/lit/ - Literature

>>9520028
Honestly? Only learn one language at once. Two at most if you don't completely suck at one of them. Nobody learning 3 or more languages from scratch ever makes it. If you are remotely serious about it, you won't find enough time to keep up with practicing all of them. You'll also mix them up with each other, regardless of their similarity, if you are at the same proficiency level with all of them (worsened if you are only at an elementary level of fluency).

>>9520052
Seconding this, tried German and French at same time, and kept on fucking up and capitalizing Nouns.

Latin. French is next.

I've finished Lingua Latina and Wheelock's Latin and I've been reading Seneca's Epistulae Morales for a month now. I'm only 24 letters in.

>read chapter out loud straight through or at least under my breath if i'm in library
>go back through slowly and mark down vocab i don't know
>keep vocab in notepad and then transfer it to quizlet
>go back through chapter again after running through vocab
>next day go back through chapter once more, before moving onto the next one
>always try to go through the two previous chapters that day

Unfortunately it's hard to piece together an entire letter. I can catch every other sentence, but if I miss a nominative early, it can mess up the rest of the paragraph. I'll read the translation every once in a while to see if I'm getting the gist, and I'm doing "okay." Any advice on this strategy?

>>9520083
It's basically how I learned to read German, aside from the part where you look at the translation. I can still read German nearly effortlessly even though I haven't really done it much in years and can't speak it for shit.

>>9520028
I got duo lingo Spanish to like 6%, but without immersion I doubt it will go much further.

>>9520028
Is that an app?

>>9520240
Filename
Mobile version kinda sucks because it doesn't have grammar notes

>>9520246
Ah, I couldn't find it on the play store but found it now. Does it sync with your account and can continue online?

>>9520261
Yes, it keeps track of your account's progress
However, practice sessions need to be finished in the platform you started doing them, but they are rather short.

>>9520268
Thanks mate
>>9520212

Learning French. Read l'étranger without too many problems. La chute is hard. Candide was too hard. Been working on it 12-18 months.

>>9520052
I agree with everything you said. I already know Spanish and focus entirely on Greek. Tried German but will probably pick up some other time. (Add Arabic joke in here)

I see Duolingo for dabbling in things and seeing how you like them. By the end you have a couple hundred word vocab(if practiced enough) and a nice feel for the language. But to reach real competence you need to bump up your vocab and grammar knowledge.

>>9520212
The day streak is really rewarding for autists like me who are compulsive about stuff like that. I always make time no matter how busy/tired I am. Every little bit counts.

Currently learning Spanish. I have family from Spain and friends from Spain/Mexico so luckily I know many that are fluent so that I can converse with and learn from them. Although, I'm using memrise instead of Duolingo. Is Duolingo better? I enjoy memrise.

>>9520351
How is Greek? I am learning French right now, but I think Greek is way more fun, but I know it is not as useful. Only problem is, I am already 5 months into intensively studying French, so I do not want to switch to Greek unless it is really worth it.

>>9520452
It really feels nice being able to read a different set of letters. It feels so alien at first but once you get the hang of it its super comfy.
Its a hell of alot easier than Ancient Greek and I would absolutely suggest Modern Greek before going into Older Greeks if you want to actually reach competence in any of them.
No great value in Modern Greek lit as far as I know but I do plan on reading the New Testament and Iliad in Greek soon.
It isn't very different from Romance languages, once you get the hang of the letters you realize there are alot of common roots from your previous language knowledge (Scientific English/Latin/oddly Spanish)

>>9520595
How about the grammar and overall difficulty? Even Modern Greek is probably significantly more difficult than French? I already know the Greek alphabet inside and out btw.

I've been working on French for about a year and a half in and outside the classroom. I'll go to France too this summer to aid in immersion.
I've also been dabbling in Norwegian for about a year just for its fun structure.
Also I just started Vietnamese with a lot of help from a friend who speaks it fluently. It's really nice to see how a language that is neither Germanic nor Romance does things.

>do the majority of my studying by watching let's play videos on youtube with a dictionary

Eventually I'll have to move on to more intensive study methods for /lit/ purposes, but for crossing that gap to conversational level with minimal ego depletion I would definitely recommend studying something that you can have fun with rather than a textbook or program.

>>9520697
Why not montreal? It would be much cheaper (unless you are not a burger) and generally speaking the english spoken in montreal is much better than in France.

>>9520725
Burger here. I know people in France who I'm staying with, I don't know the Canadian dialect as well and I'd like more immersion with less English (though the people I'm staying with speak amazing English)

>>9520704
You could talk to qt girls on the internet as well, th victory condition is a picture of their asshole.

Any recommendations for someone who wants to learn Akkadian? Textbooks, sites, etc?

>>9520028

why would you learn the language of failed economy

I've been studying italian for a while, now. I'm fluent enough that i picked sanskrit up, and been copying verses of the bhagavad gita in my notebook. Tried to do the french and german duolingo trees at the same time, but gave up. I always post my method on other threads, but here goes: write down the six grammatical persons of the language in a column, and next to it, columns of verbs conjugated for each person, with the different tenses and modes (conditional, subjuntive, etc), this is for vocab mostly; practice what you learn with duolingo, and after that, marathon of anime dubbed in the language you want (i watch anime, but whatever works for you. I just recommend cartoons because it's easier to make out what you hear than in live action movies)

>>9520028
Phonics -> Vocabulary (~1000 words) -> Grammar

In that order.

