How to REALLY learn a language in 2024 (a linguist explains)
How to REALLY learn a language in 2024 (a linguist explains)
In this video I explain how to really learn a language in 2024.
Links to books mentioned:
Yufa! (mandarin grammar): https://amzn.to/3UKxB48
Grammar of Persian: https://amzn.to/4bK6Umg
Thackston’s Persian: https://amzn.to/42Jfs8G
Routledge Colloquial Persian: https://amzn.to/3uDB4qq
Farsi Shirin Ast: https://amzn.to/42J2cRA
Edited with Gling…
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I want to learn Arabic because I live in a place with a very large Arab community. I want to better understand and connect with this community that is overlooked by the majority of the people I know. Both personally, and professionally.
Finally a real teacher!
Started french this winter and I'm hoping to be able to read a book or listen to a podcast this summer. Also visiting a wedding in France but my goals for speaking/comprehending at the wedding are not as clear at the moment.
What if you're a neurodivergent who hates apps and ai used in them being suggested over resources made solely by qualified linguists? 🙁
i’d like to be able to take grad level class in mandarin, read a novel, an academic paper in my field (math), navigate comfortably in mainland china, be able to crack a joke, and be able to bond and properly get the know the international students at my university
Just started dating a woman who is Romanian, but fluent in English. I'd like to learn the language for her, and for the approval of her family. Any tips here folks?
watching this on 2015, I wonder how's your Persian going? hope you achieved the goals you set!
I want to learn Japanese so that I can watch my favourite Ghibli movies and be able to understand them without relying on translated subtitles to do so (have already been watching them in the original Japanese for years), I'm nearly a month in on duo and I am already getting a thrill out of recognizing words here and there (had a moment of confusion during one of them as the characters were talking about meals, and I was confused as to why they were talking about rice so much when the subtitles said breakfast or dinner, – then a few lessons later I learned about asagohan, hirugohan and bangohan, lol) I find myself pausing screens with kana on them to see what I am able to read.
i grew up as a native bilingual of german and english(in austria) and i like the way you address me at the beginning of the video. "maybe you already have a few languages under your belt" yeah technically i do and i dont know how to learn a language so thank you for addressing us native polyglots who dont know how to learn a language
Hmm my answer to the question “why do i want to learn a language?” almost always will be “cuz it sounds cool” 😅
My goal is to talk with colleagues in a partnering company in their first language.
Happy to have found you! Dabbled in French for 18 months floating from app to app workbook to workbook
great info- thank you!
Learned a few basic French words like I, you, am, are, a, man, woman, girl, boy from Dlingo (my very first lesson), plus words I already knew, then wrote simple sentences in my notes on my phone. I copy/pasted them to Google translate to see if I got them right, but mostly ignored the pronunciation. It's pretty fun, actually.
Using ChatGPT to write short stories in French and just translating it is surprisingly helpful; I get the jist/meaning of each word over time.
I want to learn French, but more to read and write, not necessarily talk to people. But I don't want to skip over pronunciations altogether. French is a pain in the cul to get right.
Hmm. My comment was deleted.. this is why I don’t really like YouTube anymore, to much censorship.
I really hate the English language. Especially being my first language. It's very difficult to learn and comprehend Latin languages. That Germanic influence isn't no help either.
I just learning words for the beginning. 1000 portugese words in 3 weeks. Im aiming for about 3000 before starting to work more with grammar.
I am persian and i've moved abroad in Italy to study. i have a private teacher who lived in Italy for many years and he knows Italian. it's been a year that I am having classes with him but for the past 3 months I feel like there is no progress. it might be also my fault but I think his method is not working anymore. i am scared of speaking Italian, I understand most of the words, but still can go further than doing daily routine things with Italian, not actually having a conversation, I really don't know that should I push myself more, or should I change my teacher…
so when i try to learn spanish the actual raw info is somewhere between 20-10 minutes but i spend a lot of extra time up to 2 hours writing and reviewing what i learned and what ive done previously should i do more raw language input and review less or write less?
3:30 kaliforniya flag is the most hilarious and genius thing I've seen in a while 😂
I’m a second gen Bosnian immigrant in Australia and English is the only language I know fluently, my Bosnian skills are disappointing to say the least and a lot of my extended family don’t speak a lick of English. My goals are 100% to be fluent eventually, but to at least start being able to hold a decent conversation in Bosnian to connect better with my family and roots in general, and I’m literally just writing this as a reminder to myself lol.
Thank you for listing number 11 and giving some slack to the neurodivergent, both of which apply to me. I put learning Spanish on the back burner now since I need to focus on university studies. I knew for over a year that I would ditch Duolingo, but I wasn't ready for the intense "step up" that Lingoda invites. Keep up the great work!
