New Prof Argüelles Youtube Series

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Re: New Prof Argüelles Youtube Series

Postby Cainntear » Tue May 23, 2023 3:13 pm

Kraut wrote:No, no, you will save a lot of time, you will learn only one meaning for 4 forms:

¿Qué vamos a desayunar hoy?
Qu'est-ce qu'on a pour le petit déjeuner aujourd'hui ?
Cosa mangiamo oggi a colazione?
Was haben wir heute zum Frühstück?

Is this a hypothetical difference between versions or a confirmed real one? I recognise it's a likely outcome either way -- either the books will mangle idiom to be more similar, or they will use appropriate idiom and obscure grammatical rules. My personal suspicion is that "quaint" old books are more likely to sacrifice idiom at the altar of grammar, but you never know....
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Re: New Prof Argüelles Youtube Series

Postby Cainntear » Tue May 23, 2023 3:35 pm

lowsocks wrote:But now, he recommends studying up to four languages simultaneously, every day. One hour per day for each language, for a total of four hours per day. The only separation he suggests is to spread out the study hours during the day, e.g., some languages in the morning and others in the afternoon.

Of course, he is entitled to change his mind about these things. After all, it has been over 14 years since he made the first video. But I would be curious to know what caused him to change his views.

There is a real danger in the internet market of the so-called "influencer" being influenced by his market. People don't really want to hear what he was saying 14 years ago -- they want someone to show them how to do great things now!!! There is a whole heap of language YouTubers who are making a name for themselves by talking down proper experts and telling people "you just need to BELIEVE in yourself" and declaring about the majority who fail: "they didn't BELIEVE in themselves enough".

These influencers are convinced that their platitudes are nuggets of wisdom that merit a price tag of hundreds of dollars, but they're really a tiny fraction of the wealth of knowledge that I can buy for £20-£30 in an academic bookshop.

What I find really curious about Arguelles is that he's clearly been dragged down this route of selling people what they want to hear while convincing himself that he's selling his expertise, not selling out. He seems to be working in the old sense of university education (hence lecture + group tutorial + office hours) but at the same time he's teaching you how to teach yourself, so he's basically eliminated the individualised assignment feedback side of things... which is where I often find myself "breaking the budget" in times of going far beyond my contracted hours (for no extra pay!)

Also, the thing that's always bugged me is that oe of the most enduring criticisms of university education is that there's a culture of "it's not not my job to teach you -- it's your job to learn." I don't know if that's his own view, but I don't believe I've ever heard him critically evaluate what works and doesn't -- he makes seemingly authoritative statements on what does and doesn't work in his experience, and we're supposed to trust him because he used to teach in a university...? But why exactly did he stop?

(I should say, I don't completely disagree with him. Students have been studying both French and German at school for generations, and the two don't seem to interfere seriously with each other. But I am less sure about Spanish and Italian.)

Exactly. The blanket statements "multiple languages simultaneously are fine because I did languages F and Q simultaneously" and "multiple languages simultaneously is a disaster because I failed languages Y and X simultaneously" just ignores the simple fact that what's true of one language pair isn't necessarily true of another. I always try to push that point here, and I'm quite forgiving of that error from happy amateurs. I am less forgiving of that from professionals who should know better.
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Re: New Prof Argüelles Youtube Series

Postby Le Baron » Tue May 23, 2023 4:07 pm

Cainntear wrote:He seems to be working in the old sense of university education (hence lecture + group tutorial + office hours) but at the same time he's teaching you how to teach yourself, so he's basically eliminated the individualised assignment feedback side of things... which is where I often find myself "breaking the budget" in times of going far beyond my contracted hours (for no extra pay!)

Well, that background is what affords something a sense of authority. If I go to local public meetings and say things about economics people either listen or don't listen of are sceptical, whereas if I tell them I was previously teaching and researching it at the university (which shouldn't be the checkmate), they don't feel as confident challenging me (but they should if they have a fair critique).

