Lonely Planet is offering audio phrasebooks compatible with the iPhone platform.  Can you say freakin’ sweet?  I knew you could…

To celebrate the launch of iPhone 3G and the Beijing Olympics, Lonely Planet is offering free downloads of the Mandarin Mobile Phrasebook in the Apple App Store for a limited time only.

(also available in Cantonese, Czech, Thai, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Spanish and Vietnamese)

Sometimes I come across a friend in the field who has landed a plum position, and I get a twinge of jealousy. Sometimes I talk to people who taught “back in the day” in certain countries where/when they managed to pull down gobs of money in a 15 hour work week, and my stomach starts doing backflips, and I just wanna smack them.

Then. there’s. this…

BEST. LANGUAGE.GIG.EVER….

Rage…  Uncontrollable…  Need… Air…

Stu! Come on, man! Throw some work my way! Don’t you need an intern or something for these types of gigs???!!!

It makes the heart proud…

Marcoux is as multilingual as they come, though this was his first trip abroad. One of his goals is to one day speak more languages than anyone else in the world.

He plans to achieve his goal by becoming fluent in one language from each of the families in the Indo-European language family. Then, he said he “can go back and knock off the other languages within those language families.”

He said he is fluent in English, Welsh, Norwegian and Spanish; conversational in Greek, Russian and French; and that he “knows a bit of” Farsi, Danish and Swedish.

His secret?  Blonds…  No joke.

“Three years ago, I met this Norwegian girl online through an art site — your stereotypical 6-foot-tall, blonde hair, blue eyes — and she was a very sweet girl, but she didn’t speak English,” said the 20-year-old Jefferson resident.

At least he’s got his priorities straight!

It’s a puff-piece, to be sure, and reading in-between the lines does give some indication that, in all probability, the definitions of “fluent” and “conversational” are a bit stretched, but the young man seems to exude a confidence and excitement about language learning that is frankly refreshing (and I can fully empathize).  One realistically has to hold in mind that a 6 week trip to Norway (even after 3 years of study) isn’t going to suddenly boost one to an FSI 5 level.  Another clue is the quote by his professor/mentor, “My perception would be if I told him I want you to speak basic Russian by the end of the month he’d be able to do that… If I told him ‘I want you to be able to hold a simple conversation in language x by the end of the month,’ I think he’d be able to do it.”  Learning a linguistic structure will usually land you at around a low FSI 1, but that will give you a strong base to learn from.  Higher fluency comes only from prolonged exposure/study.  Conversational tapes are only going to get you so far, as real conversational ability is predicated on having someone to converse with…  I don’t want to sound like I’m knocking the guy.  He actually sounds like someone who’d be fun to hang with…  There’s always the odd chance that he’s a language prodigy in the manner of StuJay, but I always like to err on the side of caution.  Regardless, with that type of passion and talent for language learning, Michael should be in good position to get his dream job in the Foreign Service (although, note: ambassadorships in the “cushy” countries are often more political appointment than merit-based, so he’d better start practicing his suck-up as much as his linguistic skills).

Two thirds of teenagers intend to work abroad in Europe or Asia when they leave school even though most of them speak no foreign language, government research has found…

The research, published today, is further evidence that most young people assume they can get by in a foreign country by speaking English, and comes just weeks after official GCSE data showed the number of children taking formal exams in foreign languages has fallen yet again.

To which I can only say:

FYI: You know why no one complains of such in the U.S.? Because not many teenagers aspire to go anywhere besides LA or NYC…

Which reminds me of a story… My mother is a retired high school English teacher. She had one girl some years back who told her in all earnestness that “she didn’t need to learn English…” Intrigued, my mother asked her the reason for this supposed exemption to learning the finer points or reading and writing. The girl’s answer: “Because I’m moving to L.A. as soon as I graduate…”

Sigh…

Dee Fung Sway, a Chinese Table Tennis champion, is learning the proper way to speak Urdu so he will be understood when he visits London. “I was a fool and learned English, but then the Chinese government showed us the population statistics of the UK and we decided to learn Urdu and Arabic instead because we want to be prepared”, Sway says.

 

don’t panic… it’s a joke…

Wuzzah!

