>What language(s) are you learning?>Ask questions about your target language!>Help people who want to learn a new language!>Participate in translation challenges or make your own!>Make frens!**Comprehensible Input Wiki**https://comprehensibleinputwiki.org/wiki/Main_PageRead the wiki:https://4chanint.miraheze.org/wiki/The_Official_/int/_How_to_Learn_A_Foreign_Language_Guide_WikiUseful links:>Free language‐learning book archive:https://mega.nz/folder/INlRkAQC#CthKI9-_kmDNyrOx12Ojbw>Books on linguistics and language courses:https://mega.nz/#F!Ad8DkLoI!jj_mdUDX_ay-8D9l3-DbnQ>Assorted language resources and some nice visual guides:https://pastebin.com/ACEmVqua>Torrents with more resources than you’ll ever need for 30 plus languages:https://archive(dot)ph/x0dFH>Russianon’s list of comprehensible input resources:https://docs.google.com/document/d/1wXd0V32TjCFsr1-F_en_lA4MI-i7JtyYf26cWLtPRec>Massive collection of textbooks on various languages, sorted by familyhttps://theswissbay.ch/pdf/Books/Linguistics/>/lang/ inpoot torrentshttps://rentry.org/inpoot>Refold Anki deckshttps://rentry.org/refold>Non-English piracy siteshttps://fmhy.net/non-englishPrevious Thread: >>221449367Previous Challenge: >>221449426
Translation challenge - Alone on a Friday night>EasyI stayed home on Friday night.Rain hit the windows all evening.My phone stayed silent for hours.I made coffee and watched old videos.The apartment felt strangely quiet.>MediumWhile everyone else seemed to be out enjoying themselves, I wandered aimlessly through the internet for hours.I thought about calling someone, but it already felt too late and too awkward.The empty streets outside made the city feel much larger than usual.After replaying the same songs several times, I realized I was listening more to memories than to music.Even the glow of the monitor began to feel cold after midnight.>HardWhat disturbed me most was not being alone itself, but the growing suspicion that nobody had even noticed my absence.Although I kept switching between games, videos, and social media, nothing managed to hold my attention for more than a few minutes.By the time the first hints of sunrise appeared beyond the buildings, the entire night had dissolved into a blur of restless distraction.I wondered whether the desire to connect with others had slowly been replaced by the safer habit of observing them from a distance.The silence of the apartment seemed to amplify every unresolved thought I had successfully ignored during the week.
>THREAD RULE:THREAD RULE:>THREAD RULE:No indecisive questions about which language you should learn. If you can't decide in 5 minutes, then you shouldn't learn a language.
>>221514482Comfy workstation, just a bit of space needed, some low furniture would be useful for books, for example, so they were within reach but don't get in the way on the desk >>221514615I support this
guys I can't figure out whether I want to learn Jamaican patois, Inuktitut or Esperanto what should I pick
>>221514615I love portugal
>>221516533Esperanto, out of the three it's the least terrible of them. There's books for learning Esperanto, and literature in the language to read; there's seemingly odd, autistic weirdos that (seem) to know the language. Jamaican patois has writings on dried out treebark, I suppose. Inuktitut is spoken by eskimos, who have writings carved into walrus tusks, which is quite oriental in utility and noveltyHope this helped, remember the thread rule
Daily reminder that if you don't read regularly you aren't serious about learning. Post your current reads.>>221514615Anyone who asks should be forced to learn French. Jokes aside I agree with you, if someone doesn't already have a gut feeling for what they want to do probably won't get very far. Though there is no shame in trying something and then quitting either, better to do that than just sit around and feel anguish about it.
If you already have a B2 listening level in your TL, is it a good idea to listen to podcasts at 1.2x speed to increase automaticity?
Once I finish Deutsch Nach Der Naturmethode what language level will I be? What is my next move, should I read a textbook or a basic book?
>>221517851that's probably a good idea only if its content you would perfectly understand otherwise at normal speed
>>221517851>>221519173iirc they do second-pass listening at increased speeds pretty extensively at the DLI so there is precedent for it
>>221519072It's hard to say. Just browse through some readers until you find a level where you're comfortable and work your way up from there.https://rentry.org/german-readers
Bump
>>221493360sorry for not answering, haven't been using 4chan much. I did memorize katakana and hiragana and did a premade Japanese deck for like a few days but I haven't kept up with it, thankfully.I'm still doing my Chinese reps. Motivation is wanning because I'm getting swamped with emotional and physical issues IRL, but hopefully once I get over some stuff I can inpoooot more.
Should I abandon Japanese for German because German is more useful for an English speaker? (Approx 14 months into Japanese over a longer period of time)
>>221522310are you feeling burnt out with Japanese? Are you not having fun with any content in that language?