My ADD hack is a spreadsheet that tracks the units, levels, lessons, and words Duolingo says I learned. It’s all false milestones, but it helps with the dopamine hit.
I love my Duolingo. Would love to know what a better app is for practicing speaking and listening. Will eventually afford iTalki or preply, but want to have enough under my belt AND know which language I need to learn before I commit that kind of money. (Moving to Europe, not sure which country yet.)
Definitely want more on Michel Thomas!
Also, after hearing about Mr. Thomas, I suddenly have no excuse not to learn French, German, Dutch, and Portuguese while trying to move to Europe with 2 sick kids.
this video helped a lot, thank you greatly! I tried learning German when I was 12. last year, I took two semesters, and I've been continuing on my own. I would love to move there once I graduate – the food, work culture, nature, and sociopolitical environment are something I want to be a part of. I want to live an average, calm, stable life, and that's not very possible here in the USA for young people.
I've found that German, unlike many stereotypes, is a beautiful language when spoken, and I appreciate how literal it is (words are pronounced exactly as they look). it's a very concise and efficient language ("do you want to listen with me?" can simply be said as "willst mithören?") I'm around a B2 level right now but hope to become fluent within the next few years so that moving will be a little smoother!
I don't have a diagnosis yet of autism and ADHD, but I can affirm I have traits of both conditions. The reality is that people while you are a beginner hype a lot, then, when things go better (and you have more knowledge of your weaknesses) you start to feel shitty bc you don't have the same privilege than before to make mistakes. If you have other neurodivergent friends they will probably tell you sincerely what you should improve
subbed as soon as you popped off on all the bs language people on youtube that are either lying or extremely gifted lol
Great video 🎉
i wanted to learn Russian for like 2 years now , never started cause im afraid of failure. my goals or the reason why i want to learn is to listen to Russian movies , to talk to Russians and understand my fav video game series which is the Metro games. also to better understand russian and soviet history
I wish I could tell you how I really felt about this video doctor Taylor Jones. I want to be very respectful. There's probably a more helpful way to help people like me that watch your video without feeling certain ways. If you allowed it I'd share with you in private. I do appreciate that you want people to learn languages and open up all the wonderful things that comes with it.
Is that a Linux or Unix book on the shelf? Let me know (in a Nutshell)…
Trying to get a latina girlfriend …need spanish
Currently have a 2 year relationship with a danish girl and I would love to suprise her and to talk to her family and when we have kids to be able to have our kids to be bilingual
My frustration is I have an idea of what would work best for me, but no one offers that approach. I want to learn like I did in elementary. Learn the alphabet, the sounds, how to put those sounds together, and then how to form sentences. I want to learn like I'm a kid. But I swear to god, I can only find stuff that just teaches casual sentences. Just saying a sentence and knowing what it means isn't enough, I need to know why it goes there and why it's structured that way.
I want to learn Spanish. I am using dualingo, and Pimsleur. I am getting vocab and some grammar from dualingo, and I am speaking and listening with Pimsleur. Pimsleur is a drag, honestly, but I think it is necessary. I can spend hours on dualingo without much effort. I also plan on singing up for a college class starting this summer. I also plan on watching and listening to hours of cartoons once I feel I have a good enough base to benefit from them. What is your opinion of my approach?
Anyone who wants to join language learning groups where everyone can find different different partners for each other ( i haven't made it right now, coz this idea just pop in my head right now so if u anyone is interested just comment here and i can give insta I'd and u just have to type me )😁
Since you said to make this comment, might as well
I want to learn Japanese in order to consume Manga, Anime and the like. It is my high priority language I am trying to learn, and I am currently going towards that goal by using Chat GPT to break down each individual sentence in a game I am playing.
I have a desire to learn many languages, like Spanish, Chinese, Korean, anything that I feel I encounter at all, and develop habits and skills to get general ideas about new languages.
My current method is a bit long and a tad draining, but I feel that using what I am interested in (Paper Mario, the Thousand year door) to keep myself dedicated to my goal even as I come across new words, phrases and dialects.
My hope is to use the sentences the game provides as a replacement for flash cards, picking up on the patterns that I see because they are being commonly used, rather than learning words, phrases and ideas in isolation.