Some of the best SAT scores in Connecticut are posted by students who study Chinese or Latin, participate in the arts, take honors courses, come from wealthy families, and — at least when it comes to math — hold citizenship from another country, according to scores for the class of 2008 released Tuesday….

Students who participated in acting, music, studio art or photography scored well above students who weren’t involved in the arts. And students who took more than four years of foreign language posted higher average scores on all sections than those with fewer years. Those who took Chinese and Latin, in particular, posted the highest average scores among students taking languages.

The link between language study and general academic preparation is well-established.  Note that there is no link between multi-lingualism and IQ… this is general academic performance as opposed to general intelligence.  Foreign language ability has some palpable and intuitable advantages for other academic subjects.  For example, it allows for the development of metalinguistic abilities which helps native language grammar, and, depending upon the language, there might be a direct facilitation in acquisition of science terms (and not just Latin or Greek, either — some languages, such as Chinese, use much more transparent terminology than does English — ex. 白血病 “bai xue bing” lit. “white blood disease” for “leukemia”).  Early language learning has been correlated with improved reading scores in the native language, and overall superior academic performance.  Thus, these results are not completely surprising.

One note, however: the increased performance for those who study Latin or Chinese probably has nothing to do with those languages themselves, and everything to do with where those languages are most typically offered.  Let’s face it, while Chinese programs are spreading in popularity, they (along with Latin) are still most prevalent in affluent school districts.  The study already notes that students whose families earn between $160,000 and above a year (side note: an absolutely mind-blowing amount to me!) tended to outperform everyone else.  Wealth certainly does transfer sizeable academic advantages, which standardized tests, such as the SAT, will immediately note.

I enjoy running this blog!  I enjoy writing and sharing my thoughts on language acquisition (which along with guitar playing and swimming, are probably the only things I should ever be entrusted to teach to other people).  I’ve had some interesting email exchanges with readers over the year and a half or so that I’ve been writing this, and I look forward to continuing ad infinitum.  There is one thing that I absolutely despise however, and that is spam comments.  It’s just a fact of life in the blogging world, but I must say that after logging countless hours simply deleting bot-authored tantalizing offers for porn, genital-enlargement herbal treatments, etc., that I find myself fantasizing of finding the people who send this &%$* out on the wrong end of a howitzer.  The spam seems to come in waves — I’ll get a trickle for a couple weeks and then a torrent; and the topics seem to be cyclical.  This blog in particular generates mountains of spam for generic and discount drugs (often of Russian origin — how random is that?) — probably due to my chosen moniker, The Foreign Language Doctor.  Of late, I’ve been getting a lot of investment portfolio ads.  I really would love to know what key words set off certain spam searches…  Anyway, as I’ve had it up to here (lacking visuals, you probably don’t know how high I’m pointing — the answer is around 5′10″, for the record, or more generally, up to my eyeballs) with the spam, so I’m sending out a general request for information on WordPress compatible filters.  Anyone know of anything effective at blocking spam comments?  I’d particularly be interested in keyword-based blocks.  Thanks to all!

At a mandatory South Korean player meeting Aug. 20 at the Safeway Classic, the tour informed its largest international contingent that beginning in 2009, all players who have been on tour for two years must pass an oral evaluation of their English skills. Failure would result in a suspended membership.

I’m not completely convinced of the arguments.  It seems that they want players to be able to give post-game interviews and sponsorship plugs more fluently, as they’re trying to boost their flagging viewership.   I just don’t know why they think that this would be significantly hindered by using a translator…  I’m not a golf fan, so what do I know?  Anyone who can explain what I’m missing here?

Title stolen from the letters section of The Independent, wherein we find this pertinent question.

Money Quote:  In the 1960s, at my secondary school, I took French, German and Latin to A- level. At the end of seven years I came away fluent in none of them. If all that effort had been put into just one language, it most likely would have been French, and after seven years I would have been fluent in it.

The writer comes away calling for Britain to focus on a single foreign language of study.  I think the author of the letter has the right concerns, but follows them to an erroneous conclusion.  There is some natural “give and take” to the concept of offering multiple language options to students, as opposed to a monolithic language curriculum, as is the norm throughout much/most of the world.  The author correctly infers that it was the “hodge-podge” — a little bit of this, and a little bit of that — approach to language learning that allowed him to study 3 languages and master none of them.  The problem is that multiple language offerings often delude people into thinking that a little of several languages is better than a lot of a single language, and, if your goal is any sort of communicable fluency, that’s simply not the case.

