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An organizational note: over the course of this book, I'm going to introduce you to a lot of tools and resources. If you ever forget which one is which, you'll find them all in the Glossary of Tools and Terms at the end of this book, along with a brief explanation. With that said, let's get started.
I intend to teach you how to learn, rather than what to learn. We can't discuss every word, grammatical system, and pronunciation system that exists, so you'll need some additional resources specific to your language of choice. Speaking of which, you should probably begin by choosing a language to learn.
Choose a language based upon employment opportunities, difficulty, availability of resources, or number of speakers, but in the end, choose a language that you like . A reader on my website once asked me whether he should learn Russian or French. His relatives spoke Russian, he loved the culture, but he was worried about the difficulty. French seemed like a safe alternative.
Never settle for safe when you can have fun instead. Your language will become a constant companion, living in your head. If you like your language, then you'll have fun studying it, and when you have fun, you learn faster.
You have many resources at your disposal.
Get yourself some books. Someone sat down and spent months (or years, heaven forbid) organizing the information you need, and you can have all of that effort in the palm of your hand for $15–$25. Thank you, Herr Gutenberg. In Appendix 1 , I list my favorite picks for the top eleven languages you're most likely to be studying. If your language isn't there, go to my website, Fluent-Forever.com . I aim to have book recommendations for as many languages as people want to learn.
A good grammar book will walk you through your language's grammar in a thoughtful, step-by-step manner. 1 On the way, it will introduce you to a thousand words or so, give you a bunch of examples and exercises, and provide you with an answer key. You will skip 90 percent of the exercises in the book, but having them around will save you a lot of time once we begin to learn grammar. If the book gives you“Englishy”pronunciation for each word ( Bonjour: bawn-JURE, Tschüss: chewss), I give you permission to burn it and find a different one. Walking into a Parisian cafe and saying“bawn-JURE”is a good way to get ignored indefinitely by the waiter. If your new book comes with a CD, then so much the better.
There are two pitfalls here to avoid. First, avoid books systematically detailing every single solitary rule and detail and exception, all at once, in an uncontrollable torrent of grammatical despair. I used to love these books—until I tried learning from them. These are technical tomes that lay out the entire grammatical system of a language in giant flowcharts. They're lovely reference manuals but are very difficult to use in a step-by-step manner.
Second, be wary of most classroom books, especially those without an answer key. Books designed for classrooms are often sparse on explanations, because they expect that the teacher will be able to handle any confusion. You'll often have more luck with a self-study book.
A phrase book is a wonderful reference, as it's difficult to find handy phrases like“Am I under arrest?”and“Where are you taking me?”in a dictionary. Phrase books from the Lonely Planet company are cheap and come with a tiny, extremely practical dictionary in the back. We'll use this dictionary when we learn our first words, because it's a lot easier (and faster) to skim through than a real dictionary. We'll grudgingly allow“bawn-JURE”here but only because there are no phrase books without it.
A frequency dictionary typically contains the most important five thousand words of your target language, arranged in order of frequency. (The number one word in English, the, shows up once every twenty-five words.) These books are amazing, with lovingly picked examples and translations. They'll save you tons of time and they take so much work to compile that we should be throwing money and flowers at the feet of their authors. There are some online frequency lists, but they're not as good as the paper versions. Frequency dictionaries don't exist in every language yet, but if your language has one, you win. Get it.
A pronunciation guide will walk you through the entire pronunciation system of your language, with the help of recordings and diagrams of your mouth and tongue. For many languages, you can find guidebooks with CDs devoted entirely to pronunciation. They're wonderful resources and well worth the purchase. In addition, I've made it my personal mission to develop computerized pronunciation trainers in as many languages as I can. These trainers can do a few neat things that textbooks can't, and we'll discuss them in depth in Chapter 3 . You won't be able to find a guidebook or trainer in every language, but when they exist, they're extraordinarily helpful.