Use flash cards. Make your own decks. Use pictures instead of translations. Include audio files for every word you want to learn. After you have a vocabulary of around 1000 most common words, prepositions, and pronouns, open up a grammar textbook, and start studying.

Congradulations, you'll be conversational in 6 months.

>>9520653
Modern Greek is easy comparatively to Latin and Ancient Greek. Only have to worry about Nominative, Accusative, Genitive cases for modern Greek.
Understanding cases is a one time thing for Latin/Greek/German/etc. Once you get it, applying it to other languages isn't hard but its a medium/large jump from no cases in Modern English/French/Spanish.

I don't know French but treating it as Spanish, it is more difficult to remember Greek words especially the bloody random accents. Knowing Latin makes everything easier. It is easy to to translate from Greek to English but I have massive trouble going from English to Greek is the point I'm at in my study.

>>9520776
Modern Greece is a pathetic broken nation. At this point their entire national identity revolves around the current economic crisis(based on the news and forums I translate). They don't hate the Turks and don't care about reclaiming their homeland. A bunch of Turkish rape babies and refugees-in-transit is all that is left in the husk of a former cultural monolith.
But the history is still in the written word.

>>9520028
Duolingo is such a waste of fucking time, just learn 10 - 20 words (or more) a day, practice the grammar by writing and participating in online discussion and read books, it's all you need to learn any language.

t. extremely fluent in 4 languages and currently learning Japanese.

I'm studying Mandarin, preparing for HSK3. I think I could study languages with other scripts at the same time and I'm thinking about picking up Arabic and Spanish.

>>9521077
It's intended to be used as a supplement, not a sole means by which you learn a complete language. If one were to use only Duolingo, it would get you to A1, maybe A2, at the very best.

I used it to pace myself, and to see what I needed to study next. A module or two per week would get you by; I also immersed myself quite a bit with additional reading and listening. After finishing the French tree, I could read L'étranger, with minimal dictionary usage, within the year of my starting French. Le Petit Prince I read within two months of starting, and I found that Duolingo actually taught me much of the vocabulary found within it.

I see far too many people shitting on Duolingo when it doesn't really pretend to be anything more than a game.

Doing Japanese at the moment, I've dedicated my last month entirely to grammar rules as I find switching between listening, vocabulary very distracting. Once I solidify my grammar, get a general framework of the language, I will be piecing together other parts.

Once I reach N3 level (hopefully by the end of next year) I plan on doing either language school or working holiday over there to for full immersion and test for N2. Once I reach N2, I'll have finished my bsc. So I'll teach English for a bit before moving on to another language/country.

I hope to be completely fluent in 4 languages by the time I reach 25 -- currently I'm fluent in 2 and around N4 level in Japanese (self taught for 2 years).

>>9521077
>Just learn 10-20 words a day
>Duolingo is shit
What do you think Duolingo is used for?

>>9520083

This is how I've been learning to read Russian. It gets easier.

Learning Russian for just over a year now. Can read news blogs and sites/childrens books with essentially no difficulty. Have been trying to read real literature for a bit now on readlang and its quite hard. The required vocabulary is frankly immense, and I guess it doesn't help that I skipped from childrens books to Gogol.

>>9520088
>and can't speak it for shit.

So what's the point?

>>9523251

books my dude.

Also when you can read and listen speaking will come fairly quickly if you ever need to speak it regularly.

Trying to learn German, doing it through extra shit in college. Got it as my paper today and I fucked it up

post how to get better in languages ITT :)

want to learn german (currently using duolingo)

>>9523296
>duolingo
Don't.

>>9523269
>Also when you can read and listen speaking will come fairly quickly

It's quite the opposite my dude.

>>9523328

When compared to not knowing anything of the language at all?

Don't be dense.

>>9520028
>Duolingo
The Japanese course was supposed to unlock today, but fucking nothing so far

>>9523334

You can access it anyway. There's a reddit thread on how to do it on /r/duolingo.

I warn you though, it's a crap course and extremely substandard for duolingo

>>9520028
I'm learning Spanish and French on Duolingo but put French on pause because I was starting to mix everything up. I finished the Spanish course but am still trying to keep everything gold and am watching telenovelas without any subtitles and am starting to understand the begins and endings of sentences, but the middles of longer sentences just sound like random Mexican noises. Also I practice reading the Spanish news paper El País out loud so I can work on my accent.

>>9521937
> I plan on doing either language school or working holiday over there to for full immersion and test for N2.

Just a warning: it's difficult to get "full immersion" in Japan, unless you are outside of any major city and are in a small company where everyone's English is shit. A lot of Japanese coworkers won't waste their time trying to talk to you in Japanese unless you're already highly proficient, and will insist on speaking in English, regardless of how good (or not good) their own English is. I worked for about 9 months at a big Japanese company in Tokyo, and had passed N3 prior to going; I didn't get any immersion, and scarcely used Japanese at work except when talking to security and some of the clerical staff. I actually used Japanese more outside of work, like talking to city hall officials, shopping, doctor's office, etc. I have friends who are or were doing JET or other English-teaching jobs, and those who aren't in small countryside towns say they haven't seen much improvement in their abilities over 1.5-2 years.

