"Flow Doesn't Lead to Mastery"

[blaurebell]

Flow happens at the local grocery store but I wouldn't call it mastery.

Oh yes, it's mastery of the "grocery store" interaction template. Surprisingly I only fail at this in German supermarkets. I also fail at "Call strangers on the phone", "Don't piss off people who decide about your future" and a few other essentials I guess only people who fail at such things will notice that there is anything to master here.

Accurate flow is required for C2 level but what you're describing here is being able to speak like Cicero and write like Conrad. I could have mentioned another writer but Conrad is a good example of a non-native writer who, to put it mildly, was no Cicero in oral expression.

To be honest, I've always taken university level listening, reading, writing and speaking skills of a humanities student as a yard stick for C2. Conrad's writing skills still go beyond that because there is also story telling involved and that's an entirely separate skill. Otherwise, I think it matches. Or maybe I'm aiming too high here? I've never taken such tests, so don't really know what's required.

Cicero doesn't quite match either, because of another skill we're ignoring: rhetoric and public speaking skills! I petrify in front of large groups - 20 is fine, but make it 120 and I start stammering in any language! Basic levels of those skills are definitely needed for university students - holding presentations, defending a position in a discussion, that sort of thing. Still not Cicero though!

You're right, 40,000h skill training is probably enough to make you a Conrad meets Cicero with the level of education of a university lecturer in film studies, which is of course a bit overkill for C2 A less crazy question is probably whether 2500h on each skill are enough to get to C2. As I said, I believe I spent much more time on my English, but can't say with certainty when I left the path to C2 and embarked on the Conrad meets Cicero meets Film studies lecturer madness. Probably when I was already taking Film Studies courses at an English university

By the way, speaking skills "lagging behind" written production is very common actually, even among natives! My brother is one of the most well-read people I know, but since he never went to university himself, he never had a need to convince people of his level of education. His spoken language therefore happens in a completely different register than what he reads and writes. He sometimes complains that even my rusty, somewhat halting German is better than his way of speaking. Not sure I agree, but well, it's at least his perception comparing speaking abilities among native speakers.

Quite in general: I'm not quite sure every native speaker could pass a C2 test.

[aokoye]

Flow happens at the local grocery store but I wouldn't call it mastery.

Oh yes, it's mastery of the "grocery store" interaction template. Surprisingly I only fail at this in German supermarkets. I also fail at "Call strangers on the phone", "Don't piss off people who decide about your future" and a few other essentials I guess only people who fail at such things will notice that there is anything to master here.

I think you make a really good point Blaurebell. Flow happens only because we learned the appropriate ways in which to do things. Using a language related example, emailing my professors is often a situation where I'm in "a state of flow." I know what register to use for the specific professors I'm emailing and for the topic I'm emailing about. The register I use with professor A is going to be different than with professor B. The register I use when asking for a letter of recommendation from professor C is going to be different than the register I use when I'm asking her a question about something more mundane but still having to do with school.

This is something that is taught and learned. It's also something that L1 and L2 speakers need to learn if they want to have amical relationships with their professors. I would argue that English language learners, at least at my university (who are in English as a second language classes), are often taught it a lot more explicitly than L1 speakers. That said, I have had a number of professors who explicitly tell their students what to put in the subject line of an email if you want to send them an email and a few who have offered to go into greater depth, regarding academic discourse, in their office hours.