7 Bullet Points About Languages - Week 72
Myths, Elaboration, Solidifying a language, and Vietnamese culture
Hey language lovers
I hope you all had a lovely week!
Updates
Mine was close to perfect.
I visited magnificent spots (you’ll get a bonus pic further below!), studied all my languages well, and wrote a few articles I’m pretty happy with.
I’ve also had an extremely insightful conversation with one of my friends about cultures around the world, their importance and evolution of interculturality, and many other topics. It’s been pumping me up ever since.
The only downside of this past week was an unexpected change of plans. I will not be going to live a few months in Germany in the end. It’s unfortunate but life sometimes throws punches at you so you have to learn to live with them.
As you read this, I’ve been in France for a few hours. Being home feels great and having my language books collection next to my desk is already motivating me to study languages more!
Alright, let’s dive right in!
7 Bullet Points
Each week, I share 7 things that could be useful to your learning odyssey.
I hope they can help you improve your journey, tickle your curiosity, and inspire you to keep exploring.
🎥 One video
The 5 Most Common MYTHS about Language Learning — Days of French 'n' Swedish
I really thought this video would be about basic stuff I knew but Lamont really outdid himself with this video.
I loved his analogy with rivers to explain that you can’t rely on speaking early to learn to speak a foreign language. You need to get a feeling for the language that can only come through exposure to tons of content.
On the topic of needing to do more than 30 minutes per day to learn a language, however, I believe there’s some leeway to add. You will indeed need to spend more time if you’re aiming for a high level of fluency in not so long, but if you’re ready to learn for the long run and don’t aim for a high level, 30 minutes a day can be enough.
Basically, the more you do, the better, but 30 minutes is a good start!
If you’re curious about the 3 others, check out the video. Lamont was also highly entertaining in his way to present them!
📚 One article I read
Translation exercises in self-study — Discussion on “A Language Learners’ Forum”
After sharing a few interesting discussions from the now-defunct How To Learn Any Language forum, I now want to take a look at interesting discussions on its successor.
The first topic is one that’s currently close to my heart since I’ve been learning Thai mostly through translating two simple books for the past two months.
Translating is an intensive activity most people try to avoid and the user who created this discussion is right in reporting translating a language in another is risky because some languages just don’t have the same construction.
This being said, as Iversen explained, translating allows you to find what your brain needs to do to really understand your target language. That’s why it can be a good exercise.
Finally, rdearman did well in bringing Luca Lampariello’s bidirectional method into the discussion. It’s something I haven’t tried but that could help me bring my intermediate languages to the next level.
Could be good for a challenge!
✍🏽 One article I wrote
The Best Way to Improve Your Active Language Skills Is Elaboration
Since the challenge for this month is to practice elaboration, I figured I should probably write about the process and how to put it in practice.
If you’re looking for clear instructions, links to places to get your feedback, and inspiration about what to elaborate on, have a read!
🎧 One podcast episode
Episode 10: Solidifying My Language Level — By Love, Joy, and Languages
I discovered Heidi’s podcast in the interview I shared as part of Week 69 and, since then, I’ve been enjoying every episode she’s put out.
This one really connected with me from the beginning, when she said whenever she’s got time to study, she wants to use it learning instead of reviewing because she feels she needs to see something “new” all the time.
We all know we need to review to really learn something and Heidi even told that to her daughter too, while overlooking she was focused on quantity (ie. learning something new) without taking care of quality (ie. reviewing).
This was a good reminder for me to open my notebook and review some of the things I’ve studied in German rather than just push forward aimlessly.
One more interesting topic in this episode was her thoughts on the “intermediate” stage.
In her mind, the intermediate stage was this “advanced” level where people start looking for depth rather than breadth in their language. In reality, the intermediate level starts when people can express “simple ideas,” as stated in the CEFR scale for B1.
This was interesting for me as I often feel like a beginner until I reach a low advanced level!
Maybe you’re the same too?
