No, they are much closer to each other than Welsh and English. If you speak French and Spanish you will understand a lot of what is being said.
http://www.omniglot.com/writing/catalan.htm
- Thread starter Marianopolita
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Bilingualism- Article from the Montreal Gazette, July 9, 2009
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http://www.omniglot.com/writing/catalan.htm
This is a great article and its one of my cheif concerns for my kids also. I am Dominicano and my wife is pinay. I want them to learn her two dialects tagalog and bisaya. I also want them to learn english, and native dialects of the Dominican Republic and spanish also. so that is like 5 languages? but of course we live here in United States, so they will learn english so easy. what to do, what to do, such a dilema for us?
I read the other thread which prompted me to add my sixpenneth. Our daughter will be 3 in August, her mother only speaks to her in Dominican. I would like to speak to our daughter only in english but there is the problem, my wife does not speak english and is not trying very hard to learn it so I am stuck most of the time having to speak in a language my wife understands. We do have one small advantage insomuch as both our daughter and I are early risers so we get two or three hours only english on mornings which are school holidays or the weekend. When my daughter and I go out, just us, she tries very hard to say things in english. Like counting up to ten, telling me which letters she can, phrases like? lets go home?,? yes please un helado?, ?moo-cow lola?, and trying to sing more than one verse of ?old macdonald had a farm? . This coming term we are starting her at another school which includes english for three year olds. If anyone has other bright ideas I?m all ears (or eyes).
Be realistic...
This is not directed at you specifically but just a general comment after reading your post. Parents need to be realistic with the amount languages their kids can learn and they must be fluent as well? One aspect that must taken into consideration is when will they start learning these languages. The longer the parents wait the harder it will be for them to learn and why are they not being exposed to these languages at an earlier age? Set realistic goals in language learning just like anything else and sending them to a language school is not the simple solution. Don't expect miracles.
You mentioned Dominican dialects? What are you talking about? Spanish is spoken in the DR with regional variations and speech varieties but only one of the true dialects in Spanish in general is el cibae?o which happens to be spoken in the DR.
This is quite a common scenario/ situation among couples when it comes to language. I see it all the time and observe the dynamics. Normally, the language of the relationship is the one which is common among the the two to whatever degree. Using Spanish as an example, one person speaks only Spanish and the other is either bilingual, competent or very basic but the bottom line is the language of the relationship is Spanish, the one of unilingual speaker. When kids come into the picture it creates a problem for many reasons and what language the child learns. Bilingualism (only) works if the bilingual speaker has very good language skills to maintain Spanish as the language of the relationship and English (in this case) with the child/ children.
I think the child ends up missing out on learning two languages from an early age. However, may choose to learn English or have the opportunity to learn English later on but depending on where and how the child learns it may not be at the level it could have been if one parent had spoken to him/ her in English consistently. However, I like what you are doing on weekends. That 2-3 hours of English if maintained will make a difference down the road. Your daughter may not be fluent but she will understand English to a certain level which is a step in the learning process anyway. Just keep doing what you are doing and do the best you can. Some exposure is better than no exposure at all IMO.
Just on a side note IMO sometimes all these studies really don't shed light on the language learning process at all.
A lot about language is survival and instinct. People have been learning languages just based on being in a certain environment and in many cases it's a sink or swim situation. I have never seen so much analysis and theory like there is today. If a person is born into an environment where more than one language is spoken that becomes their norm and they learn to speak the languages of the region or community. Yes, it's a challenge at an older age but much less of a challenge when a person is raised in a multilingual environment (in the home or external surroundings).
-Marianopolita.
This is not directed at you specifically but just a general comment after reading your post. Parents need to be realistic with the amount languages their kids can learn and they must be fluent as well? One aspect that must taken into consideration is when will they start learning these languages. The longer the parents wait the harder it will be for them to learn and why are they not being exposed to these languages at an earlier age? Set realistic goals in language learning just like anything else and sending them to a language school is not the simple solution. Don't expect miracles.