You also want to find two dictionaries. It is up to you whether you find them online or in print. The first is a traditional bilingual dictionary (e.g., English-French/French-English), with accurate pronunciation listed for every word. Again, if you see“bawn-JURE,”burn it. If you see funny symbols (e.g., [bᴐ̃.ʒuʁ]) , keep it. We'll make friends with the International Phonetic Alphabet in Chapter 3 . The second is a monolingual dictionary (e.g., French-French), which has actual definitions (e.g., in French) rather than translations. You'll never see“bawn-JURE”in one of these, so don't worry about finding your lighter.
You may also want a thematic vocabulary book . These books arrange the words in your language by theme: words about cars, words for food, medical words, and so on. They're handy for customizing your vocabulary (we'll talk about them in detail in Chapter 6 ).
If you've already spent some time studying your target language, adjust your shopping list as follows:
First, if you already have a grammar book, make sure that you actually like it and that it's sufficiently challenging. If not, get a new one that fits your level.
Second, if you don't have a phrase book, they're worth having. Even if you're already reading books in your target language, you might not know how to ask about business hours or rental car insurance. A phrase book will let you look up sentences for many day-to-day situations that don't show up in books.
Third, you probably don't have a frequency dictionary yet, and you'll use it much earlier than a beginner. Go get one.
Last, hold off on a pronunciation book or trainer until the end of Chapter 3 . You'll have a better idea then as to whether you'll need one.
The Internet is filling up with free grammar guides, pronunciation guides, frequency lists, and dictionaries of all shapes and sizes. The quality varies drastically from site to site and changes daily. You can learn a language for free on the net, but you'll be able to do it faster if you combine the best Internet resources with well-written books. I list my favorite Internet resources on my website ( Fluent-Forever.com/language-resources ), and we'll be discussing the most important websites—Google Images and the new language exchange communities (e.g., Lang-8, italki, Verbling)—throughout this book.
If you need faster results and have some funds to spare, you can speed up your learning with private tutors (who are extremely affordable at italki.com ) or intensive programs at home and abroad. The fastest route to fluency is also the least convenient: intensive immersion programs will provide twenty-plus weekly hours of class time, ten to twenty weekly hours of homework, and a strict no-English policy. You'll leave with a comfortable proficiency in your language of choice in exchange for two months of your life and a wad of cash. Some of them have generous financial aid policies if you apply early enough, so they may be within your reach if you lack the funds but have the time.
In this book, we're going to discuss the process of learning a language on your own, outside of the classroom. But if you're already enrolled in a class (or if there are some good affordable classes offered nearby), then be sure to check out Appendix 6 : How to Use This Book with Your Classroom Language Course.
In the coming pages, we will knock down language's challenges one by one. I'll introduce you to a memorization system that will allow you to remember thousands of facts effortlessly and permanently. Then we'll determine which facts to learn. I'll guide you step-by-step through your language's sounds, words, and grammar. Every step of the way, we'll use your memorization system to learn more rapidly. Finally, we'll develop your listening and reading comprehension, as we pave a path toward fluent speech.
Along the way, I'll show you all my favorite toys. I like finding ways to make life more efficient, even when finding a faster way to do something takes more time than simply doing it. Someday the month I spent memorizing a hundred composers’ birth dates and death dates will pay off in time savings, but it hasn't quite yet. 2 When it comes to efficiency in language learning, I got lucky. I needed to learn four languages to fluency for my singing. Beyond these, I want to learn Yiddish, Hebrew, and Hungarian to speak with my relatives, and I'm fascinated by Japanese. With so many languages to learn, I could spend an enormous amount of time looking for efficiency and still justify the time expense. As a result, I have a chest full of neat tools and toys to play with. We'll begin with my favorite one: the Spaced Repetition System (SRS).
1. They'll do it, for the most part, in English. Yes, this breaks my no-English rule, but you know what they say about rules and breaking things.
2. But every time I type out a recital program and don't have to look up a composer's dates (Johann Strauss Jr., 1825–1899!), I win back a little more time.