🌎 One cultural aspect to discover
Random Vietnamese Culture Facts
I shared Thai cultural aspects as part of Week 68 when I left Thailand and now that I just left Vietnam, it’s time to do the same for Vietnamese culture!
Of course, this is just an overlook and there will be a lot I won’t have the time to cover so please share other interesting aspects if you know some!
Let’s start with a few interesting facts.
Vietnam has 54 ethnic groups, some with influences from the surrounding countries and some even called “Montagnards,” the French term for mountain people—or highlanders,—a relic from French occupation of the country.
Each ethnic group has its own custom but going over all the differences would make this too long so we’ll focus on the overall Vietnamese culture.
Another interesting fact is that Vietnam is the second largest exporter in the world, behind Brazil. Coffee is said to have been brought to Vietnam in the 1850s by the French or Portuguese so this is proof of how fast the industry grew.
On another note, there is no legal age for drinking and there’s a culture of drinking Bia Hoi from the afternoon in Hanoi. This type of beer is made on the same day and stored in kegs. The glasses used are all full of imperfections and made from recycled glass!
While walking around Hanoi, many children have say “hi” to me but it wasn’t until my last week that I understood why they also made the “V” peace sign each time.
It turns out “two” in Vietnamese is said “hai” and sounds similar to “hi!”
Talking about gesture meanings, while crossing fingers is a way to wish luck in many cultures, it is said to represent female genitals in Vietnam and now has the meaning of “F*** you.”
Something similar to what I saw in Korea also surprised me: in Vietnam, you have to use your two hands for everything as a sign of respect. When paying, most people will put their second hand under the paying arm, as if they were holding it.
Japan, Korea, China, and Thailand are well-known for their martial arts but did you know Vietnam also has one? It’s called Vovinam or Việt Võ Đạo in Vietnamese. It’s a rather new martial art, only dating back to 1938, but it’s already quite developed and even part of the bi-annual SEA Games.
One of Vietnam’s national sports is Đá Cầu, also known as “kick badminton,” a sport where you kick the shuttlecock rather than hit it with a racket. Hands are prohibited but the rest of the body isn’t!
Finally, let’s turn to respect for the dead. Burning votive papers is a common custom. The idea is to burn paper on which offerings are drawn or written so the dead can receive them in the afterlife. It is slowly disappearing with the younger generations refraining from doing it for environmental reasons though.
Researching the Vietnamese culture felt like a never-ending rabbit hole. It’s a country with an extremely interesting culture.
If you’re curious, why dig into the toad of money and fortune, Jin Chan, or Breast Milk Fruit? You won’t regret it.
📜 One quote to ponder
“Attention is the most important ingredient we have to living a good, productive life.” — Chris Bailey, Hyperfocus
💪 One monthly challenge (May Edition)
Practice Elaboration - Get a Better Handle Your TL
Learning a language can be fun and almost effortless but actually putting some effort is what helps you improve faster.
During May, let’s work on this.
One difficult aspect of learning a language is creating long sentences. It’s all good and fun to make sentences like “I eat a croissant.” but can you precise where, or why, or with whom, or any other detail within the same sentence?
The concept of Elaboration is just what it seems like: to expand (elaborate) your sentences little by little.
For example. “I eat a croissant.” could become “I eat a croissant because I’m hungry.” and then “I eat a croissant because I’m hungry for French food.” and so on.
Try to expand sentences you encounter as often as you can.
Add one detail to a sentence you find in a resource or create a small sentence you slowly make longer and longer!
Continue until you struggle, for that’s where you’ll actually progress! Of course, the more fun you can have along the way, the better 😉
✅How the challenge is going for me
I got some good feedback on what I have elaborated on so I decided to start again from scratch on another topic. This time, the goal is to see whether I truly understood the feedback I got with my first “batch” and could create better sentences.
I uploaded it on Journaly so we’ll see what kind of feedback I get!
How is the challenge going for you?
As always, thanks for reading!
Mathias Barra