You mentioned Dominican dialects? What are you talking about? Spanish is spoken in the DR with regional variations and speech varieties but only one of the true dialects in Spanish in general is el cibae?o which happens to be spoken in the DR.
This is quite a common scenario/ situation among couples when it comes to language. I see it all the time and observe the dynamics. Normally, the language of the relationship is the one which is common among the the two to whatever degree. Using Spanish as an example, one person speaks only Spanish and the other is either bilingual, competent or very basic but the bottom line is the language of the relationship is Spanish, the one of unilingual speaker. When kids come into the picture it creates a problem for many reasons and what language the child learns. Bilingualism (only) works if the bilingual speaker has very good language skills to maintain Spanish as the language of the relationship and English (in this case) with the child/ children.
I think the child ends up missing out on learning two languages from an early age. However, may choose to learn English or have the opportunity to learn English later on but depending on where and how the child learns it may not be at the level it could have been if one parent had spoken to him/ her in English consistently. However, I like what you are doing on weekends. That 2-3 hours of English if maintained will make a difference down the road. Your daughter may not be fluent but she will understand English to a certain level which is a step in the learning process anyway. Just keep doing what you are doing and do the best you can. Some exposure is better than no exposure at all IMO.
Just on a side note IMO sometimes all these studies really don't shed light on the language learning process at all.
A lot about language is survival and instinct. People have been learning languages just based on being in a certain environment and in many cases it's a sink or swim situation. I have never seen so much analysis and theory like there is today. If a person is born into an environment where more than one language is spoken that becomes their norm and they learn to speak the languages of the region or community. Yes, it's a challenge at an older age but much less of a challenge when a person is raised in a multilingual environment (in the home or external surroundings).
-Marianopolita.
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My wife only speaks a little english, but her pronunciation is good. We just had a baby, and well, I'm in Canada for the time being, she's in the DR. I was thinking a good way for her to practice and give our girl some exposure is to practice by speaking to the baby. This removes the embarassment of making mistakes, and gives the little one some exposure, no?
Since there are quite a few canadian posters in here, multilingual an so on. I thought I'd post a job here, the govt. is looking for translators.
https://psjobs-emploisfp.psc-cfp.gc...age=en&noBackBtn=true&poster=93343&psrsMode=1
https://psjobs-emploisfp.psc-cfp.gc...age=en&noBackBtn=true&poster=93343&psrsMode=1
Yes I do even Portuguese and Italian, Spanish is my first language. When watching TV in those languages I catch the meaning of the conversation.
Similar as your langauge and Creol.
JJ
Multilingualism
Speaking as a linguist, who regularly works with multilingual people, I can only say the more languages for young children, the better.
Babies are equipped with an acquisition tool in their brains, which means they do not have to learn a language, but rather they acquire it by being exposed to it. I currently work with 2 children (2 and 6 years old) who are both fluent in English, German, Czech and Danish (as fluent as a 2-year-old can be). They live in Germany (i.e. German daycare/school), their mother is Czech, father Danish, and the parents speak English to each other. The children constantly switch between the languages according their circumstances.
So my advice to parents would be: Do not worry about exposing your children to many different languages. They will not be confused. This is something that happens rather frequently to adults learning new languages, but you rarely see that in children. They simply don't think about it, whereas adults tend to try to find the logic behind a new language. If you've known these languages from when you were a child, you don't have to think about it.
Oh, and by the way. Being truly bilingual means perfecting 2 languages, speaking 2 languages on mother tongue level, having grown up with equal exposure of both language. A person learning a 2nd language as an adult will never become bilingual. Same goes for multilingualism. I speak 6 languages fluently, but I am only bilingual
Another quick comment: It is not true to say that most Europeans speak 2-3 languages. In the south of Europe many people only speak their mother tongue. Same goes for the UK and Ireland. French and/or possibly German may be taught in school, but that does not mean that you learn the languages. The only true bi- or multi-lingual countries in Europe are (IMO) Belgium and Switzerland.
