Songs have a place in learning languges

General discussion about learning languages
golyplot
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Re: Songs have a place in learning languges

Postby golyplot » Fri Jan 14, 2022 2:56 pm

I actually found French music a lot easier than Japanese (but still not easy), presumably due to being closer to English. I've been studying Japanese for over two years now and still am at the "I recognize some of those words" stage when I listen to Japanese songs. Meanwhile, I've been listening to Japanese podcasts for the last year and a half and it has been very helpful.


Distant languages are precisely when music is least helpful, because music is Hard Mode, and relies on your built-in scaffolding of English grammar to understand, and studying Japanese is what made me realize that.


P.S. I think that songs are actually worse than podcasts for repetition. If you listen to someone talking about a topic, they'll repeat common vocab related to the topic many times in different contexts. However, a song will merely repeat the exact same thing you didn't understand the first time many, many times. Furthermore, song lyrics tend to be highly abstract and poetical, meaning there's no context to go on in the first place, and the words are sung in an unnatural way to fit the music, which makes them hard to recognize.
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reineke
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Re: Songs have a place in learning languges

Postby reineke » Fri Jan 14, 2022 8:08 pm

Eh... with all this serious, intensive studying going on here you guys chose this for guessing from context? That works too sometimes but you can also look up the lyrics, find a karaoke version and come back to it another time. With more distant languages songs remove some of the Teflon like properties of foreign vocabulary.
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golyplot
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Re: Songs have a place in learning languges

Postby golyplot » Sat Jan 15, 2022 3:36 am

You can look up anything that has a transcript though. That isn't exactly an endorsement of songs.
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reineke
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Re: Songs have a place in learning languges

Postby reineke » Sat Jan 15, 2022 3:39 am

You can't hump it all day long.

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golyplot
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Re: Songs have a place in learning languges

Postby golyplot » Sat Jan 15, 2022 5:47 pm

Well you made me want to study Italian again, so there's that.
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Re: Songs have a place in learning languges

Postby Erisnimi » Thu Sep 08, 2022 7:28 am

Songs are an essential part of my language immersion. And they are a way to see where I am at with the language, once I start understanding more than what I specifically look at line by line. What I do is I compile private playlists on Spotify (other streaming services are available) with anything I find with the right style (a matter of taste), a pleasant voice and clear enunciation.

Songs have introduced me to elements and vocabulary that I've found useful later too. Words and sequences really stick with me this way, and it's up to me to determine if they are essential, worth hanging on to.

To take an example, one of the first songs in Hebrew that stuck with me was one called "Kvar meuchar" by Avigail Roz. There's a bridge (at 3:08 in the video) where she repeats the line "Kvar meuchar aval li margish mukdam" (It's already late but I feel it's early). For a beginner, it was a powerful line: you've got "late," "early," "already" and a way to talk about what you feel. It's still a powerful line now but that's because I can appreciate the poetry of a few common words.



I always try to at least find out what the title of any song I add to my playlists means and if I still don't get the general idea, I'll look deeper into the lyrics. If I'm really curious I go through the lyrics more carefully, but the focus is not so much on language learning as it is on appreciating the poetry. It really helps that I'm hearing the same songs over and over. Of course I wouldn't be doing that if I didn't enjoy hearing them. I think especially without studying French, and having an interest in it, I would be missing out on some of the best contemporary pop music, but again that's a matter of taste.
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Re: Songs have a place in learning languges

Postby anitarrc » Thu Sep 08, 2022 9:38 am

I learned most of my Mexican expressions from

Los Tigres del Norte

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCcAeCx ... kCr6yTLhEw

they have excellent stories to tell, have been pioneers in many ways and are still going strong.

It is just what I need when I feel homesick..
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Re: Songs have a place in learning languges

Postby TopDog_IK » Fri Sep 09, 2022 12:05 am

Sentences and phrases I learn from songs really stick. As others have said, the repeatability of music is a big bonus.
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Re: Songs have a place in learning languges

Postby Amandine » Fri Sep 09, 2022 2:27 am

I love music, it's a passion. I have a weekly show on community radio devoted to new music. However, I tend to find the effort required to actually study lyrics (which can be quite poetic/non standard usage etc) versus what you get out of it is not that great so I don't do it unless there's a specific reason to. I do however listen to a lot of music in my target language but I tend to just enjoy whatever takes my fancy without concentrating too hard. It is an important lagging indicator, though, meaning as I get better in general I understand more and more of the songs I have listened to a lot and that is satisfying.
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