If you really want to improve your skills in a short time, do the language school; it may cost money, but it's a better investment of your time and effort.

The hardest part for me is connecting the new vocabulary with the thing, not the English translation.
Now it's like:
New word --> English word --> thing

What I want:
New word --> thing

Any tips?

>>9523395
You mean abstract concepts or real things like trees, cars etc?

>>9523395

Need to read more, listen more, communicate more.
It just comes with time. With more and more practice you'll find you're listening and not translating

>>9520028
>For you polyglots (duoglot english doesn't count) what tips/tricks/suggestions do you have?

>Staying with begginner material for too long
Duolinguo and begginer books are fine for dipping your toe in the language, but IMO you should drop them after 3-4 months into learning. People will say "B-but I'm not ready for A2/B1 yet!", and they will be right. You need to push your boundaries in order to advance. If you try and it seems hard or you feel lost, then the beginner book and your grammar will always be there. But you NEED to progress, and you can only do so by increasing difficulty.

>More than one language at a time
I would say 2 at most, and that's only if you are around C1 at one of them

>Waiting to get the "perfect material in order to start
There's no "best" method for learning as we all learn differently. For instance I have friends that swear by anki to improve their vocabulary, but I personally can't stand flashcards and I prefer to read with a dictionary. So try different approaches and you will eventually find the method that suits you best. Best of all, by the time you have found a good method/routine, you will hopefully already have a decent grasp of the language.

>Using only "learners" material
You must also consume media intended for natives. Not only it will show you how real people actually speak, but it is also a lot more interesting than books/movies/podcasts aimed at learners.

>Time, time, time, time
Language learning is all about time. You will need to spend several years of your life to master just about any language. It is easy to get discouraged, but you need to push through those moments when you feel you are making no progress.
People usually assume that I have a "gift" for languages. The truth is, I'm a slow learner. I grew up bilingual and then learned three other languages over a span of almost two decades. If you are willing to put in the time, the results will show no matter your innate capacity.

>Inmersion
If you are serious about mastering a language, a stay in the country is almost mandatory. If you are happy with a C1 level or so, you should find a tandem partner or join a class. Basically any face to face conversation is invaluable practice IMO. I do know a guy that has gotten crazy good at Spanish by self-learning, but even him acknowledges how much he improved once he could chat with me in Spanish.

This is all based on my subjective experience, so take all of this with a grain of salt.

>>9523395
That is completely normal. Give it some time, thinking in a foreign language is not something that happens overnight or that you can really "force". With more practice comes a gradual change in the way you use the language and think about it.

>>9520028
Isn't duolingo's Greek course modern Greek? If so, why would you do this?

I want to start learning latin, where do I begin?

>>9523517
Wheelock's

what a nice, constructive thread!!

I have no interest in learning a language but i support your endeavours

>>9523515

I personally just want to be able to sound out the greek words I see in my texts, since they tend to give a definition and a spelling, but not a pronunciation.

>>9523542
could you be more specific

>>9523515
I'm not OP but i suppose that learning modern Greek would serve to read modern authors such as Kazantzakis and Seferis (because it's not like Greece hasn't produced anything of literary value in the last 500 years) while it makes it easier to learn Ancient Greek due to the similarities of both languages.

>>9523555
The pronunciation of philosophical terms quoted in literature changed between ancient and modern Greek. Go ancient or go home.

>>9523562
Wheelock's Latin is a beginners grammar text book/work book.

>>9523568

how?

>>9523395

Words are total abstractions until you tie them to experiences. This is something that can't really be accomplished by simply studying. What I would do is make a flashcard deck where you add words as you come across them in the wild, and then also include a little reminder word that will trigger the memory of the initial time you encountered it. Say you were reading a book about bank robbers and one of the characters used the word "vault". Maybe include the title of the book or the name of the character who said it on your flashcard. Your brain will still go

Foreign word for "vault" --> Bank robbing book/bank robber's name --> the concept of vault

for a while, but the concept of bank robbery that will accompany the trigger word you use is much more closely related to the concept of vault than the arbitrary syllables/letters that make up the English word "Vault" that accidentally got associated with the word in your initial process of studying.

>>9523774
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uFOX6rM9nCM
Don't worry about it, not important or beneficial.

>>9523515
see >>9523564
Mostly about making Archaic Greek easier, the rich history of Greece does not fall under a single dialect. Reading Greek lettering like I read the Latin Alphabet was a major jump for me. I do plan to read modern Greek Lit and visit the country. If you have tried Ancient Greek you know how much of a slog it is.

>>9523875
Very good contribution thank you.

bump

>>9523913
thanks for the link, this guy's channel is very insightful

Holy shit if you use duolingo to learn a language you are 100% retarded. It will actually probably do more harm than good.

>>9525068
You want to be helpful and recommend something better?

Mfw want to learn ASL because I like the feeling of talking through primitive hand motions
There's just something so natural about it

>>9525190
In my opinion, the effectiveness of duolingo and other language websites seem dubious. Casually learning languages isn't going to make anything stick. If you want to he fluent in a language you have to actively study it and not do a couple vocab quizzes on your lunch break.