Back when I was really into independent study, I would write things in pen (like vocab, sentences, matching — all things that would be on a school quiz) and I would “test” myself with pencil. That way I could check my answers over time and see which parts I needed more focus on. Then erase the answers and come back a week later and see! It was pretty effective
Thanks a lot, FREE palestine
00:20 Watching this video ahead of New Years makes me either 11 months late or 1 month early. tips forehead
What book do you recommend for reviewing the sentence gammar of Spanish? I currently typically use a tri-fold quick study laminated guide by bar charts for Spanish grammar, as well as various on-line dictionaries for verb conjugation. This is useful as a quick reference, but it isn't really conducive for seeing the whole. I could see how a book with multiple example sentences coupled with a sentence diagram and a bit of instructive commentary could be very useful. My problem is I am not using my Spanish often enough to keep all the grammar rules in my head.
It would also be useful to know what reference book is the Spanish equivalent of the Chicago Manual of Style.
For context, my focus with Spanish is to be sufficiently fluent to be able to deliver corporate training, as well as management consulting services in Spanish. My Spanish is currently just barely good enough to sanity check machine translated written materials, and sufficient to read written Spanish with only occasional use of machine translation. My speaking skills are intermediate level aided by having spent 40 hours a week for three months using BaseLang, yet has faded some from lack of daily use. (My LeSS course in Spanish can be found here: https://agilecarpentry.com/clp/sp_global/)
As a child, I often only fully learned how to properly pronounce English words as I learned to read. Sentence diagramming always came naturally to me in school. In studying Spanish with BaseLang I was reminded how important reading is for me as an individual learner. Speaking and listening practice remains critical, and I'm sure more active writing with the guidance of a teacher would be helpful.
I am not currently prioritizing moving my Spanish forward as much as I could, but that could quickly change with the right client engagement.
My goal is to learn Norwegian, Swedish and Danish, then German! I am starting with Norwegian because its sounds pretty and because I have a few friends who speak it and would love to be able to surprise them by speaking their language. My end goal, is to learn as many languages as possible so that I can communicate with people around the world without having to use a translator. I want to leave a mark on people and be a nice memory for them!
I am learning Welsh; I started it on a whim because I liked how the SaySomethingInWelsh introductory video went about teaching me one sentence. So, my immediate goal was to get more time and material for a process of learning that I liked (I love learning new things, especially in good company.) I'm a complete introvert, so the SSIW format works very, very well for me: I don't have to deal with real people face to face, but being human I like the human voice, and I especially like the infinite patience of recorded audio that I can pause and rewind as many times as I like; or skip; or whatever.
Four years in, here's my goals that keep me going:
— learning new words at a satisfying rate; ditto phrase forms
— retrieving semi learned words soon enough
— enjoying the relief from rumination (I'm a terrible ruminator, and recent events…. gaaah)
— participating in a community that doesn't ask more than I have to give
— walking, hiking and driving companionship tolerable to this confirmed introvert
Other goals are: finding cool idiomatic phrases and learning them; getting to use and explore the fine online Welsh dictionaries; getting the pronunciations down better and better as I relisten to older recordings of me saying things in Welsh.
I'm very interested to hear that I could actually be a lot more fluent already than I am, according to what you're saying at about 2:50 in the video; but my inner reaction is kind of like, "oh NO if I were fluent I might actually be looking for people to talk to, that's scary. Really scary." So I'll probably incorporate some of your recommendations, but more for the sake of learning more of the language than for the sake of being able to talk with people. That's a bit peculiar of me, but then, I often find myself off at the thin end of normal curves anyways, it's a familiar place for me.
The community that I've gotten hooked into is the group of volunteers running Cymdeithas Madog, the Welsh Studies Institute of North America. In 2023, I went to their residential week, held on a university campus. I'm a serious introvert, so I half expected to be done with the too much people by about mid-week, and had cleared with my "how much money am I spending on this" frugal inner critic that I was allowed to just go home midweek if I hated it. Instead, I stayed for the full week, as it was a group of wordnerds a lot like me, and even volunteered to fill the Secretary position on their Board, as I have had experience doing that for another group that suits my introvert nature (which does need a bit of intermittent human connection…).
I'm bopping along with the SSIW level 4, which I have turned into an auto-didact's adventure, in which I'm generating my own extra audio supplementing the "sgwrsia naturiel yn Cymraeg" that is my favorite part of Level 4, which works for me because of the list of goals put down above. Part of my project of supplemental audio means I'm recording myself saying Welsh, which really gives me a sense of how close I'm coming to the native speakers saying things on the audio from SSIW. I'm getting a very colloquial view of Welsh, which is lots of fun.
I really enjoy watching the slow development of my comfort at making up my own inner conversations in Welsh. That enjoyment is the most important goal.
دستتون درد نکنه 😅
thank you so much for the neurodivergent tips 🙏 lord knows i forget them too often