Definition of a Polyglot

General discussion about learning languages
User avatar
leosmith
Brown Belt
Posts: 1341
Joined: Thu Sep 29, 2016 10:06 pm
Location: Seattle
Languages: English (N)
Spanish (adv)
French (int)
German (int)
Japanese (int)
Korean (int)
Mandarin (int)
Portuguese (int)
Russian (int)
Swahili (int)
Tagalog (int)
Thai (int)
x 3103
Contact:

Re: Definition of a Polyglot

Postby leosmith » Thu Apr 21, 2022 11:22 pm

Le Baron wrote:The mule-headed insistence that in primarily English-speaking media the word polyglot and the whole idea of being a polyglot hasn't been re-imagined and recast as people devoting themselves to accumulation of languages in a dubious way, is just that: mule-headed pettifoggery.

I understand what you're saying, and you may be right. But I like calling myself a polyglot; I've been doing it for years. As someone who speaks several languages, the word fits me perfectly. I don't want to identify myself as a linguist or multi-linguist because they sound too academic to my ears. So I push back when I see the ugly "I hate polyglots" threads in other forums by telling them they are saying "I hate people who speak several languages". I wish more people would push back.
3 x
https://languagecrush.com/reading - try our free multi-language reading tool

User avatar
Le Baron
Black Belt - 3rd Dan
Posts: 3510
Joined: Mon Jan 18, 2021 5:14 pm
Location: Koude kikkerland
Languages: English (N), fr, nl, de, eo, Sranantongo,
Maintaining: es, swahili.
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... 15&t=18796
x 9386

Re: Definition of a Polyglot

Postby Le Baron » Fri Apr 22, 2022 8:36 am

leosmith wrote:I understand what you're saying, and you may be right. But I like calling myself a polyglot; I've been doing it for years. As someone who speaks several languages, the word fits me perfectly. I don't want to identify myself as a linguist or multi-linguist because they sound too academic to my ears. So I push back when I see the ugly "I hate polyglots" threads in other forums by telling them they are saying "I hate people who speak several languages". I wish more people would push back.

You're allowed to call yourself what you want to. I specified that there will be people using the word in a bone fide manner (viz yourself), but that the popular usage of the word in recent years has revolved around a more widely adopted superficial concept and identity. I don't want to destroy the word 'polyglot', I want to save it!
2 x

tractor
Green Belt
Posts: 379
Joined: Sat Oct 29, 2016 10:58 am
Location: Norway
Languages: Norwegian (N), English, Spanish, Catalan, French, German, Italian, Latin
x 773

Re: Definition of a Polyglot

Postby tractor » Wed Apr 27, 2022 7:10 pm

Cainntear wrote:As yet, I have never met anyone outside of the internet language learner sphere who uses "polyglot" the way Simcott does.

Is the word "polyglot" used much at all outside of the internet language learner sphere?
0 x

Cavesa
Black Belt - 4th Dan
Posts: 4960
Joined: Mon Jul 20, 2015 9:46 am
Languages: Czech (N), French (C2) English (C1), Italian (C1), Spanish, German (C1)
x 17566

Re: Definition of a Polyglot

Postby Cavesa » Wed Apr 27, 2022 8:01 pm

tractor wrote:
Cainntear wrote:As yet, I have never met anyone outside of the internet language learner sphere who uses "polyglot" the way Simcott does.

Is the word "polyglot" used much at all outside of the internet language learner sphere?


Yes, just a bit differently. A bit less overall, and not sure whether better or worse. More vaguely, more as if talking about mythical beings. But sometimes also about people with ridiculously low amount of languages for the term (such as 4). There is no consistency that I could observe.
2 x

Cainntear
Black Belt - 3rd Dan
Posts: 3468
Joined: Thu Jul 30, 2015 11:04 am
Location: Scotland
Languages: English(N)
Advanced: French,Spanish, Scottish Gaelic
Intermediate: Italian, Catalan, Corsican
Basic: Welsh
Dabbling: Polish, Russian etc
x 8662
Contact:

Re: Definition of a Polyglot

Postby Cainntear » Wed Apr 27, 2022 8:07 pm

tractor wrote:
Cainntear wrote:As yet, I have never met anyone outside of the internet language learner sphere who uses "polyglot" the way Simcott does.

Is the word "polyglot" used much at all outside of the internet language learner sphere?

