Another reason to learn Spanish

windeguy

Platinum
Jul 10, 2004
42,087
5,914
113
Interesting topic. And don't forget computer programming "languages".

I used to speak French (not what Canadians speak, the other version from Paris) . Much better than I will probably ever speak Dominican Spanish or any other form of Spanish, but that probably doesn't count any more.
 

La Rubia

Bronze
Jan 1, 2010
1,336
28
0
Interesting, thanks for posting the link.

Most studies usually focus on younger people, I like the effects on aging.

Bilingualism?s effects also extend into the twilight years. In a recent study of 44 elderly Spanish-English bilinguals, scientists led by the neuropsychologist Tamar Gollan of the University of California, San Diego, found that individuals with a higher degree of bilingualism ? measured through a comparative evaluation of proficiency in each language ? were more resistant than others to the onset of dementia and other symptoms of Alzheimer?s disease: the higher the degree of bilingualism, the later the age of onset.
 

imfromda305

New member
Dec 9, 2011
306
0
0
I'm finally finished learning Spanish, now when talking to people here it seems I should've learned an other type of language.. it's called DOMINICAN! :dead:
 

pelaut

Bronze
Aug 5, 2007
1,089
33
48
www.ThornlessPath.com
As usual, the perpetually "know better than the rest of you" NYT gets it wrong. The article states:
"Researchers, educators and policy makers long considered a second language to be an interference, cognitively speaking, that hindered a child’s academic and intellectual development." BS.

In fact, it has had broad acceptance since the 1940s that languages learned before puberty expand cognitive function that lasts a lifetime. Not so good after puberty, but still worthwhile. I learned six after puberty. My grandson learned three before, and at 14 is working on his fifth.

Languages learned before puberty get the added benefit of being accent free and put into the mother's language locus of the brain. Also, the more languages learned before puberty, the more complex is the development of the facial, throat and tongue neuromuscular systems, and one can therefore learn additional languages with less accent — but word retrieval is associative rather than direct.

Whether ideology or science, the NYT, like the BBC, ceased being the "anything of record" sometime in the 70s.
 
May 29, 2006
10,265
200
0
One of my co-workers in Japan was Dutch and his wife was French. They spoke English to each other. Their five-year old kid spoke French, Dutch, English AND Japanese. They often had him translate from Japanese into English.

One thing I've noticed in the restaurant business is a growing number of Hispanics working in Korean storefronts. I'm not sure if the Koreans are learning Spanish or the Hispanics are learning Korean...

I also knew an African guy who told me a story of meeting a white guy back in Ivory Coast. The white guy asked him how many language he spoke. He thought about it for a bit: French, Swahili, English and some tribal languages. Six. Then he ask the white guy how many languages he spoke and he said just English. The African guy went, "Ahhh! AMERICAN!"