I've been learning french since last august and since I've made a lot of progress, I thought it'd be a good idea to do a language immersion course with my uni in Paris this summer.
Holy shit is it hard. I can't understand a casual exchange at the grocery store yet. Everything's so fast, people start talking to me and I start stuttering out "Je suis dessolé, mais je parle seulement un peu de français" and they're already shouting over me by dessolé. I'm in an intermediate course with a really nice professor that's going well, but everyone else on the program is some private school kid who's been learning from a french tutor and traveling the world since they were six. Professors talk to me and I pick up two or three words and respond based on what I think they're saying, but I really have no idea. I'm here until june 30th so I'm really hoping I can see some improvement by then but holy shit, I feel like I'm drowning.

>>9525310
Don't worry lad, you are making progress just by hearing and trying to articulate your thoughts in french. I know it can feel overwhelming but try to focus on the good. You are not there to understand everything but to improve your French and to have a great time

Learning Russian and have precisely 0 interest in ever going to Russia, only reading. Over time my interest in reading has only increased, but I've wanted less and less to go anywhere near that god forsaken hole of a country.

Learning the language has given me access to various resources from which I've learned about Russia as a country, and I don't think I've ever seen a faster descent to 3rd world from 1st world. It's deeply depressing, and honestly I can't fathom why anyone would want to touch that steaming pile of shit that passes for a country with a 10 foot pole.

Good books though.

>>9525390
Thank you anon. It's just very stressful. I can parce written french fairly well, I just can't process anything fast enough to keep up in a conversation. I didn't realize how easy my professors made things in the classes I've taken in burgerland.

>>9525415
Chill out hillary, I guess its a scary place if ur a pussy

>>9525310
You're doing it wrong m8. French ppl are the worst when is about their language.

>>9526515

Nah man, I don't mean politically. I mean literally an irredeemable shithole on the brink of economic collapse, I feel very bad for them.

Lingvist>>>>>>Duolingo

Seriously, that shit is amazing for vocabulary, in 15 days I could read basic german stuff easily.

>tfw duolingo makes you pronounce the words into the mic and you sound like brad pitt in inglorious basterds attempting italian

>>9527419
Just don't use that feature then? Duo isn't the best for pronunciation.

Duolingo is a bad meme. Take the time to find, or make better resources.

I want to learn a second language, but I have no idea which one to learn.

>>9527747
What is the culture that interests you the most outside of the anglosphere?

>>9525068
Duolingo and things like it are good introductions to languages but yeah, the only way to learn a language is to just hear, read, and speak it all the time with people who are fluent in it. It's like learning an instrument where you have to accept that you suck and just constantly try to improve.

>>9527760
Idk. I like a few Swedish movies. Islamic culture is kinda interesting too. Also, Italy seems like a cool place. I like the way Russian sounds.

Spanish would probably be the best choice for me since it's the most likely to come up since I live in the South in the U.S., but Idk if it's really something that appeals to me.

>>9520028
Hey OP, how did you go learning the Greek alphabet? I really struggle with it.

>>9527856
Yeah it was a big jump for me too. I had practiced enough to associate the sounds with the letters when I started Duolingo's course. What made a massive difference was actually typing in Greek. I am a fast english typer(long time committing internet faggotry) and now I can type quite quickly in Greek too. It has made it so I unconsciously associate the Greek letters with the English keyboard letters. (Switch between keyboards by shortcuts obvi) This might not work very well if you have to look at your keyboard when typing in your native language.

I'd suggest picking up the coarse on Duolingo, you can do the practices without a timer at first and then as you get more comfortable you can challenge yourself with the timer and that really pushes you to learn. This is why I like it so much, it is regardless of Modern or Ancient, I can read comfortably now without having to think about the letters which was a truly pleasant realization.

>Tfw people bashing duolingo
Its for baby's first attempt at learning the language. If I wanted to learn Spanish I wouldn't suggest it but for Greek it is a massive help (It does not teach Grammar well, find out about Gender, Cases, Declensions, etc beforehand to understand whats going on).

Is it realistic for someone with a lisp (i pronounce 'mass' kinda like 'maff', and i have difficulties with the letter 'r' some times) to learn german? What are some languages which someone with a lisp wont have that much difficulty with?

Pls no bully

Started learning French pretty recently, about 2 weeks ago.

Enjoying it so far but I can't for the fucking life of me pronounce the r sound correctly. Like in a few words I can make my mouth and throat do something that almost gets there, but some words (like "arbre" for example) just seem fucking impossble. And even the words I can somewhat pronounce the r in properly, I seem to only do it properly like one tenth of the time.

>>9520028
German. I've been out of class for a while and I'm a bit rusty, which is unfortunate because I'm going to Germany in just over a week

>>9527968
> (It does not teach Grammar well, find out about Gender, Cases, Declensions, etc beforehand to understand whats going on)
The problem with me is that I don't understand grammatical concepts in English. When my various German resources talk about "indefinite verbs" or "word clauses" I have no idea what they mean.

>>9527968
>people bashing duolingo

It's deserving solely for the fact that it's a meme at this point and there are better apps that serve the same purpose, namely lingvist.

>>9528580
Name some more anon. The general consensus is that Duolingo is better than most other apps

>>9523366
Thanks for the heads up anon. I will probably need to delay the trip and save up more money for the language school but if what you're saying is right, it will be worth it.