Not on a daily basis, but a lot of educated people will define the word when asked. (While looking at me funny cos they're wondering why the hell I'm asking.)
2 x

User avatar
tarvos
Black Belt - 2nd Dan
Posts: 2889
Joined: Sun Jul 26, 2015 11:13 am
Location: The Lowlands
Languages: Native: NL, EN
Professional: ES, RU
Speak well: DE, FR, RO, EO, SV
Speak reasonably: IT, ZH, PT, NO, EL, CZ
Need improvement: PO, IS, HE, JP, KO, HU, FI
Passive: AF, DK, LAT
Dabbled in: BRT, ZH (SH), BG, EUS, ZH (CAN), and a whole lot more.
Language Log: http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/fo ... PN=1&TPN=1
x 6093
Contact:

Re: Definition of a Polyglot

Postby tarvos » Wed Apr 27, 2022 8:36 pm

jeff_lindqvist wrote:
Le Baron wrote:I hadn't really heard of 'polyglot' years ago.


I knew the word (and used it) when I studied Classical Greek in high school. That was in -93/94.


I had heard of the word, but I only got familiar with using it often when I entered the language learning/polyglot community (or whatever you want to call it). I still don't use the word to describe myself, because I refuse to be associated with snake oil salesmen or ego competitions, I just do what I do when it comes to languages. But I've heard this word used often by other people to describe me, more than once, and I feel like, in language learning circles, I am known as *that polyglot* quite often. So here's what I have to say about that.

As for the identity discussion, identity is such a fluid thing (and has changed so much for me over the years), and there are so many cultural and personal components to it, that calling myself a polyglot (apart from whether I qualify based on my skill set) is such a minor part of my identity. Sure, I speak multiple languages, and sure, you can make the argument I am good at them, even excellent (my track record corroborates that), but this is only a small part of my identity as a person. You could just as well pin down my identity as being "queer" (and I am using this in the modern sense to mean part of the LGBT community, not in the archaic sense of strange or even as the slur it used to be), and you'd be partly right, but is that all there is to it?

When you reduce polyglottery or language learning to discussions as to who qualifies and who doesn't, you're engaging in some very suspicious and gatekeepy behaviour that I don't really jive with. It's like, "how bisexual do you have to be to be LGBT"? If you're a woman attracted to both men and women, but you've only ever slept with, kissed, and been in relationships with men, are you a bisexual? Yes, you are, because you're attracted to women as well. It's no different with polyglots. If I've studied Japanese, French and Hindi and am a native English speaker, then do I really have to be a full on Japanese interpreter to be a polyglot? No, I don't, and that's the end of that discussion.

I don't find this discussion very productive. It promotes extremely gatekeepy behaviour and gives off a vibe of "you don't belong to OUR tribe, OUR tribe has to do xyz." As soon as people start doing that, I'm out of there. If we want to label and shoehorn people into certain stereotypes and conform to our preconceived notions on the internet, there are plenty of trash Twitter/Facebook threads where we can do just that. It's not high school anymore, that behaviour was trash back then and led to ostracism. It isn't any less trash now.

What I'm trying to say is: you can call me a polyglot if you want. You can call Richard Simcott a polyglot if you want. But remember that it's just that: a word, a label for lack of better. It doesn't actually tell you that much about me, or about Richard, or about anyone else mentioned in this thread.

I prefer fostering an inclusive community. That's the approach I am going to take, and I think it is more productive to use the word in these circumstances, rather than argue about levels or mythical natures. No one mentioned in this thread is mythical, they are all people. And some of us have a bigger interest or a larger skill set, for whatever reason, and bigmouths will always exist. Let them prove it in real life, which is where their skills are going to count for things, and don't worry about the rest.
9 x
I hope your world is kind.

Is a girl.

User avatar
Le Baron
Black Belt - 3rd Dan
Posts: 3510
Joined: Mon Jan 18, 2021 5:14 pm
Location: Koude kikkerland
Languages: English (N), fr, nl, de, eo, Sranantongo,
Maintaining: es, swahili.
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... 15&t=18796
x 9386

Re: Definition of a Polyglot

Postby Le Baron » Wed Apr 27, 2022 8:50 pm

tarvos wrote:What I'm trying to say is: you can call me a polyglot if you want. You can call Richard Simcott a polyglot if you want. But remember that it's just that: a word, a label for lack of better.

Pretty much what I said in terms of it not being a magic word. However there can be no dismissing how words and meanings are used/employed or 'misused'. This has nothing to do with any attacks upon vulnerable identities.
1 x

User avatar
Iversen
Black Belt - 4th Dan
Posts: 4768
Joined: Sun Jul 19, 2015 7:36 pm
Location: Denmark
Languages: Monolingual travels in Danish, English, German, Dutch, Swedish, French, Portuguese, Spanish, Catalan, Italian, Romanian and (part time) Esperanto
Ahem, not yet: Norwegian, Afrikaans, Platt, Scots, Russian, Serbian, Bulgarian, Albanian, Greek, Latin, Irish, Indonesian and a few more...
Language Log: viewtopic.php?f=15&t=1027
x 14962

Re: Definition of a Polyglot

Postby Iversen » Wed Apr 27, 2022 9:03 pm

My standpoint is that there is a word 'polyglot', and it refers to people who know several languages - probably more than the average number in the society at large, but certainly not just one or two. If you use the word 'polyglot' about people who haven't bothered to learn any new language since number one then it would be as misleading as calling me a professional poker player or football player or the pope himself. But there is still a lot of flexibility in the notion when it comes to the exact level of each language and maybe also to the level at different skills.