Which language shouldnt I learn
>>221522408I like the content, but I don't think it's a very useful language. Japan's economy has been shit since the 90s and it isn't really getting any better. It's also the only language where its spoken. Germany is spoken in three major countries (Germany, Switzerland, Austria), all of which are highly developed with pretty good economies. If Japan was as easy as Spanish this would be less than an issue, but I don't know if putting 4000 hours into it is worth it ultimately. But sunk cost fallacy has made me just want to "finish" it, to put it one way.
>>221522543you know you can just learn Japanese and German, right? There is nothing stopping you from doing both, unless you are planning on dying within the next 5 years you have more than enough time.
>>221522762Do you think that if I dedicate a lot of time for the next 1/2 years, I can get to a somewhat passable level in Japanese enough to start focusing more on German instead?
Is there anything like that >>221519534 but for different languages?
>>221522965https://tadoku.org/japanese/en/free-books-en/
>>221522953just do both at the same time
>>221523152That sounds inefficient
>>221523263its notyou can just study one of them for an hourand then the other one for an hourit is a systematic task. it doesnt matter how much time you spend doing it each day, it just matters that you do it each day and it is inevidable that given x amount of time you will know the language.just lock in for the long haul.
>>221523320once you reach the point where you know enough of the language to read a book in the language, you can transfer your study hour into a reading and studying hour which will increase your knowledge of the language and your knowledge of the contents of the book.don't think of it as in "i am trying to finish japanese" but rather japanese is a part of me now.
>>221523024Hm, thanks
bump.
you can do it brothers
>>221523320>you can just study one of them for an hour>and then the other one for an houryou will literally never learn japanese with one hour of exposure a day. no one in human history has ever learned japanese on only one hour a day.
>>221522543Japan has more people than Germany, Switzerland, and Austria combined, so I don't think the number of countries is really a factor unless you're talking about English, Spanish, French, and Arabic.The main question is what do you want the language for. Not in a vague sense of "learning this language might be good for the future" but what you actually see yourself using it for. If you actually see yourself working in or traveling to the EU or consuming a lot of German media, learn German. If you see yourself working in or traveling to Japan or consuming a lot of Japanese media, learn Japanese. If both, consider how interested you actually are in each and which takes priority. >>221522953I've been studying Japanese for 4 years at a quite slow and relaxed pace. I am around N3 level and can mostly understand simpler anime and games. If you really lock in and study consistently, you could probably get to my level in like 2.5 years. >>221530218That's not far from what I did. I've had some days where I've studied for like 3-4 hours and some where I didn't touch Japanese at all.
>>221517193We've got the same language combo.For jap I'm currently reading また、同じ夢を見ていた. It's also got an audiobook so I can read a chapter, then listen to it again for listening practice.It's the first real novel I've been able to read in Jap. Up until now I've been stuck reading some very bad light novels because that's all that I could find at my reading level. For French I've been slowly working through the Complete Collection of Arsene Lupin. They're easy and entertaining enough for light reading. Although I've been neglecting French in favor of Japanese for a while now so I don't read it as much as I should.
>>221514482When I go to HelloTalk it's usually a lot of people in their 20s having fun. People in their 30s who are actually learning and seldom people in their 40s or 50s.The thing is, all the 40~50 year olds there are Japanese women speaking English. I wonder what's going on with this demographic
>>221530473>>221530402I don't have any immediate plans to leave the United States to be honest. When I think of "number of countries," I mean the economic standing of those countries. Germany and Switzerland are countries with a decent amount of economic potential even if they're choked by EU regulations. I could see myself living in the EU potentially. I could not see myself living in Japan at all except as a refugee. Japan is too insular. Living in a society like that would be exceedingly lonely for me. And on top of that their economy is dead in the water, and is getting worse day by day. I hope that China's rise will be able to stimulate their economy again though that is far-fetched. Speaking of China, I thought about learning Mandarin but I've heard it's not particularly useful.
>>221530856Fuck my life I didn't mean to respond to the brazilian
>>221530856English is the only useful language. Chinese is the most useful language of all the useless languages though.
>>221514574>I stayed home on Friday night.星期五夜晚我在家>Rain hit the windows all evening.晚上雨打过这些窗户>My phone stayed silent for hours.一些小时我的电话是安静>I made coffee and watched old videos.我做了咖啡和看了一些旧视频>The apartment felt strangely quiet.感觉公寓奇怪的安静
>>221522507English
>>221522507Polish
>>221522965Surprisingly, no. You can find graded readers for the most popular languages, but no one seems to have bothered to consolidate them into a single list and difficulty scale, each publisher has their own subjective system.This German list I copied from an obscure russian site and I added some Andre Klein books that were missing. Tracking down readers is hard enough, but audiobooks are almost impossible to find, yet almost every book in that list has audio as well. Probably the best German resource in my opinion.I will try to make a Swedish list because they use a fairly standard system so it won't be too hard to order them by difficulty, but I've had zero luck finding audio for them.
