Neocities.org

i just woke up but im reading this immediately

Thank you so much for the interesting observations and resources! I've always wanted to learn Russian and German for scientific purposes. I really ought to pick them back up again. I would imagine that many language learners who persist to fluency do so for reasons similar to that quote attributed to Nelson Mandela. To paraphrase: "If you talk to a person in their language, it goes to their heart."

The joys of human connection! Unfortunately, as you've eloquently pointed out, there are two significant obstacles: The most effective way for one to approach their own study of a language often only becomes apparent in hindsight, and a significant core of every langauge is idiomatic and conditioned through use rather than the result of some type of inherent logic.

I also agree with much of what suboptimalism mentioned. It often comes down to cultivating a mindset, having a clear intention and a strong motivation. Learning materials that try to shoehorn one language into the structure of another are more of a hinderance than a help, while translation is often an attempt at fitting a square peg into a round hole.

Therefore, it becomes a matter of learning a few fundamental pieces thoroughly, and then using them to "bootstrap" the rest of that core by repeatedly relating the language to itself through a steady stream of input and personal experiences. Developing these associations is vital if one wants to avoid my mistake of learning a lot *about* languages versus actually *using them*.

I hope you find it useful, Hui! Your recent remark on Russian is what reminded me I had this file on hand, after all :)

Thanks as always for the thoughtful comments, LLT. That Mandela quote is a classic and it endures because it's true. I like your description of "bootstrapping" the language. I've made the same mistake of learning /about/ the language; in fact this mistake is by no means unique to language learning. It reminds me of the comment you left some months ago about the act of /doing/ mathematics and how procedural knowledge

is often overlooked in favour of declarative knowledge. The gap between them hurts.

I feel your pain 😩 Haha! Well, at least sharing experiences can shorten the gap between them. Thanks again!