>>9520083
Solid strategy, but how loud are you reading aloud? Unless you're literally screaming then this won't be that effective. Close your door in your room and make sure your'e home alone and honestly wail as loud as you can as you read through the text. You should be screaming, NEMO QUI PLORANDA NON EST STULTUS EST. ET CETERA. The louder you read aloud the more the synapses in your brain will fire off.

>>9528590

anki, memrise, and lingvist provided better retention of vocab I find and gives you far less useless vocab. The only advantage of duo is having some more versitle methods of learning (drop down from list, translate sentence) but not enough to make it worth my while when I'm fucking learning vocab at lightning speed in comparison.

Seriously try all 3 and see if one works better for you. In my experience lingvist > memrise > anki > duolingo

>>9521895
Then why waste your time with a stupid game, when you could play actual vidya in the language you desire to learn?
>>9523195
Duolingo is used for the gamification of language learning while completely failing at actually teaching the language. It is only used by retards that will never end up proficient in any language, because they don't care about learning the language for the sake of understanding the language/culture/works, instead only care about "knowing" a language as a tool to stroke their own dick either before colleagues or for self esteem.

If you use Duolingo for vocabulary, what's the point? You can just pick up a book or even go on youtube and watch a movie or tv show in that language and pick out the vocabulary you don't understand and learn it naturally, but I guess this won't give you any "XP" or "Levels" that you can show off with.

>>9527990
I don't think it matters, there are people with lisps all over the world isn't there?

>>9520083
I'm going through wheelock's latin too. Cheers

>>9520028
I've been studying Japanese for about 3 years. I can read YA stuff without referencing a dictionary too much. I mostly started learning Japanese so I can play video games without feeling like I'm wasting my time; no real plans to read Japanese literature.

Chinese as a cognitive language, Latin as a basis.

My Spanish is so-so, but I am looking to improve.

What's the best strategy? I just want to be able to read the Latin, so will it harm me if I'm learning Chinese and Latin at the same time?

I studied German all through school. I keep it up by listening to news/podcats and reading occasionally.

I started Italian with duolingo, worked through a grammar book, and now try to read simpler books.

I also did a bunch of other duolingo courses just for fun because I like the platform. I like being able to use it in short, five minute chunks throughout my day. I finished Esperanto, Norwegian, French and Spanish. Haven't actually pursued these further, since Italian is my main focus.

What do you guys think of lingq? At the risk of sounding like a shill, i think its pretty good and much better than duolingo or memrise. Its like duolingo but with full sentences instead of words, and it has anki built into it too. I didnt try it exyensively because the free version is very handicapped but i think it is a great system

desperately trying to learn Polish after two years here. admittedly I have not been applying myself properly but fuck me sideways it's a difficult language for someone from a germanic language family

>>9523195
Last time I looked at it, it was a spell checker.

Anyone got tips for gitting gud at listening?

>>9528726
>You can just pick up a book or even go on youtube and watch a movie or tv show

there's no point unless you have 500-1000 words down first. From there I agree that it's better to move on but the apps are perfectly fine introductions to languages.

>>9529991

Make sure you don't fall into the passive listening trap where you play something in the background and expect to get significantly better. I think this is mostly a waste of time. You might get something out of it, but only if you're getting distracted from whatever else you're doing. If you're doing some fairly automatic task where you can actually dedicate some attention to the input, like driving on the highway or doing the dishes, then that's different, and definitely a good time to get some practice in.

Set aside some time, and really focus on whatever you're listening to, ensuring that you pick up everything by either repeating it or looking at corresponding text.

Also, this is purely anecdotal, but I find that listening before going to bed is extremely effective. If I do a decent amount of listening before going to bed, then, when I go to sleep, the language is still sort of dancing around in my head. The next day, I often feel like I've made significant progress with only that one session.

>being able to read normal texts in a foreign language
>calling yourself a 'polyglot'
fucking Americans... hilarious.

>>9529403
I liked the guys videos on youtube and have wanted to try it out for years but free is way too limited and all other options seem too expensive. Also hear the android app is buggy shit.

>>9530262
this. people ITT have high school level understanding of foreign languages. Here in The Netherlands I got 6 years of Greek, Latin and French. My understanding of these languages is far superior than what passes ITT as being a 'polyglot'. But I guess that as an American, being exposed to anything that is not English must be a revolution.

>>9530262

Nobody here is calling themselves a polyglot

>been studying japanese for a year now
>had to drop focus in it for a tough semester
>now free time
>duolingo has a beginners course released now
>oh man sounds like a good way to get back into it
>only on iOS for the next few weeks

fuck, anki and JAV it is for me

>>9520028

>take my college's placement test for german
>the format is just reading comprehension, doesn't test your ability to write or speak
>don't """cheat""" but look up a couple words that I don't know
>get placed into the highest possible course that says it requires 3-4 years of high school experience
>only been doing duolingo for like 2 years and read kraut /int/ threads sometimes

I think Imma fail, especially when they find out I can barely speak it.
How do I get fluent in like 3 months

>>9530500

You can get into the course y some script shit on a computer. It's really bad, short, and totally lacking in grammar explanations. Best stick to anki for now, and a textbook for grammar stuff.

>>9530527

You'll be fine. College courses build you up from the start even if you're in a high placement. The tend to stick even the lower ability people in the same classes with the people with previous experience by second year, so you're not actually at all that much of a disadvantage, though your first few weeks will likely be hellish.