Speaking as a linguist, who regularly works with multilingual people, I can only say the more languages for young children, the better.
Babies are equipped with an acquisition tool in their brains, which means they do not have to learn a language, but rather they acquire it by being exposed to it. I currently work with 2 children (2 and 6 years old) who are both fluent in English, German, Czech and Danish (as fluent as a 2-year-old can be). They live in Germany (i.e. German daycare/school), their mother is Czech, father Danish, and the parents speak English to each other. The children constantly switch between the languages according their circumstances.
So my advice to parents would be: Do not worry about exposing your children to many different languages. They will not be confused. This is something that happens rather frequently to adults learning new languages, but you rarely see that in children. They simply don't think about it, whereas adults tend to try to find the logic behind a new language. If you've known these languages from when you were a child, you don't have to think about it.
Oh, and by the way. Being truly bilingual means perfecting 2 languages, speaking 2 languages on mother tongue level, having grown up with equal exposure of both language. A person learning a 2nd language as an adult will never become bilingual. Same goes for multilingualism. I speak 6 languages fluently, but I am only bilingual
Another quick comment: It is not true to say that most Europeans speak 2-3 languages. In the south of Europe many people only speak their mother tongue. Same goes for the UK and Ireland. French and/or possibly German may be taught in school, but that does not mean that you learn the languages. The only true bi- or multi-lingual countries in Europe are (IMO) Belgium and Switzerland.
In my experience a significant proportion of Dutch and Scandinavians speak English to the point of bilingualism.
It is true what you say - I have a reasonable degree of fluency in Spanish (even though it is my mother's mother tongue and I always had a passive knowledge of Spanish I didn't really learn to speak it properly until I was in my 20s) but I do not consider myself fully bi-lingual - as a translator I only accept Spanish to English assignments, never the other way round, unlike lots of translators who in my opinion should not be translating into a language that they are not perfectly fluent in.
My son, on the other hand, is truly bilingual.
It is true what you say - I have a reasonable degree of fluency in Spanish (even though it is my mother's mother tongue and I always had a passive knowledge of Spanish I didn't really learn to speak it properly until I was in my 20s) but I do not consider myself fully bi-lingual - as a translator I only accept Spanish to English assignments, never the other way round, unlike lots of translators who in my opinion should not be translating into a language that they are not perfectly fluent in.
My son, on the other hand, is truly bilingual.
We do speak good English in the north of Europe (I am a Scandinavian, living in Holland), and we learn it in school from quite a young age. (We have no choice as noone else speaks our languages ) But it is extremely rare that we become totally fluent.
I specialised in northern Europeans learning English, and they (we) almost all make the same grammatical mistakes - true bilinguals don't make these mistakes.
) But it is extremely rare that we become totally fluent.I specialised in northern Europeans learning English, and they (we) almost all make the same grammatical mistakes - true bilinguals don't make these mistakes.
A new voice in the forum... welcome!
That's a decision you have to make but if your wife's English is limited then..
It's nice to a have a fresh voice on the subject of bilingualism, multilingualism and language acquisition. I have posted similar details in various posts and threads over the years to the point where now I prefer to observe the dynamics of the forum and see if others will initiate interesting threads. At this point I read and only respond or participate if necessary. Your post is solid, I agree with the language learning vs. acquiring process that babies and young children experience in comparison to adults.
However, as much as children/ babies have that advantage to be bilingual or multilingual from an early age due to exposure to languages, I do believe some people have a gift to acquire language even at a much later age and reach bilingual fluency. It just depends on their familiarity and usually they have had some kind of exposure to the other language in their pre-school years and it became dormant for a long time for diverse reasons. It takes years to completely forget vocabulary although a person may have been fluent or close to fluent at one point in time. It's the fluency that suffers first and is eventually lost if the person does not speak the language over a long period of time.
