Comments on: Bilingual children learn language rules more efficiently than monolinguals

By: Auck

Auck — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 14:07:40 +0000

@Eric makes a good point about the languages of the bilingual children. Different languages have different proportions of AAB and ABA word structures: http://theadventuresofauck.blogspot.com/2009/12/processing-two-structures.html Also, about the levels of bilingualism in the world, see here: http://theadventuresofauck.blogspot.com/2009/11/levels-of-bilingualism.html

By: Eric

Eric — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 08:50:51 +0000

Hm.
Can we draw any correlations between countries who are generally “monolingual” vs. “multilingual” and their effect/impact/contribution/development in the world? If so, is this due at all or in part to those linguistic practices as a whole?
Does having multiple languages impede communication and thus impede development of the whole?
One more thing got me thinking in the article. What languages were represented in the “bilingual” children? Was there any correlation between the language’s distance apart in language trees and their improved ability? Would there be furthur performance discrepancy between an English-Spanish environment and an English-Chinese environment?

By: Kevin

Kevin — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 14:57:29 +0000

@matt: Where ever did you get the idea that monolingualism is the natural state of humans? Just because it happens to be that way in eg. the US doesn’t mean it goes for the rest of the world. In many places, the “natural” state is to be bilingual (or tri-…); look at India, Indonesia, etc. etc. There are a lot of places where people grow up to be bilingual simply because the next village has a different language (I read somewhere about a place where it was only considered proper to marry someone who spoke a different language from yours, probably Papua New Guinea…).
Anyway, the point is that if you do grow up in a place where you hear two languages from people who you have to deal with (ie. within the group of parents, friends, educators there are at least two languages), any normal human will learn both. It just happens, without any more trouble than learning one language. The fact that many cultures now are monolingual is to be considered “accidental” – it has completely different causes.
And of course, enforcing one language is a great way of ensuring that minority groups stay subdued; this has happened in a lot of societies over the years (eg. in the past the Sámi people of northern Norway were not allowed to speak Sámi at school, nor keep any of their other symbols of their own culture – fortunately this is not the situation today).

By: Gerrit

Gerrit — Tue, 14 Jul 2009 12:00:35 +0000

I just got back from Italy and it always amazes me that a lot of people there hardly speak any English. This makes it hard for me to talk to people, since I can’t understand any Italian, even with the help of Google Translate (most sentences sound to me like one very long word).
I’ve run into the same problem in France.
I’m from The Netherlands, where we get taught English in school from an early age. I think other countries should follow this example, it would solve a lot of problems and apparently it’s even good for the development of the brain.
It would also help a lot if these countries would stop dubbing TV shows and movies, Transformers: Vendetta del Caduto just doesn’t sound right.

By: ex linguist

ex linguist — Mon, 13 Jul 2009 17:05:45 +0000

My understanding of worldwide bilingualism is that not so long ago the majority of people would have been bilingual due to trading. It’s possible that the rise of the nation state has led to the reduction in languages worldwide and the reduction of bilingualism.
Bilingualism is also a tricky thing to define. I can speak a tiny bit of french but don’t consider myself bilingual. At what point does one become bilingual? When you can arrange travel? (Common) When you can understand most of the utterances you hear? (Less common) When the native speakers of the 2nd language can’t tell that you’re not a native speaker?(rare. This of course does not include the complexities of when the 2nd language was learned.
By the way, this is an excellent blog.

By: Lab Rat

Lab Rat — Sun, 12 Jul 2009 10:13:08 +0000

@matt: “why is it not the case that the natural state of human communities is to possess at least 2 languages?”
How would these be defined as ‘two languages’? Take for example the idea of having ‘french A’ and ‘french B’. With everyone using them to communicate with each other, it would just become one language. French. The words would be used interchangably and grammer rules would merge.
Hightened learning ability is not necessary for continued survival and reproduction, therefore does not confir an evolutionary advantage. And as most human brains are, at base, a little lazy, learning only one set of language rules tends to be prefered, unless necessity, or personal preference, dictates the learning of two.

By: Al West

Al West — Sun, 12 Jul 2009 09:58:56 +0000

“Our school based language learning has conditioned people to not like languages.”
I went through the state school system here in the UK and came out the other side proficient in French and German, and I’ve gone on to study Chinese, Mongolian and Indonesian at university. I love learning languages, and I’m pretty good at it. I’d say that reducing the complex issue of why people in English-speaking countries don’t learn other languages to the simple idea of language classes in schools being boring is misleading. And how do you propose to change it? Languages can’t be learned without instruction, unless you live in an environment where the language is spoken all the time without alternatives, and even then, that leads to a skewed development. I know quite a few ex-pats in places like Taiwan who have learned to speak reasonably well and who may even have a convincing accent, but whose grammar is shoddy (in terms of being able to construct sentences themselves) and whose reading and writing, beyond basics (like “toilet”), is abysmal.
And having sat through languages classes in German schools, I can tell you that they’re just as boring as anywhere, but their English and French are generally very good.
“why is it not the case that the natural state of human communities is to possess at least 2 languages?”
It depends on what you consider to be a language (as opposed to a dialect), but in some ways it is a natural state. Certainly, in a lot of developing countries it’s the case. In the Philippines, most people speak at least rudimentary English, Filipino (Tagalog), and whatever the local language is. Children might have a Cebuano-speaking mother and a Waray-speaking mother, and at school they speak English and Tagalog. A lot of Africa is like that too. You could also consider the state of language in a lot of Indonesia – not only do people speak Indonesian reasonably well, but also the local language; and not only that, but with languages like Javanese and Balinese, there are three “levels of language”, dependant on who you’re speaking to, each with a different set of vocabulary (completely different, in most cases). So someone who speaks standard Indonesian and Javanese might speak four languages already.
It’s interesting that you use French as an example, because until the late 19th century, most French citizens didn’t speak standard French as a first language. There used to be a lot of variation, and no doubt people spoke both standard French and the local language to a high degree of proficiency. Italy was the same. Monolingalism is not the norm, in a sense. Or at least, it wasn’t the norm until very recently, when media divided neatly along national lines.

By: Air Yeezy

Air Yeezy — Sun, 12 Jul 2009 09:11:18 +0000

I must say this is a great article i enjoyed reading it keep the good work.Because languages is so important in this society.

By: Steve Kaufmann

Steve Kaufmann — Sun, 12 Jul 2009 05:13:44 +0000

Most people learn the languages they need or want to learn, naturally. Our school based language learning has conditioned people to not like languages. This needs to change.

By: drcharles

drcharles — Sun, 12 Jul 2009 04:48:51 +0000

very interesting i agree. as you probably know the US is rapidly becoming a dual english-spanish speaking country. despite my proficiency in spanish, i started learning too late to ever become fluent… now i have one more excuse for my stunted brain development