Language as a Window into Human Nature
I'm a big fan of Harvard's Steven Pinker and RSA Animate makes his excellent talk about language and human nature even better. If you enjoy the talk, I highly suggest his influential book, The Language Instinct. Incidentally, it was the first book I was assigned in university linguistics, is one of the only assigned books from university that I still own, and is the only college text I actually reread regularly for fun...
read moreThe Input vs. Output Debate: John’s 2¢
As a language learning addict, I follow lots (and I mean lots) of polyglot blogs and podcasts. It is always interesting to see what has worked (and what hasn't worked) for successful language learners. While most fluent foreign language speakers tend to agree on the vast majority of language learning DOs and DON'Ts, there is one area that always seems to cause heated debate, shouting, name calling, and occasional mud/poo flinging: the importance of language input (i.e. listening and reading) versus language output (i.e. speaking and writing). I have sat quietly on the sidelines for some time now, politely listening to both sides of the argument. But it's time to blow my referee whistle because both teams are "offsides" (Okay John, enough sports analogies already!)
read moreIs Your Native Language a Help or a Hindrance?
When I started my Vietnamese intensive course, a lot of non-linguistists I talked to said that the Chinese students would have an advantage because they already speak a tonal language. It is true that some Westerners could be completely stumped by tones, and just not get the language at all. But, a person who already speaks a tonal language does not have an advantage over a Westerner or a Korean or Japanese who is intelligent, motivated and who is trying to learn tones. Remember that a Cantonese or Mandarin speaker has mastered the tones of his or her language, not the tones of Vietnamese. Saying that someone from a tonal language would have an advantage is like saying people from languages with words, or sounds, or verbs or adjectives would have an advantage.
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