Much of this confusion seems to be rooted in a complete ignorance of what actually constitutes fluency.  I had a friend in high school whose mom would always brag that he was “fluent” in 4 languages.  The truth was, he spoke 2 at a high level, and knew a smattering of 2 others.  Besides English, he had studied 2 years of high school Spanish, 1 semester of college Japanese, and had served as a Mormon missionary in Taiwan, and thus could actually speak Chinese quite well.  He tended to just role his eyes when his mom said stuff like that, because he knew well that he couldn’t actually converse beyond basic needs in Spanish or Japanese.  Many of us have initially jumped into languages with the erroneous idea that we would be able to speak within a year or two (or even less), only to find out that language learning is actually a complex and time-consuming affair.  I can remember when I was around 16, making out a roadmap of all the languages I wanted to study (there were about 30 listed) by the time I was 30 years old.  When I moved to France at age 19, I quickly discovered how much time it actually takes to learn a language.  The whole “becoming fluent via immersion in a couple of months” thing is so much malarky.  I had to immediately reassess my learning goals to correspond to the reality of how much time language study actually takes.  Now, at 30+, I speak 5 languages well, but I’ve studied 2 others which I can’t do much beyond basic needs, and I’ve got two others which I can just parrot useful tourist phrases.  I would never think to claim mastery of 9 languages.

All of this is to say that foreign language takes time, and if one takes a “sampler” approach to the courses listed in secondary (and tertiary) schools, one is unlikely to attain any meaningful level of language proficiency.  Most learners would be better served by investing the same amount of time into continuous study in a single foreign language.  However, I would completely disagree with the call for a national FL curriculum.  As I’ve stated here before, I believe that there giving children various options in language learning is an overall strength.  It allows learners to choose a language more compatible with their own likes and interests.  Additionally, it gives the nation a stronger and wider reserve of foreign language competence.  So keep the multiple offerings, but make clear to people that more is not necessarily better…

I saw this featured this morning on the Today Show: the basic concept seems to be an overt parody of Sex in the City, while featuring the city of Beijing. Result: Sexy Beijing. I can’t speak to the accuracy of the parody, as I must admit the fact that I’ve never actually seen a single episode of the Sarah Jessica Parker show, but I have to say that Sexy Beijing is pretty slick. The host, and American girl, Anna Sophie Lowenberg (Chinese name: Su Fei) roams the city interviewing people on topical questions (latest topic: arranged marriages). It’s a nice mixture of English and (English-subtitled) Chinese, so for those studying Chinese, this would be a great resource for listening practice. You can watch former episodes via podcast (or even download audio/video to your I-pod). Su Fei seems to speak a fair amount of Chinese, but my one little “whine” is that her thick accent gets on my nerves a little bit. I think it’s just the American accent rising to the surface, but I’m more than willing to admit as well that it could be the fact that she apparently studied in Beijing. For those who aren’t aware, the accents/dialects in Taiwan differ greatly from those in China — especially from northern China — so, while I’m used to hearing Beijing-natives speak, it always requires some additional attentiveness on my part (like listening to someone from the UK of Australia), and hearing foreigners who learned in Beijing has always struck me as odd in the same way as, say, listening to a Japanese person who learned to speak English in Australia. Just some accent-prejudice on my part, I guess (sigh!)…
Anyway, check it out. It’s a fun show! I must admit some pangs of jealousy on my part whenever I come across creative shows like this. My wife has pushed me for years to go on a certain Taiwanese show that features a panel of foreigners and is often a spring-board for TV careers for Chinese-speaking foreigners. I’ve resisted to this point, as I’m the type who would almost certainly collapse from stage fright, but I do find a certain attraction to the idea of making a living via hosting travel-type shows. Getting paid to travel, eat, talk with locals, and generally make a fool of oneself: wonderful…

Closet Fantasy Job: The gold standard of that genre, and the guy with one of the most enviable jobs ever….