French / Dutch / Wolof

[eplumb]

Well, i like the new place!

I hadn't posted on the old forum since January or so, and had started lurking language learning subreddits while just trusting myself to know what I'm doing. I guess the big story is that I've started working on Wolof but am also in the position that I might be learning any of about 5 other languages instead, so I'm not putting huge amounts of effort into it. I have been focusing a lot on gathering resources for French/Dutch/ Wolof and any others I may want to learn during my two years in Senegal. I will be in a remote area and will have to travel to cybercafes to use internet, so I need to be well prepared. I have acquired lots of French films/BD/radio/TV but it is very frustrating to "acquire" Dutch language content. I guess there just isn't that much. The idea is to make a start at Latin or Greek while abroad as these won't interfere as much with acquiring the native languages.

I've got three weeks left in the states and am visiting two French speaking groups each week which is a good time. Americans have such terrible French accents! But some of the folks have a good command of the language and have been working on it their whole lives; always things to learn. My mom has volunteered me to help with weekly Dutch lessons at the Dutch American society which is fun times. Both languages seem to be holding up alright. I still hate writing in both of them but its the skill I value the least, so...

I am liking this fiddling with languages thing enough that I am thinking about getting a Masters in Linguistics when I am finished (in 2017) at a Dutch or Belgian university. I don't particularly like Amsterdam (mostly it seems expensive) and am thinking about Groningen in the north. I don't want to be a linguist, I just want some time to refine my thinking. (Also thinking about learning IPA while I'm in Senegal...I wish there was a free Anki deck worthy of the task)

I am very excited to report back on the Peace Corps 3 month language boot camp and what I think of it, but I've still got three weeks before it starts.
It's funny in a way though; we have been advised to use Duolingo for French, which is just not that useful for me right now, and as for Wolof, they gave us three conversational recordings with a transcript and translation...Pretty damn lazy as preparation. I don't regret investing in the French language Wolof materials I have (like 200 euros worth) but i wish someone could throw me a couple amphetamines so I could sit down and process them all into Anki decks. Its so weird starting a more obscure language and really feeling the desire to create my own resources. I really enjoy the challenge but my tech user level is kind of low and I am pretty frustrated with Anki. I recently created a deck of French expressions and it works great on my computer but won't load the sound or image files on my tablet! O well, anyways, till next time

[iguanamon]

Welcome to the forum, eplumb! I am looking forward to reading about the Peace Corps language learning and following your Wolof learning. This is definitely a "less commonly studied" language. When you reach your third post, forum software will allow you to flesh out your profile more.

[eplumb]

Thanks!
I guess I'll just throw some more thoughts out for myself while I'm here.

One realization I'm coming into for myself is that consistently doing what is easy and enjoyable is better than doing nothing. I really came to that through my Yoga practice and have just started applying it to other skills like my violin playing and language learning to good result. I mean, I think any system we come into as learners is just made to last for a short whole and be replaced by something that better meets our needs. So for the moment at least I am going along this path of lesser resistance. It's also that giving ten or twenty minutes of a fresh mind to a task seems to achieve the highest ratio of cost to benefit. I have benefited a lot of from slow parsing of sentences and consciously decoding language into various parts of speech to understand their relationships, powering through hours of study at a time but I just don't think its of long-term effectiveness for me in my life right now. Its underbelly is burnout.

Lately this has involved mostly listening, shadowing and singing ; this is something I can carry around with on my tiny mp3 while biking, walking, etc.
I have been learning the songs of Stromae, and as for Dutch, well, some of "The Opposites" but I am not too into their music overall. I like the singing! Its something I've never done before in my life and I find it helps with naturalness and pronunciation. It is not the end-all but it is something I joyfully spend 10 or 20 minutes doing each day, first using the printed lyrics as a guide. Beside that I have been shadowing the same podcast (one French, one Dutch) for well...4 months? It is basically an excercise in seeing what percent of the podcast I can get out of my mouth before the hosts. It is really weird! I probably should move onto new podcasts, I have basically memorized these two. Besides that, well very scattered one time listens of all kinds of media. Have been reading HP in Dutch and Candide in French but am much more taken by allowing myself to read English, something I hadn't done in the past 9 months. Ellison's Invisible Man is pretty gripping as well some Simone Weil (the irony being that I could just read her in French).

