Hello everybody,
I was reading an "inspiring" blog named "fluent in 3 months" owned by Benny, a polyglot irish guy. I think a lot of people here know him.
I was reading this blog post: http://www.fluentin3months.com/one-year/ "how I learned 5 languages in 1 year".
When I started to read this I tought "that is amazing! Five languages in just 1 year!". Then I red this part:
I can now speak all five of these languages with varying degrees of fluency:
German (B2)
Spanish (A1)
French (A2)
Chinese (B2)
Czech (A2)
and I started to think about what the people mean with "learn a language" or even "speak a language". Does the level A2 or A1 really gives you the title of "language speaker"? That sounds quite strange to me.
By my side, in order to know a foreign language you have to have prooven skills in Listening, Speaking and Reading. The levels A1 and A2 and even B2 don't give you such knowledge. With the level A2 you don't even completely know the whole grammar.
So, for that reasong when I talk about my language skills I say:
- Italian: mothertongue
- spanish: level C2, I say I SPEAK spanish, as I have a complete knowledge of the language. I lived in Spain, I have no trouble in any situation.
- English: level B2, I say I KNOW english, but I can't say I am an english speaker, because my knowledge lacks in some point, I have problem with the american accent, I make mistakes and so on.
- French: level B1, I say I BARELY KNOW french, because I certainly am able to speak about any topic (french is close enough to italian to be a comfortable language even if your dictionary is not complete) but I make a lot of errors.
- Persian: level B1, I say that is the language I am learning, nothing more.
So, altough in Chinese and German the author did it brilliant, on the other 3 languages it's a waste of time.
What do you think?
I deem that sincerity should prompt the people that make such claims (I speak 50 languages and so on) to clear all things up and share the details of their knowledge. Thus, a supposed polyglot should say e.g. I speak 10 languages - 2 of them fluently (almost native-like), 4 of them on the "conversative" level (B1-B2) and using these 2 tongues that I know not so well yet I'm able to order a meal, or ask for directions.
I'd like to highlight that I respect Benny Lewis a lot because he urges people to speak up and not being afraid of making mistakes. On the other hand, such statements may wrongly induce some people to think that being jack-of-all 20 languages is really possible. It is not (in most cases, of course. There are prodigies in this world, no doubt.)
Experienced translators and linguists are telling me constantly (Faculty of Linguistics) that mastering even 2 languages on the top-notch skill level is very hard and time-consuming. You can chat and read in another twelve but there is a huge difference between such chatting/passive skills and the true C2 mastery.
In the good days of yore the stress was put on extensive study and memorisation of grammar rules (Greek, Latin etc.). Nowadays, in general, the pendulum has gone to the other side. There is a strong communicative approach in language learning, so for some people B1 skills are satisfactory and sufficient. I would add that true mastery is born as the child of these two approaches.
To sum up, it's completely ok with me when someone says that speaks, let's say, 10 languages (If you can pass a concise message in the particular language you can say you speak it, I suppose). Nevertheless, I do appreciate some clarification on this topic.
This is a very important thread, many people may decide to focus more on the languages that are of the utmost importance to them after reading the comments above(It's hard for us, language lovers, I know :)).