I also knocked around on HTLAL and I even have an unused account there from way back, I just never spent a great deal of time there because I was too busy didn't want to waste my youth on the internet. I remember several people from there with guru tendencies, who are, as now, in turn have it confirmed for themselves by others fawning over them like the Dalai Lama. I'll draw a distinction between 'guru' and 'charlatan', because Arguelles is not a charlatan, but seems to have lost a sense of perspective. Maybe the 'academy' is for all those who are superhumans or have nothing else in life to detract from language learning because it can't be for ordinary people. And all that stuff about "15 minutes a day" and running many languages simultaneously, well great. I can only say try it and see. if it suits you, hooray; if not it won't be astonishing as to why.
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Re: New Prof Argüelles Youtube Series

Postby jeff_lindqvist » Tue May 23, 2023 6:02 pm

lowsocks wrote:It is a bit odd. In the older video (from 2009), he suggests studying the four languages consecutively, rather than simultaneously. That is, first spend about two hours per day on Spanish until you have reached some proficiency in it.
/.../
But now, he recommends studying up to four languages simultaneously, every day. One hour per day for each language, for a total of four hours per day.


Don't the two videos have different objectives? The first one is a five-year plan with languages (OK, in sequence), and the recent one a three-month plan. A taster, a smorgasbord... an experiment.

In a galaxy far, far away, he wrote about his plans for an Academy of Polyliteracy (similar to what he is doing at the moment, right?):
https://web.archive.org/web/20191021201 ... tml#dpfpsp

Each "track" had several languages (and more) going on at the same time. (Discussion here: Six languages an educated person should know (Prof. Argüelles) - the academy talk starts on page 9.)
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Re: New Prof Argüelles Youtube Series

Postby luke » Tue May 23, 2023 6:25 pm

Le Baron wrote:Maybe the 'academy' is for all those who are superhumans or have nothing else in life to detract from language learning because it can't be for ordinary people. And all that stuff about "15 minutes a day" and running many languages simultaneously, well great. I can only say try it and see. if it suits you, hooray; if not it won't be astonishing as to why.
Perhaps the course is for superhumans, although you seem to have accomplished quite a bit on your own with languages as a side interest.

One thing I'm curious about in his upcoming course whether those 15 minute slots will split each of the 4 hours. I.E., the student will study all 4 languages in each 1 hour study session and try to split the 4 study sessions throughout the day as he's proposed.

The professor has some novel ideas and novel approaches. I'm expecting some of his students will be very successful. The enterprise has both self selection as well as the professor's selection to foster success in the endeavor.

Ah, to be young and superhuman. :mrgreen:
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Re: New Prof Argüelles Youtube Series

Postby Cainntear » Tue May 23, 2023 7:08 pm

Le Baron wrote:
Cainntear wrote:He seems to be working in the old sense of university education (hence lecture + group tutorial + office hours) but at the same time he's teaching you how to teach yourself, so he's basically eliminated the individualised assignment feedback side of things... which is where I often find myself "breaking the budget" in times of going far beyond my contracted hours (for no extra pay!)
...
I'll draw a distinction between 'guru' and 'charlatan', because Arguelles is not a charlatan, but seems to have lost a sense of perspective.

Well, that background is what affords something a sense of authority. If I go to local public meetings and say things about economics people either listen or don't listen of are sceptical, whereas if I tell them I was previously teaching and researching it at the university (which shouldn't be the checkmate), they don't feel as confident challenging me (but they should if they have a fair critique).

Hmmm... not sure. It's more like you going to a discussion about economics and saying that you know more about learning economics than anyone in the room, and that you'll teach them how to teach themselves economics... without actually teaching them economics. like, without telling them the stuff that you know about economics.

I don't doubt he's an expert lecturer, but I do question whether he's an expert in pedagogy. Would you be able to teach an economist to teach economics? Probably. But are you a world expert in it? That's why the "guru" tag really kicks in here -- Arguelles may be a good teacher, but does he know why that is? There are plenty of people who will tell others how to teach like them, and then have to face the reality that it just doesn't work. The guy that sticks in my mind most is the guy who proselytised "gamified university teaching" and after a few years he just had to console himself with the knowledge that he was a good teacher who didn't actually know what made him such.

And as I say, I haven't really seen any real evidence that he has ever been the type of lecturer that causes learning to happen rather than the type of lecturer that tells you what to learn then leaves you to muddle through because you're motivated to get a degree.

If his students were teaching themselves, that calls into question the value of his experience -- they learned because of themselves, not because of him, so what is he teaching?
And if the students were learning because he taught them, that also calls into question the value of his experience -- they learned because he taught them, so how does he know anything about getting folk to teach themselves?


Maybe the 'academy' is for all those who are superhumans or have nothing else in life to detract from language learning because it can't be for ordinary people. And all that stuff about "15 minutes a day" and running many languages simultaneously, well great. I can only say try it and see. if it suits you, hooray; if not it won't be astonishing as to why.