You'll learn fast as unis force you to actually use the language for reading and such

>>9528705
hahahah i hope he does this
but obv its retarded - the benefit of reading out loud comes from forming the words yourself, not hearing them

I've been trying Polish, and brushing up on my French. I'm frequently hamstrung by my inability to listen to the audio since I use duolingo in a public library, but I also feel like I'm just doing rote answer memorization rather than learning things.

Doesn't help that there's literally no real person to practice with.

Learning Japanese, passed JLPT N1 with 178/180.

Most languages are useless IMO.

The only one that gives you an outstanding rate of return is english. Nothing else comes close.

The saying "know your mother tongue well, but know english even better" fits me like a glove.

>>9520028
brazilian portuguese is my native tongue

want to learn spanish properly (can naturaly read a lot of stuff because its very similar to portuguese but want to be able to read complex stuff and write and talk etc). my objective is to read don quijote in spanish, also maybe some bolaño and borges (this might be harder).

then want to learn italian, my biggest goal in literature is to actually be able to read the original divine comedy in italian.

want to go through wheelock's latin too but i am lazy as fuck and don't have much time

>>9530709
>my objective is to read don quijote in spanish, also maybe some bolaño and borges (this might be harder).
You got that mixed up, portubro. The language in Don Quijote is very archaic and has loads of expressions and words that are not used anymore. Even native speakers can struggle to understand some sentences.

>>9530672

That's nice, everyone here knows that already, now take your shit opinion and fuck off to where people actually care

I signed up for an accelerated into to Spanish class for my next fall semester. I want to know how I can work a little ahead this summer. Should I learn by Esperanto or just start Spanish early? Should I make sure my knowledge of English grammar is up to snuff? Any help would be appreciated.

>>9530672
are you just another burger trying to excuse the fact that you can't learn a new language?

>>9530672
>Most languages are useless IMO

That's about as circumstantial as you can get. A language is only as useless as you are would probably be a better saying tbqh

>>9530724
I will have to treat it those expressions and words as if it was something like latin then I guess...?

>>9526715
>never been to the country
>i hurd it's bad on ze internets
Don't get me wrong, it's pretty bad in many ways and I'm happy I left, but you're genuinely retarded.

Learned Japanese last year, doing Russian this year.

It's beyond me why people bother with language courses when they're only learning a language to read its native material. Why waste time learning to introduce yourself and listening to natives speak when using it for anything other than reading is a long term goal at best? If you want to learn a language quick then just learn its basics, read native shit for kids, then native shit for teens and finally native shit for adults.

>>9525310
I can second this. Doing a semseter in Geneva and holy shit people here are the worst. No one wants to speak to you unless you speak at a C1 level

>>9520438
Can't hurt to use both. That's how I learned Spanish.

>>9531025
>No one wants to speak to you
That's generally true of most Swiss people, has nothing to do with your language level. Don't sweat it, the country is as autistic as it gets.

>>9530709
Actually, a lot of the archaic language in Cervantes strikes me as very similar to Portuguese, especially when DQ lapses into faux-chivalrous dialect. You should be well equipped after a solid foundation in the language seeing as how syntax and conjugations differ only slightly.

>>9520830
I happen to hate the Turks, although I'm a Greek American.

>>9530774
>Should I learn by Esperanto?
No, how did you cook up such a stupid idea?
>Should I make sure my knowledge of English grammar is up to snuff?
Not English grammar specifically but make sure you know what a determiner, article, adverb, preposition etc. is. And that you know how to locate direct and indirect objects and whatnot (actually not so important since Spanish does not have a case system)

>>9531049
True, knowing another romance language helps a lot with archaic lexicon. Some words that have fallen out of use in Spanish have evolved and mantained their relevance in Catalan, for instance.

>>9531203
Okay. What resources would you recommend?

>>9531232
I wouldn't know because I'm a native Spanish speaker. Honestly I would not do a lot of heavy studying if your class is intended as an introduction.

What I would recommend is fire up Duolingo and dip your toes in the language. You will meet the gender system as well as some basic vocabulary and expressions that will serve you well for your upcoming classes. I really despise Duolingo as a learning resource, but it is perfect for absolute beginners to get a feel of the language.

Try to learn about Hispanic culture. Listen to Spanish music and watch Spanish films. This will get you familiarized with the language and also give you motivation to stick with Spanish.

Sorry I could not be of much help

>>9520052
this is bad advice in my experience, or at least not true for everyone.
by all means pace yourself and don't overload yourself with work but also don't force yourself to hold off on a language you really want to learn.

personally, I try not to start with several languages at once but sometimes there's just no other way because i just can't control my desire to know more about a certain language/culture.

i almost never get confused between languages. it helps to learn proper pronunciation for each language and to get a feel for their respective "personalities". if you know what a certain language should feel like and sound like, you're less likely to confuse it with a different one. learn proper pronunciation in any case, otherwise where's the fun in it?

in any case language learning is about the journey of discovery for me, not about fluency by any means and as quickly as possible. if you're going into studying a language with that expectation, you're likely to get frustrated quickly. fluency is always the final goal on the horizon but you might not ever reach it and that's fine as long as you keep moving towards it in a kind asymptotic approximation.

considering welsh desu

>>9520052
why the hell would you learn two languages at once outside similar based languages like Spanish and italian

>>9531353
because you want to know both?


why does learning two similar languages at once make more sense to you than learning dissimilar ones? if anything, that's more difficult.