I also would take a moment to recommend two products to any L2 speaking groups, I've had fun with them recently. Both are excellent because they can be used for any and all languages. One product, all languages!
https://www.storycubes.com/
These dice have images on each face that are combined to tell a story; a great challenge and opportunity to be creative.

http://www.lexicarry.com/
This book is filled with comic book like illustrations of scenes bearing empty speach bubbles, as well as taxonomic presentations of vocabulary.

[extralean]

I've met a few wolof speakers in my time, it's a fun language, and I like the sounds of it. However, most of the Senegalese I know speak French; so why do you want to learn both?

T

[Bakunin]

I also would take a moment to recommend two products to any L2 speaking groups, I've had fun with them recently. Both are excellent because they can be used for any and all languages. One product, all languages!
https://www.storycubes.com/
These dice have images on each face that are combined to tell a story; a great challenge and opportunity to be creative.

http://www.lexicarry.com/
This book is filled with comic book like illustrations of scenes bearing empty speach bubbles, as well as taxonomic presentations of vocabulary.

Similarly, there's the excellent workbook Action English Pictures. It has 'English' in its name, but it works for all languages. Here's the product page, and here's my review

[eplumb]

I've met a few wolof speakers in my time, it's a fun language, and I like the sounds of it. However, most of the Senegalese I know speak French; so why do you want to learn both?

T

About 10% the Senegalese population speak French (of course as a second language) and I'll be living there for 27 months, so I guess to have some more conversation with that other 60% that speak Wolof but not French.

I love the Avatar! I am a big Asterix and Obelix fan; for a low-culture aficionado like myself, it presents some pretty interesting insight into the challenges faced by translators.

Similarly, there's the excellent workbook Action English Pictures. It has 'English' in its name, but it works for all languages. Here's the product page, and here's my review

Wow, that looks like even more of what I was hoping for; procedural action based images. I think that stuff like tying shoe laces, brushing teeth, is amazing stuff to learn. It really fits into my intuitions, and what I learned about embodied psychology while at school. Also, doing my Yoga teacher training, it can even be a challenge in English to explain orientation/directions and movements in a sequence. Having the whole causal chain I think helps a lot with remembering too. Its a pricey book tho! I'll probably get it anyways

[extralean]

I'll be living there for 27 months, so I guess to have some more conversation with that other 60% that speak Wolof but not French.

I suppose that's an acceptable reason...

[eplumb]

So...7 weeks into life in Senegal and it has been amazing.
My B2/C1 French turns into super high fluency relative to the French being spoken here, and my ear is picking up the blunter more utilitarian use of the language here. French actually used for more direct communication tends to be so much easier and comfortable.
I have met some Belgians and chatted with Dutch, but I have mostly left the Dutch studying aside (except for singing some rap and occaisional radio listening).
But Wolof!!! It is really fun and, after about 4-5 hours of language class per weekday for the last six weeks, I feel like I have a very good overview of the language in its modern/urban form (which throws in a fair amount of French connectors/linking words) and think it might be the simplest language I have tried to learn so far. Then again, having government designed, immersion based language learning may be the difference. I have been given LPIs (Language proficiency interviews using standards of some American confederation of foreign language teachers) each couple weeks and have most recently scored Advanced-Low. I needed to reach Intermediate-Mid by the beginning of December so I am certainly doing fine in that regard. I expect to be at a professional fluency by summer, leaving me with, well, 18 more months of time here to try learning Sereer, Pulaar, Mandinka, Jaxonke, etc.
Come June or so, I may just go back to deeper grammar work on Dutch and French, with an emphasis on writing proficiency, but no point in getting too ahead of myself. Also there is this girl I like...who speaks native Spanish so....maybe I'll try that if things develop!
It is amazing working in another country and to have support in learning the language.
I can see how people get stuck doing development work as a career, it provides so many interesting challenges and opportunities.
I am thinking about applying to the EU's aid volunteer program (yolo dual citizen) in 2017 so that I would be able to work on European languages with my coworkers while still living in a developing country.
In terms of media here, rap music is huge and I am looking forward to getting into, but anykind of textual relationship with the language will require learning Arabic script and a much older, formal Wolof (which makes much more liberal use of the 10 noun classes) for reading Koranic texts in Wolofal. There are very few books printed in alphabetized Wolof! I will have to try and find a large bookstore in Dakar, but they almost seem not to exist in the sense I am used to.
I might be chosen to do our "graduation speech" for Wolof in a couple weeks, so that would present an interesting challenge as well. Having to figure out some rhetorical norms/devices here would definitely be good times.

