Babel No More

When I recently received a copy of the new book Babel No More: The Search for the World's Most Extraordinary Language Learners, by Michael Erard, I wasn't quite sure what to expect. A few other language bloggers have recently commented on the book, and while I tried to ignore their comments in order to form my own opinion, one can't help developing a few preconceptions.

When I finally opened the book and turned to Chapter 1, I began reading with a bit of a defensive attitude. Even after I'd... continue reading at Fluent Every Year

Reading Greek, part II

I've talked about the Greek alphabet in the past, but as I mentioned last week, there are a few more things one needs to know before effectively reading Greek.

Greek is not a fully phonetic language. A few letters can be pronounced in more than one way, and a few sounds can be represented by more than one letter. However, these exceptions aren't very large in number, so it isn't very difficult to figure it out.

In my original post on the Greek alphabet almost two years ago, I explored the... continue reading at Fluent Every Year

The haphazard construction of the human mind

I recently finished reading Kluge: The Haphazard Construction of the Human Mind by Gary Marcus. It's an entire book written just about the brain and how it works, so as you can imagine there's a lot of information in there to help learners. The book even contains an entire chapter about language.

Marcus repeatedly uses the word "context" when referring to human memory, in order to underscore the fact that human memory is not only not perfect, but it's not even well-designed for the purpose of... continue reading at Fluent Every Year

Typing in Greek

As I mentioned in my last post, I'm not yet spending any actual time studying the Greek language. I plan to begin studying intensely when February begins, but for now the most important step is comfortably reading and writing in the native Greek alphabet. Once I begin focused study, I don't want my progress to be slowed by problems with the alphabet.

What you see in the photo above is some of my typing practice. I've added support for the Greek keyboard on my Mac so that I could practice typing... continue reading at Fluent Every Year

Early steps to learning Greek

For my first month with Greek, the plan has been to ease into the language. The Greek language is written in a different alphabet than any to which I am accustomed, and if I'm going to learn this language it will be necessary to be able to read the words I see in lessons, tutorials, and phrasebooks.

You might remember that during my Italian year, I took a break one weekend and learned the Greek alphabet. I didn't memorize it, and I didn't learn any subtleties, diphthongs, digraphs, or other... continue reading at Fluent Every Year

New language mission for 2012!

As I mentioned in my last post, my first goal in choosing a language this year was that I pick something which I will have many opportunities to use. In that post, I listed out several considerations, and I think it's important to go through a similar process when choosing a new language project for yourself.

In my case, though, there are a few additional things to think about when choosing. Most of my readers probably don't have a language learning blog. And most of my readers probably won't... continue reading at Fluent Every Year

Choosing a language that you will use

In spite of the fact that my advice to others has always been to pick a language not for it's features, or interestingness, or uniqueness, or whatever, but rather to choose a language that you will use, I failed to follow my own advice with my choice of Turkish last year and that led to poor results.

Thus, I have resolved not to make the same mistake this year. So when I began thinking about what I want to learn for 2012, the first thing on my mind was to choose a language with many speakers... continue reading at Fluent Every Year