New Prof Argüelles Youtube Series

General discussion about learning languages
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einzelne
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Re: New Prof Argüelles Youtube Series

Postby einzelne » Thu Jan 13, 2022 1:52 pm

luke wrote:They don't tell the professor's history, but they do document the sort of books he's interested in.


Well, I have lots of lists of the books I'm interested to read at the moment. Last fall, for instance, I was interested in reading all extant Greek plays in my native Russian. Guess how many I actually read? Zero :D (Damn you, useless Latin obsession!) The only thing I managed to accomplish this fall is to listen to Tragedy, the Greeks, and Us. Quite an achievement, haha.
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Re: New Prof Argüelles Youtube Series

Postby jeff_lindqvist » Thu Jan 13, 2022 3:50 pm

luke wrote:Professor Arguelles used to have a website with an URL like "foreignlanguageexpertise.com". There, he had some Excel spreadsheets with Great Book lists, Western Canon, Eastern Canon, the original language, the century, etc. Maybe someone here knows how to dig those spreadsheets out of an archive. They don't tell the professor's history, but they do document the sort of books he's interested in.


Does this help?
https://web.archive.org/web/20160104222 ... books.html
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Re: New Prof Argüelles Youtube Series

Postby Vordhosbn » Thu Jan 13, 2022 9:53 pm

It's worth remembering that the professor is no longer actively studying new languages, but improving and consolidating the ones he knows. As far as I can tell, this still involves some degree of active review (as I pointed out in my last post), but much of this is likely reading. He mentioned in his famous polyglot workout video that in Korea "studying Danish" meant working with an Assimil manual, whereas nowadays (even back then) it means reading a Danish novel.

His new website will have a Q&A section sort of similar to the old "Lessons in Polyglottery" correspondence from the HTLAL days. If you're specifically interested in his reading habits, it could be worth writing to him about it, and maybe he'll include it as a question-answer piece when the site is launched: https://www.alexanderarguelles.com
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Re: New Prof Argüelles Youtube Series

Postby einzelne » Fri Jan 14, 2022 4:26 pm

Vordhosbn wrote:It's worth remembering that the professor is no longer actively studying new languages, but improving and consolidating the ones he knows.


Thank you for the link, I'll definitely ask him!

The thing is even you no longer 'study' a language there's the problem of vocabulary. I would actually argue that this is the most difficult and grueling part of language learning, since the amount of words/expressions you need to know to read literature comfortably is daunting. Especially if you set yourself a task to read canonical works since they cover periods of time and quite often exhibit unique style which requires some effort even from native speakers.
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Re: New Prof Argüelles Youtube Series

Postby cito » Fri Jan 14, 2022 4:48 pm

einzelne wrote:Especially if you set yourself a task to read canonical works since they cover periods of time and quite often exhibit unique style which requires some effort even from native speakers.


This is very true. Also think about languages that cover vast geographical areas and thus have a lot of their own vocabulary across different dialects despite being the "same language." Examples being literature from Southern America vs Europe in Spanish, or (to a bit of a lesser degree) Africa vs Europe with French. Vocabulary is tough.
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Re: New Prof Argüelles Youtube Series

Postby jeff_lindqvist » Fri Jan 14, 2022 5:10 pm

Teach Yourself a Language in 15 Minute Sessions: Intermediate Level Demonstration:
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Re: New Prof Argüelles Youtube Series

Postby RyanSmallwood » Sun Jan 16, 2022 2:06 am

TSS42 wrote:Has the professor ever described in any video how he transitions from learning a language with Assimil books to reading native material?

How does he read? What does he read?


Yeah, he has a video on Moving from Intermediate to Advanced.
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Re: New Prof Argüelles Youtube Series

Postby Vordhosbn » Sun Jan 16, 2022 3:09 am

TSS42 wrote:Has the professor ever described in any video how he transitions from learning a language with Assimil books to reading native material?

How does he read? What does he read?


In addition to the video Ryan linked, there's a post on the old forum about how he advanced to reading literature for Russian.
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Re: New Prof Argüelles Youtube Series

Postby einzelne » Sun Jan 16, 2022 4:20 pm

Vordhosbn wrote:In addition to the video Ryan linked, there's a post on the old forum about how he advanced to reading literature for Russian.


I guess, it depends on your tolerance for ambiguity but , in case of literature, I really doubt that one year is enough to develop a comfortable level of reading skills.
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Re: New Prof Argüelles Youtube Series

Postby David1917 » Sat Jan 22, 2022 2:25 pm



Here is 15 minutes of a cat purring to help you relax & focus. Once the purring stops, the video directs you to take a short break before trying to have another concentrated study session. During the break you: breathe deeply, stretch/twist, do some physical exercise (pushups/squats), and drink water.

I already do this, though without a cat. When I'm sitting down to blast through some languages I keep my water glass in the next room. Every 15 minutes I have to get up and go drink some. I don't do the squats though. Hmmmm...
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