I suspect that this will be a shipwreck. The four languages suggests he's likely to get total amateurs and the cognitive load will be too high. I agree that he needs superhumans, but the problem will be that with no language learning history, there's no way of prescreening. In universities, bad teaching is often mitigated by the selection process meaning that people who have survived poor teaching in school are likely to be overrepresented in the intake.
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Re: New Prof Argüelles Youtube Series

Postby Le Baron » Tue May 23, 2023 7:11 pm

luke wrote:Perhaps the course is for superhumans, although you seem to have accomplished quite a bit on your own with languages as a side interest.

One thing I'm curious about in his upcoming course whether those 15 minute slots will split each of the 4 hours. I.E., the student will study all 4 languages in each 1 hour study session and try to split the 4 study sessions throughout the day as he's proposed.

The professor has some novel ideas and novel approaches. I'm expecting some of his students will be very successful. The enterprise has both self selection as well as the professor's selection to foster success in the endeavor.

Ah, to be young and superhuman. :mrgreen:

For me, like most here I'm sure, it's been a lifetime's accumulation and behind the scenes a good deal of heavy grind at certain points and forgoing things like nights out on the piss for language learning.Also some failures.

Being at an 'academy' like that where everyone is eager to learn languages would probably be a great experience, holiday to remember. Maybe for some people it would serve them later on as well. Though I question all that 15 minutes stuff and juggling all those languages together.
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Re: New Prof Argüelles Youtube Series

Postby luke » Tue May 23, 2023 8:16 pm

Le Baron wrote:I question all that 15 minutes stuff and juggling all those languages together.

That's a good question. I wonder if in the short term, I.E., getting a foothold in the languages, the 15 minute sessions may work well, then as the student progresses, the individual sessions will become longer. E.G., 16 * 15 minute sessions down the road will become 8 * 30 minute sessions and finally 4 * 1 hour sessions. That speculation comes from his videos about realizing he wouldn't be satisfied with his progress in several dozen languages and he decided to drop some of them, and then came up with novel approaches for continuing in the rest.
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Re: New Prof Argüelles Youtube Series

Postby Cainntear » Tue May 23, 2023 9:20 pm

Le Baron wrote:Being at an 'academy' like that where everyone is eager to learn languages would probably be a great experience, holiday to remember.

"Here, John, where did you go on your hols last year?"

"Wot, me? I stayed at 'ome, mate. Did all my 'oliday stuff on the old 'Zoom', mate. All the fun of travel, but no queuing at the airport. Or meeting people, going for drinks wif like minded people in a pub. None of vat boring stuff. You know, just the fun part: sitting in your bedroom and reading a PDF of an out-of-print language course. 'Eavan, mate, 'eavan!"

Seriously though, I do get the point that an actual academy isn't practical because he's doing medium-term courses, and no-one's going to be able to dedicate 3 months to that, so video calls definitely make things possible, but I really think that this places a heck of a lot of pressure on people to stay motivated. I do wonder whether people will be able to keep up while doing "real life" stuff without the added motivation of being in a specific place for a specific purpose.
Or the motivation of getting a qualification out of it. A bullshit degree is still a degree and counts as a qualification -- a course without a qualification at the end of it lives or dies on its own quality.
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Re: New Prof Argüelles Youtube Series

Postby Cainntear » Tue May 23, 2023 9:47 pm

Incidentally, shouldn't this thread be called "New Dr Argüelles YouTube Series"...?

It seems to me that he always claimed the title "prof" because he was teaching in universities, but I don't think he ever taught in a North American university, did he? so the description "professor" was potentially just translationese. Certainly, you wouldn't get called "professor" in a university in any other Anglophone country unless you had very high status.

Also notable that if you are in a university in the UK or similar, you don't ever lose the "prof" bit... you just move to "professor emeritus" when you leave your chair. I seem to recall having a discussion about that when Argüelles lost his teaching position. Using the US system, a "professor" stops being called "prof" when they lose their job -- it's a US job title, not a simple "title" title. His YouTube nick is @ProfASAr, but his Wikipedia article doesn't mention "prof" at all, and on his own website, he doesn't use the title really, although he quotes students who describe him as such. It does make me wonder about whether he's been called out on using a title that he doesn't have any legitimate claim to....
Last edited by Cainntear on Wed May 24, 2023 12:08 am, edited 1 time in total.
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