Meddelanden: 38
Språk: English
UUano (Visa profilen) 22 oktober 2011 01:49:54
What's the beef with Latin?
Without Latin, we would lose the richness and beauty that is inherent in the English lexicon.
e.g.
brotherly / fraternal
sisterhood / sorority
speak / parley
talkative / loquacious
loving / amorous
I don't know about you all, but being able to recognize Latin roots means I understand English that much better.
Hundies19 (Visa profilen) 22 oktober 2011 02:58:36
But isn't that the whole point? Better to learn an easy language to begin with and understand grammatical concepts from it?
razlem (Visa profilen) 22 oktober 2011 04:03:34
Kalantir (Visa profilen) 22 oktober 2011 04:30:22
razlem:What it means is that Esperanto itself is not inherently a 'gateway' language as advertised. Any third language you learn will be more easily learned, no matter your second language.Well, it stands to reason that if the third language is always easier, you would want the second language to be as easy as possible if you already intend on learning a third and what's easier than Esperanto?
razlem (Visa profilen) 22 oktober 2011 04:49:27
Kalantir:Well, it stands to reason that if the third language is always easier, you would want the second language to be as easy as possible if you already intend on learning a third and what's easier than Esperanto?It may make learning languages easier, but not in the way most people think. I.E. There's nothing about the language specifically that aids in the understanding of other languages.
Again, had the conductors of the study performed the tests with other languages, it would have yielded a more definitive result.
ceigered (Visa profilen) 22 oktober 2011 12:52:55
*these languages normally share similar traits being in an intermediate state between two different grammatical methodologies, but often the grammar is learnt more by rote than through some sort of mathematical, formulaic system
Unlike EO or similar languages (I'd add Japanese here, despite many of its tenses being round-about ways of saying seemingly simple concepts) which isolate the grammatical components very well.
erinja (Visa profilen) 22 oktober 2011 14:17:20
razlem:What it means is that Esperanto itself is not inherently a 'gateway' language as advertised. Any third language you learn will be more easily learned, no matter your second language.I think you're misunderstanding the results of the Esperanto study.
The French study went something like this (I surely have the details wrong but this is pretty much how it went):
You had two groups of students. As I recall, one group was even the "smarter" group, and the other was the "less smart"
The "smarter" group of students studied French for two years.
The "less smart" group of students studied Esperanto for six months, then French for a year and a half.
At the end of the study, the "less smart" group spoke French BETTER than the group that had studied French the whole time, plus they also spoke Esperanto - two languages in the same time that it took the "smarter" group to learn only one language, and to learn that one language less well.
So basically it's capitalizing on the fact that your third language is always easier than your second, by making your second language an extremely easy one. And therefore you can pick up two new languages in less time than some people spend studying only one new language.
Surely this experiment would not have worked if the second group of students had studied Spanish for six months, then French for a year and a half. But probably no one has done that experiment.
UUano (Visa profilen) 22 oktober 2011 15:37:46
erinja:Surely this experiment would not have worked if the second group of students had studied Spanish for six months, then French for a year and a half.Why not? I'd studied French for half my life by the time I started learning German and had a less difficult time because of it. Granted, I'm a native speaker of English and had a strong foundation in grammar, so that probably helped as well.
It all depends on who you are. If you have a propensity for learning languages, it doesn't matter what the second one is...they get progressively easier to learn (IMHO).
erinja (Visa profilen) 22 oktober 2011 19:28:03
UUano:Why not? I'd studied French for half my life by the time I started learning German and had a less difficult time because of it. Granted, I'm a native speaker of English and had a strong foundation in grammar, so that probably helped as well.But do you think you learnt German better than someone who had been studying German for the entire time that you were studying French, plus the time you studied German?
No one doubts that having studied a language before makes it easier to study another one. The question is what level of effort versus what level of benefit.
I think that in this case learning Esperanto functioned like training wheels for language learning (and this is, indeed, the principle behind "Springboard to languages").
UUano (Visa profilen) 22 oktober 2011 20:56:19
erinja:But do you think you learnt German better than someone who had been studying German for the entire time that you were studying French, plus the time you studied German?If I said yes, would that be too immodest? hehe
I see your point, I think.