Second Life

[YtownPolyglot]

This weekend, a friend of mine mentioned that he chose to learn Portuguese because he had a Brazilian friend on the Second Life website who spoke English well. My friend is a native speaker of English with a joint Spanish and Italian major. I got my BA in French ages ago, and I am also trying to learn Brazilian Portuguese on my own.

Can anybody here tell me more about Second Life and how it might enhance my language learning?

[Stefan]

It was almost marketed as the real life version of Matrix / Sword Art Online (before SAO existed) but it's basically a traditional (voice) chat in "new" design. You create an avatar and walk around in a digital world where you can talk with people. Sadly it's mostly known here for its controversies and the fact that a Swedish city (Malmö) spent $134000 to create a virtual copy before realising that no one uses it. Here are two videos to give you an idea of what it looks like:





In terms of language learning, you get the chance to talk with native speakers in your target language.

[Cainntear]

While I was studying languages at distance with the Open University, I volunteered to take part in a study that used Second Life as an alternative for virtual classrooms. I much, much preferred it to the type of virtual classroom we had on the course, but I've never seen any mainstream company try to use it that way.

[Teango]

If youʻre interested in exploring Second Life for language learning and practice, I recommend checking out the free weekly community activities scheduled on this useful site: Virtlantis.