Are you a language tourist?

General discussion about learning languages
SalzSäule
Orange Belt
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Languages: English (N), German (C2), French (?), Czech (Beginner)
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Re: Are you a language tourist?

Postby SalzSäule » Tue Aug 16, 2022 12:46 pm

I've certainly been a Language "Dilettante" in the past before, though I think less so nowadays. The most recent example I can think of is Luxembourgish, but I never went into that with the intention of reaching an advanced level.

I think there's no shame in it at all really, because I've learnt something new about language from all of the languages I have studied in a cursory manner before. In the past I had fewer clearer ideas about what languages I wanted to learn and where I want to go with them, but now I know.

Would be interesting to come up with some vague criteria of what makes one a language tourist though. How long does one have to study before, before one is taking it 'seriously'? I think that's a question which is not easy to answer. Personally I consider Russian, Albanian, and Old English to have been 'tourist' undertakings by myself, because my knowledge of them has all but completely gone. With Czech, I have struggled on-off for years to try and get into the habit of it, but I don't consider it touristy because 'one day' I intend to actually learn it. Luxembourgish, I don't know how I feel about it yet. Definitely an interesting discussion.
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Da seufzt der Tropf im Purpur unter der unabwälzbaren Last seiner armseligen Individualität; während der Hochbegabte die ödeste Umgebung mit seinen Gedanken bevölkert und belebt.

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sporedandroid
Blue Belt
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Languages: English (N), Spanish (heritage/intermediate), Hebrew (A2-B1)
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Re: Are you a language tourist?

Postby sporedandroid » Wed Aug 17, 2022 5:11 am

SalzSäule wrote:Would be interesting to come up with some vague criteria of what makes one a language tourist though. How long does one have to study before, before one is taking it 'seriously'? I think that's a question which is not easy to answer. Personally I consider Russian, Albanian, and Old English to have been 'tourist' undertakings by myself, because my knowledge of them has all but completely gone. With Czech, I have struggled on-off for years to try and get into the habit of it, but I don't consider it touristy because 'one day' I intend to actually learn it. Luxembourgish, I don't know how I feel about it yet. Definitely an interesting discussion.

It’s hard to say when I’m taking a language seriously. I’ve been gradually studying Finnish more and more. I think it’s sort of a “tourist” language because I’ve never made any attempts at being consistent. I also never had any reason to take it seriously. I just thought of it as a non-Germanic Nordic language, so I thought I was better off focusing my effort on more mainstream Nordic languages or Icelandic.

The more I study Finnish the more I enjoy it. Maybe I enjoy it because it kind of lacks this intensity and desperation my other languages had. I was desperate to learn Icelandic fast, so it was hard to enjoy myself and I eventually quit because I wasn’t progressing fast enough. Since Finnish has never been my “main language”, I’ve never really cared about how fast I progressed. I think it will be hard to say how long I’ve been studying Finnish. Right now I feel more like I’m pre-studying.
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