I've been trying to learn japanese but the katakana are autistic as fuck.

>>9532050
>Struggling with one of the easiest parts of the language

>>9532069
Nah, memorizing shit is way harder than fucking grammar or vocabulary.

>>9532079
You can get it to like 90% in a day, and then you're exposed to it enough that it becomes second nature extremely quickly. At least for reading it, writing it may take a bit more time and practice but even then it doesn't take too long if you're writing enough. And nobody cares about writing by hand anyway.

>>9532079
>memorizing shit is way harder than memorizing other shit

Is there a flashcard program that doesn't suck (anki).

I don't want the stupid ADVANCED STATISTICAL MEMEING and shit, I just want the ability to make my own cards, have them randomly appear to me, and be prompted to TYPE the word in, not just mentally recall it.

>>9532050
>>9532069

Japanese fuck up katakana more than they do Kanji from my observations. It comes down to pattern recognition, commonly used words are easy to identify, but when you run into something dumb like アセトアルデヒド or シャンソンショー you're probably going to have to sound it out like a retard a few times or google it before it clicks.

>>9528719
I think a better question is, why are these better? I've used memerise and lingvist before and they just seemed like the same shit, learning basic vocab until you get more and more complicated sentences.

>>9532134
You can have anki accept typed input. Read the manual.

>>9532163
>you're probably going to have to sound it out like a retard a few times or google it before it clicks.
That's a vocabulary problem, _not_ a katakana problem. Stop trying to read katanakana as if its English.

>>9532206

Tell me how

>>9520028
Sanskrit.

I dunno, probably just philosophical texts. Maybe Sanskrit wikipedia. I'm not learning it with any specific thing in mind, I just like the language and its structure; it's both archaic, but also high quality, like an old statue.

>>9532211
>>Read the manual.
I'm not going to do it for you.

I believe you just edit the card and change the eg. {{Answer}} to {{type:Answer}} or something like that.

Bump für Deutsch

>>9533266
What's everyone's preferred way to learn German. Using Duolingo atm.

>>9533287
I am learning through a language school so I can't really help you out on self-learning. I can tell you how my progress went though

>Beginner
First of all, If you come from a language without cases, cram as many exercises as possible on those. It will take a while till they start making sense, but ultimately they will become a second nature (be warned: this takes time).

For tenses, start with present and Perfekt. Pay attention to the formation of participle, since this will be very important. You should note which particles are separable (ab, auf, etc.) and which ones do not accept -ge- (be, er, etc.).

You should have learnt a lot of common verbs by now. Verbs are the motor of any language so definetly try to keep that up (use anki or whatever works for you).

Learn the word order in normal sentences and Nebensätze. Learn what connectors don't affect word order (und, oder, etc.).

Suggested vocabulary and expressions for beginners are usually: how to introduce yourself, how to state your preferences (I like/I don't like), how to describe someone, that kind of stuff. Colours, numbers, body parts, hobbies, family... will all come up. ALWAYS LEARN NOUNS WITH THEIR GENDER.


>Intermediate
Learn passive and future. You should learn the verb "werden" and all its conjugations by heart, just like you did with sein und haben.

Start paying attention to irregular verbs. If a verb is irregular in English and it shares the same root in German, there's a good chance it is irregular in German too.

Pay attention to prepostitions and try to learn which ones go with each case. There's also phraseal verbs in German (warten+auf). I have not found any rule that they adhere to, so you'll just have to memorize them.

Adjective declension, superlatives/comparatives, Relativsätze, conditionals and probably more stuff that I'm forgetting about should be introduced by now, in whatever order you want.

You should start consuming media intended for natives by now. Get an ereader and read easy books with aid of the built-in dictionary. Watch german movies with subtitles in your language, if you rewatch them do it with German subs.


>Advanced
Damn, I wish I knew

>>9533425
>I wish i knew
Once you are good enough you should really go there. You will never learn everything unless you live there and force yourself to talk german 24/7. After a while no one will be able to tell the difference. If you can read books in high-level german, but have never been to germany or austria, you will learn the dialect in a couple of weeks and then you just gotta keep speaking it. A language goes away if you don't speak it. And a dialect or accent goes away even faster

>Studied Ancient Greek at university as part of Classics
>every other language feels like a joke to learn now

Feelsgoodman.

>>9533550
Any tips for newbies? What languages did you learn afterwards?

>>9533556
I learned Icelandic(I'm Norwegian)first, and then I learned German.

Both Icelandic and German are to some extent complicated languages, but I already knew what I had to do to properly learn them.

I've found that the only way to really learn a language is to buy books about grammar and put your nose to the grindstone, and worry about pronunciation and stuff like that until you actually have an opportunity to go to the country where they speak the language in question and be there for a while.

There really are no shortcuts when it comes to learning languages.

>>9533575
Did you find Greek hard?

>>9533531
I'm finishing my masters next year, and I do plan on saving up some money and moving to Hamburg for a while. I think I have a solid foundation by now, which I plan to expand on the next year. In my experience, once you reach a certain proficiency, you can disregard grammar and pretty much learn passively by inmersion.

