens up a literary world that is hidden and even a technical world which is difficult to extract with translations.

Re: The Neural Advantage of Speaking 2 Languages

#13

Post by rabidgnat »

ique wrote: post #3

Very interesting article. Can't help but to think about the differences in countries educational systems. I'm Swedish, here we start studying English in second (numbers and such) and third grade (start with words and grammar). And then study it all the way up and through high-school. Pretty much every Swede of a younger generation is fluent in English. Almost all people also spend several years in grades 6-9 studying…

"What languages would be of enough importance for, for instance, Americans, to make it obligatory education?"

My aunt forced her young children to learn conversational Spanish because she was convinced that "they're taking over." It was extremely misguided, but her children actually benefited from it, gaining both a language and some cultural understanding. How many misguided parents actually pull that off?

On a more general note, an internationalization of Americans probably won't occur until a few things happen:

1) The ridiculous taxes+fees on international plane tickets are lifted

2) It becomes en vogue to go to for vacation

3) Some famous people move to X and bring reality TV with them

or..

1) America enters a position where it is obviously no longer economically dominant BECAUSE of a lack of worldliness.

2) (1) becomes common knowledge

Until either of those scenarios occur, there's absolutely no reason for Americans to learn another language. Most Americans work and think locally. They're at least 500 miles away from another country, and they're not about to get any closer

Re: The Neural Advantage of Speaking 2 Languages

#14

Post by nwatson »

anuleczka wrote: post #4
rdtsc wrote: post #2

Apparently there is also a disadvantage -- a higher risk of developing stuttering. I know from experience (n=1), but there is some interesting research on the topic as well: http://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=stuttering+bilingual+chi...

Interesting -- I've also experienced that. Sometimes it's because I can't think of the word I want to use in one language, but an equivalent word in the other language gets stuck in my mind. More info here: http://www.stutteringhelp.org/DeskLeftDefault.aspx?TabID=156

My father is American, approaching 80 years of age, and has been living away from Brazil (in the U.S.) for the last 25 years. Even so every few English sentences he pauses to find the English word he's looking for, often saying the Portuguese word first. Lately he's just been saying the Portuguese word without bothering to translate, meaning I end up translating a lot of words/concepts on the side when he's talking to my American wife.

My father spent the "core" of his adult life in Brazil and dealt with every-day concerns in Portuguese. He traveled a lot away from his English-speaking family and was immersed much of the time. He practiced his domain expertise (soul-saving) in Portuguese. In most matters he's just more comfortable in Portuguese and Spanish, and it certainly shows when he speaks English.

Re: The Neural Advantage of Speaking 2 Languages

#15

Post by wallflower »

nfnaaron wrote: post #10
ique wrote: post #3

Very interesting article. Can't help but to think about the differences in countries educational systems. I'm Swedish, here we start studying English in second (numbers and such) and third grade (start with words and grammar). And then study it all the way up and through high-school. Pretty much every Swede of a younger generation is fluent in English. Almost all people also spend several years in grades 6-9 studying…

It's not much of a perceived advantage to study a 2nd language as an American, because no matter where you go there's probably someone who speaks English, and chances are that wherever you go few if any speak the 2nd language that you studied as a kid. There's small payoff for an American to study a 2nd language. There's large payoff for people from non-English speaking countries to study English; it must be true or…

> There's small payoff for an American to study a 2nd language.

If you are only looking at economic payoff.

I've been to countries/cultures (Latin America) where I feel that if you don't have a grasp of the language - you can only be a tourist. Reusing cliches but not being able to speak a language - you lack the passport to truly immerse yourself - you'll only be a tourist if you can't speak (to a point) the language.