[eplumb]

Well, I pretty much burnt through my language learning motivation during the first ten weeks and have spent the last three weeks, at my new and permanent home, immersed in a Sereer language environment! At home with the family, at the field with the farm laborers, Sereer is filling my ears. This one is really a minority language, with a couple million speakers at best, only found in Senegal. I will have to be learning how to greet and exchange basic information at a minimum but there are no textbooks. I may end up having to do something like a little field learning but without the motivation or the crutch of print or audio materials, I am not looking forward to this. At least I have been speaking a lot of French. I have found a tutor for Wolof who is a native Pulaar speaker, but as a French language teacher in a high school, he has really good insights into how to teach a language; I am very lucky to have him.

Some thoughts I've had over the past few months:

1. Making paper flashcards has some definite advantages over Ankifying everything. For one I can draw a picture of a noun or verb and the Wolof word, in...maybe 15 seconds? I have seen some pretty unexpected advances in my drawing skills which I never practiced past 7th grade art. Additionally with the freedom of a pencil and paper there are a lot of weird mnemonics that come to me: sometimes pictographs, hierogylphs, mathematical symbols, just sort of wild ways of communicating and capturing a sound or idea that I would not really be able to make in Anki. The process itself, of making the flashcards, is far more useful as study time than the process of making Anki flashcards. Ultimately, there's still a lot of draw backs; once you get to a few hundred paper cards and want to keep going, organization becomes its own problem.

2. When working with a foreign language, I am a lot more inventive and daring than I would be with English. It's strange how this also is its own sort of creativity and freedom of expression; trying to bend and break the language so that someone can correct you, or teach you the proper idiom or use of a word, or in some cases, creating novel utterances that the interlocutor does understand and might find interesting. I experience this often when listening to speakers of English as a second language; there can be a sort of rough poetry to it. I think of how I used English as an adolescent, which in many ways was very similar; pretentious, verbose, often innacurate, but having a lot more fun in using the language. I don't know if I can re-enter this sort of 'play' with English (without alcohol lol!) but it struck me as kind of sad that at a certain point, how I perceived maturing was limiting my utterances to things I had heard before or that were at least recombinations of words/phrases I had really mastered and whose use-context I felt sure of. I do believe in parity and clear speech, and generally find it much more honest and respectful towards a listener to produce speech at a level that aims to be commonly shared.

I am thinking about taking up Spanish or Latin to try and reignite the great rhythm I had going in 2015. I really was working on something nearly every day, whether French, Dutch or Wolof. Before I was worried about Spanish/French crossing, but having had that experience already with French/Dutch, I actually don't think there's anything to be afraid of. It's also, that in the context I find myself in right now, the boundaries between languages start to seem pretty irrelevant as long as you can get your point across. Here, most people are growing up speaking two languages, learning a third at school, and members of minority groups like Jolaa, Mandinka and Sereer, end up speaking 4 or more. Everyone is speaking multiple, interwoven languages at the same time, or switching back and forth between sentences or thoughts. Without a board of professors sitting around and fretting about what word to put into the dictionary this year, and what to do about dangling participles, it is simply language as a lived thing. Experiencing language without a written analogue is kind of freeing in a sense. So who cares if I am speaking French and start to substitute Spanish verbs or whatever mistake it may be, I'm never going to speak both by being afraid of that kind of mistake, or 'waiting' till my French is absolutely mature.

In the long term, I am still planning on taking the C1 exam for French and the NT2+ for Dutch (either of which I think I could pass with a couple months dedicated to one or the other) in 2017 or early 2018, allowing me to study at universities in those languages. It is almost New Years so....2016 goals

Spanish-A2
Sereer-A2
Dutch-Maintain B2+
French-Maintain B2+
Wolof-B1->C1 (Immersion environment)

I will try and break these into some sub-goals for the first quarter.