>>9533585
Yeah it was actually quite horrible to begin with.

Ancient Greek uses participles on a rate that is non-existent in my native language, so in many ways it's actually probably easier for a native English speaker to learn(since English can easily make present tense participles, like doing, walking, eating, working etc) and past participles(written, sung, burnt).

I am learning korean because my girlfriend is from South Korea. We're going there in a month and I hope to be able to communicate somewhat with her parents that don't speak any English. If everything goes well I will also do an exchange year and half there after summer next year.

>>9533605
Fuck off weeb

>>9533575
Are there any textbooks for learning German that you'd recommend for a beginner, or did you start off at an advanced pace?

About to start learning Polish, wish me luck.

>>9533739
Hammer's German Grammar and Usage is pretty good, but a bit pricey.

It's what I used.

>>9533728
Come on dog

>>9533795
Apparently the writers/publishers of the Hammer's grammar have another textbook which is more geared toward beginners and autodidacts, as opposed to being a "reference" grammar.
There's also the English Grammar for X Students series the slim rainbow-coloured reference guides which are affordable enough. I've been using the Latin one for the odd sentence construction or two.

>>9533825
Right, well that's probably a better bet then.

>>9531068
>I'm a Greek American.
You're just an American, not a Greek. Don't believe me? Go to Greece for once and see how they treat you when you tell them you're Greek.

Chinese is so easy I don't know why people cry over it.

Highly recommend it. It's very logical

For independent learners of languages, how much did you say you practised per day and how long did it take?

>>9533846
>Go to Greece for once and see how they treat you when you tell them you're Greek.
Why are Americans contrarians? My Greek cousins don't care i am Australian.

Currently live in Tokyo, so learning Japanese.

It's not that hard since I know Chinese but I do get tired of studying it sometimes, and it's only been a month.

>>9523339
But then I'd have to go on reddit!

>>9525190

Anything that isn't fucking bilingual. You should be learning the intuition of the language, not how to translate between English and the language.

>>9531353
It's probably harder to learn Spanish and Italian at the same time than Spanish and German, unless you're completely ignorant of Latin languages and have trouble with the grammar.

>>9525068
>>9535132
>It will actually probably do more harm than good.

Thats all well and good when you're already at an intermediate level but for starting out bilingual materials are the most efficient to getting to that point by a mile

>>9535155

No, it's exactly when you are starting out that you can fuck your intuition up the most. Pirate Rosetta Stone or something - it's not perfect, but it's way better in from a macroperspective.

>>9533864

People came here for the stuff, thinking they'd be able to keep their culture, but the stuff is American culture.

>>9535297
>>9533864
>>9533846
>Greeks calling Greek Emigrants non-Greek

>>9535140
I seriously doubt that.
There's a massive amount of overlap between the Spanish grammar and lexicon and the Italian one. The genders are also fairly constant between both.

>Hurr durr you will mix them up
That trouble is still easier than having to learn two completely different sets of vocabulary and grammar.

>>9535450
>what did he mean by this?

Let's make a deal, I am italian, if you are french you help me with french I help you with italian how about that ?

>>9530709
fun fact, the original version is lost, the one we have went through a work of Philology and we still have no idea what certain things mean.

>>9533857
Daily for my italian. Took me about five months to become conversational. I still have things to work on (participles mainly; but i hit the diminished return. At least im ready for all that poetry

>>9520028
Classic Tibetan

I'll probably start with the 17 early Dzogchen tantras

I'm actually surprised this thread lasted the weekend.

Anyway, for anyone learning Latin, either in a classroom setting or independently, I'd like to know:
At what point should I invest my time in a good Latin grammar book? I've already acquired several beginner/intermediate textbooks (Wheelock's included) whose goal is to build a solid foundation in both the grammar and the vocabulary of Latin. Since I'm learning everything by rote, I'd like some direction on how to progress from one stage to the next.
Should I focus all of my energy on memorizing every conjugation/declension while adding as many new words to my vocabulary as possible?

Pic related seems to be the best introductory/beginner reference grammar.

Bump

>>9537056
What do you think about this paragraph?

>>9537056
>Took me about five months to become conversational
That's pretty impressive. Were you already familiar with any romance language at all?

Does anyone else find the utterly obscene amount of vocab needed to read exhausting?

I'm between 3-4 thousand words with Russian and while I can read news and bloggish stuff just fine, actual novels for adults leave me looking up at least a word per sentence, and while all of these go into my anki deck, the progress is still slow. But eh, at least I'm noticeably improving.

I´ve been learning french for about 6-7 months. I took a course of basic french in college (the teacher was a beatiful ginger french qt, i must say), using duolingo intermittently, reading wikipedia articles in french (that´s how i learned english). I have no plans to travel to France, it´s only really to read literature (though my pronunciation is decent).
>>9530709
I´m thinking of picking up portuguese after french. Since i´m a spanish speaker, i figured out it would be quite easy. What literature in portuguese do you recommend for learning? I´ve read some Machado do Assis and i loved it, one of my favorite writers.

>>9538773
The lowest amount of vocabulary that a native speaker of a language is 20,000. It's not really that much, you are only a few years away from that.

>>9538918

Yeah, I suppose so. To think that when I began learning I thought mastering grammar would be most of the work.

Hoo boy was I wrong