>>221534488Done.https://rentry.org/swedish-readers
asking the important questions
>>221522953You can do a lot of progress in a couple of years of concentrated effort. I went from zero knowledge to reading manga aimed at adults and light novels with relative ease in two that time frame, plus another year for regular novels. How advanced are you currently? >>221530443Nice, good job getting that far! I didn't find the typical light novels to be particularly interesting myself either. I read a few volumes of キノの旅 which were kinda comfy but most of what I've seen is trash. JP/FR seems to be a fairly common combo though, especially with people interested in litterature.
>>221532134>星期五夜晚我在家Word order in Chinese is quite strict. It is almost always subject - time - place - verb - object (complement). Here the sentence should be:我 (subject) 星期五 晚上 (time: 夜晚 is the noun, 晚上 is the time phrase version) 呆 (verb: stay) 在家 (object)>晚上雨打过这些窗户过 is for something that HAS happened in the past. I.e. 我去过法国 "I have been to France" Vs 我去了法国 "I went to France". Chinese doesn't always need you to translate the plural, 这些 is unnecessary. Correct: 雨拍了窗户一整个下午 (here, the time phrase 一整个下午 is the verb complement).>一些小时我的电话是安静几个小时 for a few hours电话 is the abstract idea of a "telephone line", mobile phone is 手机 and landline phone is 电话机我的电话机好几个小时一直安静/都没出声音>我做了咖啡和看了一些旧视频和 is only used to link nouns and nouns. To link sentences or phrases use 也 or just a comma. You usually don't need 了 twice in the sentence, the first one already shows the entire thing is in the past.我做了咖啡看旧视频>感觉公寓奇怪的安静公寓里感觉安静得奇怪
>>221537762>It is almost always subject - time - place - verb - object (complement).I thought time-subject-place-verb was permitted? At least ...的时候 sort of sentences seem to go that way and I often see ...天 first.>电话 is the abstract idea of a "telephone line"Dang is the textbook just lying to me?
Just rubbed one out to Lily from Duolingo, she keeps me motivated
>>221538032that is more like topic-comment structure... 星期五晚上,我呆在家. 清朝灭亡的时候,我们跑到了库伦去. It is the combination of two sentences, not one sentence.>电话It does mean telephone, like you say 接电话 打电话 挂电话 but you wouldn't call your mobile phone a 电话 it's a 手机, and a landline handset is usually 电话机.I guess English just uses "phone" for all of these things but in Chinese they make more distinctions. So yes the textbook is oversimplifying.
>>221522965There's one for French on rutracker.
>>221522965Most languages dont have graded readers listed, but:https://comprehensibleinputwiki.org/wiki/
"Learner's podcasts", "graded readers" etc. are literally humiliation rituals, how do you even suffer through this slop.Native content or fuck off.
>>221540580Learning anything requires humiliation to some degree. You first have to admit you don't know something and then try and fail repeatedly for many hours.
>>221540580Sometimes I think about starting a new language but I don't think I can handle sitting through another 6 months of beginner podcasts
>>221540580the satisfaction of being able to actually understand themanyway don't tell anyone you're learning a language until you can at least attempt native content
>>221541779Then don't? You can just take it all the way with native media content. Just pick something action oriented that gives visual context to what's being said to start with.
>>221536037respect >>221539755>>221540456Thanks
bump
>>221539755Also an underrated source of graded reading and listening material which I rarely see mentioned are exam prep books for exams like the DELF. Starting at the b1 level they normally have adapted articles which are quite interesting.
>>221541779just do narrow domain input on something you already like and are familiar with
>>221542856>Just pick something action oriented that gives visual context to what's being said to start with.have you actually gotten to a solid level of comprehension in a non indo-european language by doing this
>>221548689Yes, I've done no listening practice apart from a beginner textbook in Japanese that wasn’t native media. And at this point I can comfortably understand the typical anime, drama show or video game without subs. I started with simpler stuff like non non biyori and card captor sakura. Usually I would read the manga first, then watch the corresponding episodes with Japanese subs and then rewatch them later without subs. And of course a lot of reading to build vocab, pic related the last 2 years worth of reading, visual novels and pirated scans (another 50~ volumes) obviously excluded.
Question bump. Is it possible to learn tones (like in Mandarin, Cantonese or Thai) on your own as an unc?