Would you call someone who can read Sanskrit, Mandarin, Romanian, Icelandic, Esperanto and English but only speak one of them a polyglot? Well, maybe yes, but but then with the remark that only one of the languages is active. Would you call someone who can speak 5 or 6 dialects of English a polyglot? Well, probably not, but it's a borderline case - some dialects are so far from the standard language that they ought to count as independent languages. Do you need to be at C2 in all the languages? Absolutely not ! ... I would accept anyone who could keep up a decent conversation in a handful of languages as a polyglot, even if the level wasn't exactly mindblowing.

And finally: is being a polyglot an integral part of my personal identity? Of course it is, and I don't see any problem in admitting that. After all I spend a lot of time in and on other languages than my maternal Danish, and it has serious consequences for how I think (right now I'm thinking in English, and a short while ago I was thinking in French). But I'm also a lot of other things (including some that refer to hobbies and jobs I have had in the past), and for some purposes those things may be more important than whether I can speak a few languages. For instance my doctor sees me as a corps with some defects that require me to buy and eat the pills she ordains, and the tax people apparently see me as a chicken ready to be plucked. My mother sees me as her son, and I see myself as 68 years of history and a present which I have to fill out with sundry activities. But if you ask me whether I'm a polyglot then it would be an utter lie to deny it...
6 x

User avatar
tarvos
Black Belt - 2nd Dan
Posts: 2889
Joined: Sun Jul 26, 2015 11:13 am
Location: The Lowlands
Languages: Native: NL, EN
Professional: ES, RU
Speak well: DE, FR, RO, EO, SV
Speak reasonably: IT, ZH, PT, NO, EL, CZ
Need improvement: PO, IS, HE, JP, KO, HU, FI
Passive: AF, DK, LAT
Dabbled in: BRT, ZH (SH), BG, EUS, ZH (CAN), and a whole lot more.
Language Log: http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/fo ... PN=1&TPN=1
x 6093
Contact:

Re: Definition of a Polyglot

Postby tarvos » Wed Apr 27, 2022 11:11 pm

Le Baron wrote:
tarvos wrote:What I'm trying to say is: you can call me a polyglot if you want. You can call Richard Simcott a polyglot if you want. But remember that it's just that: a word, a label for lack of better.

Pretty much what I said in terms of it not being a magic word. However there can be no dismissing how words and meanings are used/employed or 'misused'. This has nothing to do with any attacks upon vulnerable identities.


It does, because actually, speaking another language in a world full of xenophobes makes you a prime target for ridicule and discrimination. Even moreso if the language(s) you speak belong to a traditionally oppressed minority. The misuse of words in order to smear, negatively impact, create dogwhistles, is a much more negative impact than the discussion whether a word is misused because someone speaks 4 or 5 languages. Honestly, the fact that we have to sit here and talk about this in and of itself to me is a travesty because the fact that there are people that take it upon themselves to learn these things should be celebrated, not frowned upon.

Many groups of people have historically been harassed, discriminated against, even killed, for speaking another language than that of the oppressor. This happens even today.

Many a time when I hear the "you're a polyglot" card from someone, what I hear is envy. Sometimes in a positive sense of admiration, but mostly with an undertone of "this freak", or a wish in the sense of "I wish I were as good as you", which they either use to put themselves or other people down afterwards. That's my experience with it. I was ridiculed for being able to speak English as a child, because no one my age could do it. I was the weirdo, the foreigner.

This kind of jealousy and feeling of "why can't I do what they can do" leads to internalized hatred which people then take out on others in discussions like this on the internet. Arguments are fine, and I don't mind arguing the technical points of something when that is a good, academic discussion. But the undertones I always get from this discussion is that someone is lying about who they are, or that people are being torn down for whatever reason because they're more in the public eye. And that's never a good thing. That spreads the wrong kind of message about this community, and I am not about that whatsoever.

I would like to add to all this that most of the people mentioned in this thread are people I have personally met and talked to on several occasions. I know they all are aware of this and how to handle it, but I want you to understand that what this thread is turning into is NOT the look we need as a community, and it's this kind of thread that does not encourage me to be as active as I once was. I prefer showing up to meetups, events, and all the other good stuff to be social with friends and enjoy my time, not argue about insignificant definitions on the internet.

The way you talk about people matters. And if you're going to define the word polyglot in an elitist way, or excluding people, or being gatekeepy about it, then I do take issue with that.
7 x
I hope your world is kind.

Is a girl.

