Learning Chinese for Kung Fu?

[wenshu]

you have no frame of reference here Donny, you are like a child who wanders into the middle of a movie and wants to know. . .

wenshu:

David Jamieson is on the mark: language acquasition...FAIL!

Learning a language as an adult is certainly different from how you learn as a child but the idea that you are really handicapped on the issue because of brain structure and whatnot is complete and utter bull****. It's just the same as learning kung fu: hours in = skill out. Show me an adult who has spent as many hours in 5 years learning Chinese as a 5 year old Chinese child has in his entire life and I will show you an adult with better Chinese than that child. Already seen several.

Immersion is a must but it's not magic. It's just about hour/day of actual practice. I have at least 1 or 2 kids in every class of 55 or so students that speaks English well enough to chat with me and that's just in middle school. .

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Next issue:

like Gene said, it's not a binary proposition. Learn as much as you are able to. The largest single obstacle to learning Chinese is the mental block from thinking you have to actually learn Chinese. I speak from experience. I only took Chinese at first because I wanted to study acupuncture and most TCM schools require a semester or two. Well I ended up flunking organic chemistry and couldn't really handle the math required for my BS in physiology so that never happened but I kept up with the Chinese and one day...about 10 years later....I realized I could actually speak the language, not in a "get by" way but actually read and speak fluently.

I am 100% confident that if I set that out as my goal at the beginning I would have given up long ago. I just kept at it because it was kind of cool and eventually I got really good at it. . . kind of like kung fu that way eh?

Look, if you can't keep up with the conversation you are going to have to go sit at the kids table.

I didn't say anything about the comparative neurophysiology involved in first language acquisition vs. adult second language acquisition. Nor did I mention anything about apparent difficulties of adult SLA vs children.

The argument was about whether or not you can learn language without "hearing it". Immersion is not necessary, of course not.

Someone will not learn to understand or produce spoken language without hearing a native speaker or someone approaching native fluency. If that is from time spent incountry or from practicing with your kung fu teacher doesn't matter.

I didn't say anything about goals.

So dropping out of organic chemistry and physiology grants Applied Linguistics credentials? It certainly didn't help your rhetorical capacity.

If you are going to argue with me at least have the common courtesy to pay attention.

It is dependent upon the persons preferred learning style.
Some people learn well from reading, others from hearing, others from hands on approach, others from mimicry and inculcation and so on and of course combinations of those.

if you can read a pronunciation key, then you can do it.

I'm not scrubbing your idea, just saying that it is not the only way.

A common complaint among native English speaking foreign exchange students who go to China is how utterly useless what they learned in the classroom and from textbooks was.

With Chinese especially, you have to go native. Learning kung fu terminology in it's specific context will do more to prepare you for everyday conversation than just learning word order and vocabulary.

Back to the original question, yes it absolutely is worth it. Kung fu should be valued most for it's cultural heritage (I am sure we'll have more time to debate it's combat effectiveness, certainly a novel topic in itself. . .) and language is an indispensable part of understanding culture. Not to mention the benefits adult language acquisition has for memory and general long term brain health.

nay nay. You are failing at understanding the principles of learning, in particular, adult learning which is entirely different than the regular schooling that we give our kids and adolescents.

also, for those of you struggling to break free of learning styles you think are hard and fast I would submit to you that Helen Keller, a blind deaf mute, learned to read, write and speak in the english language and never heard a single thing in her life, not even the song of a bird.

so, before you start throwing out reflective statements such as "fail" about others, do a little homework.

Do some cursory research on adult second language acquisition before you reply, but if you really want to argue the possibility of becoming conversant in Mandarin without exposure to everyday usage, feel free.

It's obviously just linux anyway.

[David Jamieson]

you are more interested in getting into peeing matches wenshu.

You seem completely unaccepting of an outside idea.

I don't have a problem with your idea of how learning occurs from your understanding of it. I don't think it's the only way. You do.

You seem to take offense when people point out that your way is not the only way.
You try to deconstruct those examples that are given to you to explain a point (Keller) in order to seek out validation of your own.

I don't care if it took 5 days, 5 weeks or 5 years, the point is that your way is NOT the only way and that adults learn differently from kids and it comes down to wanting to learn more so than it comes down to prescribed method.

You are wrong, just move on.

[wenshu]

you are more interested in getting into peeing matches wenshu.

You seem completely unaccepting of an outside idea.

I don't have a problem with your idea of how learning occurs from your understanding of it. I don't think it's the only way. You do.

You seem to take offense when people point out that your way is not the only way.
You try to deconstruct those examples that are given to you to explain a point (Keller) in order to seek out validation of your own.

I don't care if it took 5 days, 5 weeks or 5 years, the point is that your way is NOT the only way and that adults learn differently from kids and it comes down to wanting to learn more so than it comes down to prescribed method.

You are wrong, just move on.

No, I'm not.

Your entire post completely invalidates itself. Accuse someone of being inflexible while exhibiting to an extreme that same myopic rigidity you purport to see in others.

"You are only interested in p1ssing matches. . .
. . .I'm right, you are wrong, move on."

What I took offense with was someone trying to argue with me without even a cursory understanding of the salient points of the argument. At least I was substantively insulting.

There is nothing inherently wrong with hypocrisy, but come one mang, come on.

Keller was an extreme outlier learning her first language. Not applicable to the general adult population learning a second language, whether it be just a couple of simple sentences to full fluency.

Stop trying to change the argument to match your criteria. Time required to acquire a language wasn't part of the argument. The insane amount of work that went into trying to teach Keller was. Demonstrating the fallacy in trying to use her as an example in regards to a discussion about adult SLA.