[eplumb]

Well starting Spanish has reignited all of those lovely energies and routines and now i found myself hungry and wanting to do too much at once.

I switched my duolingo for Spanish to a French base, and found an incredible Dutch to Spanish vocabulary deck with audio and image for 1000 words. I had never really thought about looking for Anki decks from a French/Dutch base and I've found some interesting ones, one also for Dutch->French. I started the hunger games in Dutch, it is alright so far. I've also been reading some articles on Vrije Nederland and I chatted with my mom for an hour or so. Good news-->My sister's Dutch is coming along. She has been living in the Netherlands now for about 6 months and is picking it up. Soon I'll have another person to practice with!

Parts of Latin (what I studied in HS) are coming back to me in strange places with Spanish and it really makes me feel like going back to it. I have an amazing textbook (Jones and Sidwell - Reading Latin). I guess I'll leave the option of a very inefficient etymological approach for another lifetime. I don't have time to start Latin sadly!

I've been getting frustrated with hearing Sereer all day while I'm working in the field and so I've started to listen to French podcasts. Just Tette au Carré and Terre à Terre (which is by far my favorite radio program.) I wish NPR or BBC had something similar, it is really important and beautifully done journalism. With regard to the Sereer, it is so hard facing a brick wall of immersion and just feeling overwhelmed by it. It will come I'm sure, its just difficult having no resources and no instruction. French remains my language de secours when my Wolof is lagging, so it is used a little every day.

Wolof though! I am having a lot of fun with it. I am really getting down into the grammar and having a lot of these "aha!" moments pretty much everytime I sit down to study. I am still attending tutoring F/S/Sun evening for an hour and a half but my real guide and conveyor of mysteries and wonder has been the textbook I bought in Paris in the spring of last year when I wasn't even sure if I would be learning Wolof. It has finally opened up and alot of things are coming together at once. It basically borrows directly from the Assimil presentation but its lessons are much longer (16 in the whole book) and its grammar breakdowns go into greater detail and provide very very useful transformation/reformulation drills that I still have not begun to use regularly. I have committed to buying the FR-Wolof dictionary by the same author the next time I am in Dakar (its not gonna be cheap!). Its really interesting, without a strong publishing industry here, language manuals and dictionaries, even for English-> Wolof can be found in bookstores but are generally rife with errors. I mean so many that it would be dangerous to use them. I still plan on starting to collect them so that when I have a more mature understanding I can sort of revisit them if just for amusement. I also should say, it is my ambition to extend my Peace Corps service a third year and to spend it working intensively on creating Wolof language learning materials for future volunteers. I do not think this position has ever existed for volunteers so its just kind of an idea at this point but I would immensely enjoy the task and the challenge. My agricultural work is also very interesting to me and I don't imagine being able to do both at the same time to the degree of quality I desire.

The main things eluding me right now are the precise uses of the minimal pronoun (which is sometimes similar to the French subjunctive) but to to be fair..that pronoun constitutes %50 of spoken Wolof and its uses are incredibly flexible, so there's really a lot I don't understand. There is also a floating signifier "di" that I can't quite figure out but seems to function as a marker of 'l'inaccompli'. My spoken comprehension is still terrible. I am capable of producing fairly complex sentences and can be understood but listening to Wolof in informal settings is challenging. I never really had this experience with French or Dutch; my own production running ahead of comprehension?! Anyways on my to-do: Ankify some of the audio drills from that wonderful text book, and master the contractions surrounding the question words and subject emphasis and object emphasis pronouns respectively (this should help with comprehension). It is difficult because 8 noun classes each with its own consonant, can produce 8 different sets of articles, demonstrative pronouns and relative pronouns. This is much worse than the frustrating task of learning masculine and feminine in a romance language. Luckily, the markers of noun class are starting to disappear from urban Wolof or it could be said are almost entering a sort of idiomatic identity within set phrases or with particular nouns while the bulk of nouns move towards "b" as the generalized noun class.