User avatar
Le Baron
Black Belt - 3rd Dan
Posts: 3510
Joined: Mon Jan 18, 2021 5:14 pm
Location: Koude kikkerland
Languages: English (N), fr, nl, de, eo, Sranantongo,
Maintaining: es, swahili.
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... 15&t=18796
x 9386

Re: Definition of a Polyglot

Postby Le Baron » Thu Apr 28, 2022 9:18 am

tarvos wrote:It does, because actually, speaking another language in a world full of xenophobes makes you a prime target for ridicule and discrimination. Even moreso if the language(s) you speak belong to a traditionally oppressed minority. The misuse of words in order to smear, negatively impact, create dogwhistles, is a much more negative impact than the discussion whether a word is misused because someone speaks 4 or 5 languages. Honestly, the fact that we have to sit here and talk about this in and of itself to me is a travesty because the fact that there are people that take it upon themselves to learn these things should be celebrated, not frowned upon.

Then you may have misunderstood the discussion, because whilst dealing with xenophobes is real in other life contexts and some languages are deprecated, this question is not about that. It's not a discussion about someone being oppressed because they speak 4 or 5 languages. It's that the word has been somewhat hijacked and given a certain meaning. One that pushes insane projections and makes dubious claims and misleads people.
tarvos wrote:Many groups of people have historically been harassed, discriminated against, even killed, for speaking another language than that of the oppressor. This happens even today.

Whilst true. That's not part of this question.
tarvos wrote:Many a time when I hear the "you're a polyglot" card from someone, what I hear is envy. Sometimes in a positive sense of admiration, but mostly with an undertone of "this freak", or a wish in the sense of "I wish I were as good as you", which they either use to put themselves or other people down afterwards. That's my experience with it. I was ridiculed for being able to speak English as a child, because no one my age could do it. I was the weirdo, the foreigner.

If someone wants to identify themselves as such or others do so, that's fine. I was raised in a bilingual environment as a child too, it was mostly embarrassing for me at the time and I said 'mum, speak English!' when friends were around. That's pretty much the end of it. No discussions of the definition of a polyglot arose. I knew its value. This again is not the discussion.
tarvos wrote:This kind of jealousy and feeling of "why can't I do what they can do" leads to internalized hatred which people then take out on others in discussions like this on the internet. Arguments are fine, and I don't mind arguing the technical points of something when that is a good, academic discussion. But the undertones I always get from this discussion is that someone is lying about who they are, or that people are being torn down for whatever reason because they're more in the public eye. And that's never a good thing. That spreads the wrong kind of message about this community, and I am not about that whatsoever.

Unfortunately there are some of those and they have a large platform on social media. Misleading wishful monoglots who had poor school experiences and those people struggling to learn that if they follow such-and-such magic methodology and advice they'll be a 'polyglot' too. And note that it is the feeling of being a 'polyglot' now gripping quite a lot of people, rather than just e.g. 'learning French' or 'learning Japanese' Never mind that they'll crack German, but multiple languages! In three month bursts too. Discussions about sweat and slog and possible failure and the possibility that learning 10 languages might be somewhat premature unless you're someone dedicating yourself to making 'polyglot' videos and earning money from courses and advertising revenue, turn up less. They have turned up though, since more people started critiquing it.
tarvos wrote:I would like to add to all this that most of the people mentioned in this thread are people I have personally met and talked to on several occasions. I know they all are aware of this and how to handle it, but I want you to understand that what this thread is turning into is NOT the look we need as a community, and it's this kind of thread that does not encourage me to be as active as I once was. I prefer showing up to meetups, events, and all the other good stuff to be social with friends and enjoy my time, not argue about insignificant definitions on the internet.

There have been many replies to this thread, so I don't know if you're addressing me personally or what, but I've not mentioned any names. Perhaps I mentioned Olli whatsisname? In any case it's not about the person's qualities as a person, but the thrust of a particular movement. Initially I was pleased to see languages all over the internet and YT, because back in the old days it was an obscure subculture and I hardly knew anyone but a handful of people who studied languages. Then you see how popularity makes people do weird things to stay popular. When good advice and motivation turns into conveyor belt platitudes for you tube longevity and visibility...not to mention revenue. That's part of the problem. That's also not NOT the 'look' a community needs.
tarvos wrote:The way you talk about people matters. And if you're going to define the word polyglot in an elitist way, or excluding people, or being gatekeepy about it, then I do take issue with that.

Maybe you weren't referring to me when you write 'you'? Perhaps it's the universal 'you'? In any case I'm not being a gatekeeper. I have zero control over who does what and I'm happy if as many people as possible start learning a language - which incidentally is seen as a valued thing, not something suppressed or a target for oppression. Less happy about people being faced with unattainable role model examples, some of whom are portraying a false image. Or promoting this new-fangled version of the 'polyglot lifestyle'.
6 x


Return to “General Language Discussion”

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 2 guests