I think when people say Europeans speak 2-3 languages and more specifically Western Europeans are bilingual it's used in a very loose sense to get the point across that Europeans as opposed to other nationalities in the same continent and others speak and have fluency in other languages and are not specifically referring to bilingualism in the strict sense of the word. I am okay with that and understood the comment by Alyonka in post # 4 as such because the discussion is very informal and most people posting don't have professional or deep knowledge of language, language learning, linguistics etc. Their posts are based on personal experiences, their observations and knowledge about language that they have which are just as valid within reason. I don't expect subject matter expertise.
What I do find interesting and even puzzling at times is the fact that Spanish is not (at least as far as I can tell) that important in Europe and Spaniards themselves seem to be quite unilingual. There is a surge now regarding English and mostly likely due to the European Union but in a general sense a country with 40 million + people in continent where languages are prime like a name brand surprisingly it does not have a larger presence. As mentioned French, German and English are the linguistic engines of the continent (at least in Western Europe). On the other hand the plus side of colonization is language movement and as a result the New World is multilingual with Spanish being a dominant language followed by French (I think people forget about Guadeloupe, Martinique, Dominica, French Guyana and there is some French spoken in Haiti. It's not all Creole as many think although it's the national tongue). The French spoken in these island is titled as Caribbean French and people from the above mentioned island nations/ countries understand each other. Other than Haitians because I know a few, I would like to meet people from Guadeloupe and Martinique and see what differences I notice and vice versa.
Good discussion everyone.
-Marianopolita.
That's a decision you have to make but if your wife's English is limited then..
Speaking as a linguist, who regularly works with multilingual people, I can only say the more languages for young children, the better.
Babies are equipped with an acquisition tool in their brains, which means they do not have to learn a language, but rather they acquire it by being exposed to it....
......
Oh, and by the way. Being truly bilingual means perfecting 2 languages, speaking 2 languages on mother tongue level, having grown up with equal exposure of both language. A person learning a 2nd language as an adult will never become bilingual. Same goes for multilingualism. I speak 6 languages fluently, but I am only bilingual
Another quick comment: It is not true to say that most Europeans speak 2-3 languages. In the south of Europe many people only speak their mother tongue. Same goes for the UK and Ireland. French and/or possibly German may be taught in school, but that does not mean that you learn the languages. The only true bi- or multi-lingual countries in Europe are (IMO) Belgium and Switzerland.
It's nice to a have a fresh voice on the subject of bilingualism, multilingualism and language acquisition. I have posted similar details in various posts and threads over the years to the point where now I prefer to observe the dynamics of the forum and see if others will initiate interesting threads. At this point I read and only respond or participate if necessary. Your post is solid, I agree with the language learning vs. acquiring process that babies and young children experience in comparison to adults.
However, as much as children/ babies have that advantage to be bilingual or multilingual from an early age due to exposure to languages, I do believe some people have a gift to acquire language even at a much later age and reach bilingual fluency. It just depends on their familiarity and usually they have had some kind of exposure to the other language in their pre-school years and it became dormant for a long time for diverse reasons. It takes years to completely forget vocabulary although a person may have been fluent or close to fluent at one point in time. It's the fluency that suffers first and is eventually lost if the person does not speak the language over a long period of time.
I think when people say Europeans speak 2-3 languages and more specifically Western Europeans are bilingual it's used in a very loose sense to get the point across that Europeans as opposed to other nationalities in the same continent and others speak and have fluency in other languages and are not specifically referring to bilingualism in the strict sense of the word. I am okay with that and understood the comment by Alyonka in post # 4 as such because the discussion is very informal and most people posting don't have professional or deep knowledge of language, language learning, linguistics etc. Their posts are based on personal experiences, their observations and knowledge about language that they have which are just as valid within reason. I don't expect subject matter expertise.