I'm really looking for an app that will find Spanish texts for me to read that have words that I don't already know (e.g. smart enough to learn what your working vocabulary set is). Since I'm starting out - almost every text will have words I don't know. Anyone know of an app geared towards reading and vocabulary building (and possibly reading material discovery)? Or do we have to build one (it will be a little harder because of the conjugations, m/f variants of words)

Re: The Neural Advantage of Speaking 2 Languages

#16

Post by kowen »

ibsulon wrote: post #6
ique wrote: post #3

Very interesting article. Can't help but to think about the differences in countries educational systems. I'm Swedish, here we start studying English in second (numbers and such) and third grade (start with words and grammar). And then study it all the way up and through high-school. Pretty much every Swede of a younger generation is fluent in English. Almost all people also spend several years in grades 6-9 studying…

Nearly every American has two years of a foreign language in high school, and nearly every college requires two more years. I started Spanish in 7th grade and ended up with 5 years of study. However, I don't use is and as such, I've lost it.

I studied German for 4 years in school, and am far from fluent. I can painfully pick out details in a newspaper article, and can usually figure out if people are talking about soccer or food or whatever.

On the other hand, I'm fluent in French, and learned that in France, not in school.

In my experience, school wasn't a very efficient medium for learning languages.

Re: The Neural Advantage of Speaking 2 Languages

#17

Post by rjurney »

yannis wrote: post #12
patio11 wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm a big fan of bilingualism but if you're living in America and inclined to do business primarily in America, then the advantages of it are not so great next to the prodigious effort required to learn another language. Most Americans study Spanish, but then a) countries and people who speak only Spanish are not typically great economic prospects (compared to, say, Japan or Germany or what have you) and b) supposing…

There is one other advantage, being able to read in another language opens up a literary world that is hidden and even a technical world which is difficult to extract with translations.

And one great way to learn a second language is to get a bilingual book, or two copies of your favorite book in two languages :)

Re: The Neural Advantage of Speaking 2 Languages

#18

Post by lmkg »

kowen wrote: post #16
ibsulon wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nearly every American has two years of a foreign language in high school, and nearly every college requires two more years. I started Spanish in 7th grade and ended up with 5 years of study. However, I don't use is and as such, I've lost it.

I studied German for 4 years in school, and am far from fluent. I can painfully pick out details in a newspaper article, and can usually figure out if people are talking about soccer or food or whatever. On the other hand, I'm fluent in French, and learned that in France, not in school. In my experience, school wasn't a very efficient medium for learning languages.

The best (possibly only) way to learn a language on a functional level, is to use it. In my second-year Spanish class in high school, our teacher let us chat during class, so long as we chatted in Spanish and not English. In practice, we talked Spanglish, but nonetheless, that experience made me far better at Spanish than all my other studying before and after. She also taught all of her lessons entirely in Spanish, and required questions be asked in Spanish. While traditional lecturing is not an efficient medium for learning languages, schools can teach language skills very effectively by using alternative methods.

There are also Hawaiian Language Immersion schools available in Hawaii, which I hear very good things about.

Re: The Neural Advantage of Speaking 2 Languages

#19

Post by ibsulon »

TheSOB88 wrote: post #9
ibsulon wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nearly every American has two years of a foreign language in high school, and nearly every college requires two more years. I started Spanish in 7th grade and ended up with 5 years of study. However, I don't use is and as such, I've lost it.

If you're like most Americans, you never really had it. Were you fluent? I've "studied" it in school for 6 years (MS, HS, Univ), and I'm not even close to fluent. I don't think the school system is equipped to do that.

My grammar was advanced, my vocabulary intermediate. I could mostly understand Telemundo and could hold a conversation, but was nowhere near fluent.

Now, I'm not much better off than a first year.

Re: The Neural Advantage of Speaking 2 Languages

#20

Post by yannis »

rjurney wrote: post #17
yannis wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is one other advantage, being able to read in another language opens up a literary world that is hidden and even a technical world which is difficult to extract with translations.

And one great way to learn a second language is to get a bilingual book, or two copies of your favorite book in two languages :)

I watch TED videos with sub-titles!
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