To be clear;

You will not learn spoken language without hearing that language.

The most important factor in language acquisition is quality of input.

[Drake]

Especially a language such as Chinese, which is EXPLICITLY tonal, and failure to know these tones will cause you to say things meaning something completely different than you intended.

This cannot be conveyed properly in a book. I've tried.

[Northwind]

Pinyin + Tones + BoPoMoFo

And oddly enough, I agree with SPJ about the songs; although it will do very little for your tones, it will help with making the speech a bit more natural with flow, as well as ease the complexity of sound combination that might be rare or non-existent in your native tongue. (And I actually use to sing those two songs he mentioned :P )

[Northwind]

Especially a language such as Chinese, which is EXPLICITLY tonal, and failure to know these tones will cause you to say things meaning something completely different than you intended.

This cannot be conveyed properly in a book. I've tried.

QFT...Thinking about a word that can mean a type of spice...or male genitalia depending on that. I made this mistake a couple of times in Singapore when asking for more spice at a hawker stall; after much embarrassment I went to pondering and learning :P

[GeneChing]

like Gene said, it's not a binary proposition.

I didn't say that. I'm not sure I even meant that. Nevertheless, I agree with your statement in general, omarthefish. I've never studied Chinese formally unless you count a few mediocre adult ed classes. I pick up new words and concepts here and there, through my research, working here, interacting with the wulin, and eavesdropping on my coworkers when they are cussing me out in Taiwanese. I learn a lot of Spanish that way too.

This learning debate reminds me of the old 'you can't learn from video' misconceptions. You can learn from everything. You should learn from everything. You only falter if you only learn from a single source, especially with language. I learned most of my Chinese by going and living in China. Nothing beats that. But I've also learned bits from videos, books, the web, even here on the forum.

[Lucas]

you can learn from everything. You should learn from everything.

truuufftthh

[David Jamieson]

No, I'm not.

Your entire post completely invalidates itself. Accuse someone of being inflexible while exhibiting to an extreme that same myopic rigidity you purport to see in others.

"You are only interested in p1ssing matches. . .
. . .I'm right, you are wrong, move on."

What I took offense with was someone trying to argue with me without even a cursory understanding of the salient points of the argument. At least I was substantively insulting.

There is nothing inherently wrong with hypocrisy, but come one mang, come on.

Keller was an extreme outlier learning her first language. Not applicable to the general adult population learning a second language, whether it be just a couple of simple sentences to full fluency.

Stop trying to change the argument to match your criteria. Time required to acquire a language wasn't part of the argument. The insane amount of work that went into trying to teach Keller was. Demonstrating the fallacy in trying to use her as an example in regards to a discussion about adult SLA.

To be clear;

You will not learn spoken language without hearing that language.

The most important factor in language acquisition is quality of input.

Tautology and yet more peeing match.

face it, you're readable. lol



would you like some consolation?

Because I still don't agree. You can learn rudiments of language without hearing it.

What you are failing to understand is that my point was about learning styles and how people access knowledge through different pathways. As a language is speak and hear, it seems rather obvious that expeditious routes to learning would fall into the doing that which it is that should be done. lol

You can't seem to get passed some perceived slight as you are still trying to hammer away on the point that is pointless.

Language isn't just words and sounds.

Think of it this way. A person who speaks high english and a person who speaks street. Both can communicate with each other, but neither speaks or uses the words of the language as the other does. Did someone "learn" wrong?

You tell me seeing as you are the "homework" apparently. (BTW that remark was over the top in self absorbed ass hattery! Bravo!)

[wenshu]

You are not going to win an argument just by constantly calling into question your opponent's motivations.

As a language is speak and hear, it seems rather obvious that expeditious routes to learning would fall into the doing that which it is that should be done.

English? What does that even mean?

Language isn't just words and sounds.
Think of it this way. A person who speaks high english and a person who speaks street. Both can communicate with each other, but neither speaks or uses the words of the language as the other does. Did someone "learn" wrong?

What does linguistic register have to do with anything? Two completely different areas.

Again, stop trying to move the goal posts to meet your arguments.

Please elaborate on what I said that was a Tautology. This should be interesting.

[wenshu]

Student Manual of the David Jamieson School of Online Rhetoric

Step 1

While on the sh*tter in the morning make a broadly generalized assumption founded on the vague memory of text read on the back of a cereal box 20 years ago.

Post online. Does not necessarily have to be particularly applicable to discussion at hand.

Step 2

When assumption is challenged responding in the following manner:

Question the interlocutors motivations. This can be achieved most effectively by accusing them of "passive aggressiveness" or "inability to accept opposing views" etc.

It is important to maintain a robust obliviousness to any apparent logical inconsistencies or glaring hypocrisy. Just keep stating that the only possible explanation for any disagreement is some personal ulterior motive.

Whatever you do, do not do any research on the topic to back up your point, do not make any reference to well sourced scholarship. Google is not your friend.

Step 3

Declare victory and drink a 12 pack of Molson. Then post more sub-literate jibberish.

[David Jamieson]

wow, two posts of overt "look at me, I'm an egghead" butt hurt.

your life must suck or something.

lol

you're "winning". yay!

[Lucas]

Wrong. I am winning. I always win. The End.

[David Jamieson]

Wrong. I am winning. I always win. The End.

eff you buddy.

Black Bear!

you lose.

winning!

[Lucas]

FOOL, here is what I think of you and your d@mn bear! I did this with a front snap toe kick!



*flex*