What I do find interesting and even puzzling at times is the fact that Spanish is not (at least as far as I can tell) that important in Europe and Spaniards themselves seem to be quite unilingual. There is a surge now regarding English and mostly likely due to the European Union but in a general sense a country with 40 million + people in continent where languages are prime like a name brand surprisingly it does not have a larger presence. As mentioned French, German and English are the linguistic engines of the continent (at least in Western Europe). On the other hand the plus side of colonization is language movement and as a result the New World is multilingual with Spanish being a dominant language followed by French (I think people forget about Guadeloupe, Martinique, Dominica, French Guyana and there is some French spoken in Haiti. It's not all Creole as many think although it's the national tongue). The French spoken in these island is titled as Caribbean French and people from the above mentioned island nations/ countries understand each other. Other than Haitians because I know a few, I would like to meet people from Guadeloupe and Martinique and see what differences I notice and vice versa.
Good discussion everyone.
-Marianopolita.
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If you're talking about the new world, the dominant language would be English, followed by Spanish, Portuguese, then French.
As far as europe goes, with spanish not being that important - it's only spoken in one european country. French is spoken in Belgium and Switzerland, german is spoken in austria and switzerland. English, while only pertaining to the UK in europe has become the international business language, it also seems like a good base to have as a second language, being that many people learn it, so its no surprise that spanish isn't given as much importance - however personal preference, I like spanish more than french, and can be more expressive than english. As for spanish being mostly unilingual, not true, many will speak both castillian and catalan, or valenciano(same thing as catalan) or euskadi - its mainly in the south that they would be unilingual, but a large portion of the population is bilingual - probably in its true definition.
As far as europe goes, with spanish not being that important - it's only spoken in one european country. French is spoken in Belgium and Switzerland, german is spoken in austria and switzerland. English, while only pertaining to the UK in europe has become the international business language, it also seems like a good base to have as a second language, being that many people learn it, so its no surprise that spanish isn't given as much importance - however personal preference, I like spanish more than french, and can be more expressive than english. As for spanish being mostly unilingual, not true, many will speak both castillian and catalan, or valenciano(same thing as catalan) or euskadi - its mainly in the south that they would be unilingual, but a large portion of the population is bilingual - probably in its true definition.
Yes, I am referring to other languages other than English that's a given in no specific order. My point was to show that language in general was brought to the New World via colonization in addition to the indigenous languages that were present.
Please realize when you have ONLY 10 minutes to edit, you need to use discernment in a person's post and understand that it's not always an error based on a person's posting history.
-Marianopolita.
True, I honestly was a little surprised - you seem to have deep knowledge of linguistics, so it seemed wierd. I just thought I'd clarify.
As for some people having a better ability to learn languages, even at a later age, I agree, I think that some people have a natural ability, or inclination towards language learning. Much in the same way people will naturally be musically inclined, artisticly inclined, or mathematically inclined. I don't really fall in any of the above categories, except math, but as for languages do learn quicker than most, and when trying to pronounce or say things in other languages - no matter what origin - I always get a look of surprise and a comment along the lines of "that was good!". I know a few other people that pick them up quickly, and can switch back and forth with ease. For instance, after a week of italian class, I had a dream in italian.
As for some people having a better ability to learn languages, even at a later age, I agree, I think that some people have a natural ability, or inclination towards language learning. Much in the same way people will naturally be musically inclined, artisticly inclined, or mathematically inclined. I don't really fall in any of the above categories, except math, but as for languages do learn quicker than most, and when trying to pronounce or say things in other languages - no matter what origin - I always get a look of surprise and a comment along the lines of "that was good!". I know a few other people that pick them up quickly, and can switch back and forth with ease. For instance, after a week of italian class, I had a dream in italian.
Here is one more related article about how to grow a bilingual child:Unraveling how children become bilingual so easily - Yahoo! News
I noticed how true it is about babies recognizing different sounds more easily than adults from speaking to my son in two languages since he was born. He still responds in Russian if he hears even only one word of it.
I noticed how true it is about babies recognizing different sounds more easily than adults from speaking to my son in two languages since he was born. He still responds in Russian if he hears even only one word of it.
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