How expensive is your language journey?

[Decidida]

I would not have made the progress I have made without spending money. I use free resources and purchased resources. I am extremely targeted about what I use. I purchased things that accomplished exactly what I hoped that they would accomplish.

For Spanish, I will occasionally purchase a hardcopy book in a bookstore that I do not need. That never happens for Creole, because the stores just do not stock Creole books. I do own a few inexpensive books that I do not need in Spanish, but I do not own a single Creole resource that was a superfluous purchase.

Some of my favorite things are free. Purchased is not ALWAYS better than free. None of us learn our native language with a single resource. It takes multiple resources to learn any language. Existing costs money.

I have a Creole dictionary on my wishlist. I have the kindle version which was about 2% of the cost of the hardcover version. I kid you not; there was that much of a price difference. I muddle along with hardcopy glossaries and ebook dictionaries, but I am certain that having a hardcopy of the dictionary I want will increase my progress. I cannot afford it, yet, though. It is frustrating.

[koolawant]

Well, I'm getting ready to graduate with a bachelors in Japanese studies in a few months (I still don't regret this choice my degree has afforded me fantastic opportunties and experiences) so uh, quite a lot. And that's not counting how expensive it has been in terms of time

[Fenderman]

My main cost is for weekly online tutor sessions. For my self-study course I bought used materials for Destinos (textbook, workbook) so the cost for that wasn't too bad.

[dgc1970]

My question is, how much (or little) have you spent so far? Do you buy all the resources or do you have a more frugal approach? Do you think spending the money you have has helped or do you think you could have done without? Feed my curiosity, please!

I feel an old post coming on...

That beats the hell out of me since I don't have the receipts/paper trail for all the classes I attended or stuff I've bought.

To be a little more pedantic, I can't give an accurate figure once we account for inflation (hey, I've been in the language-learning business for a while) and foreign exchange (my books in Saamic languages among others didn't cost me dollars).

Would anyone here want to run a mark-to-market check on the inventory circa 2013? (I've added more stuff since; my Korean stuff is noticeably absent in the photos).

You know you want to

Hard copies of stuff not in boxes or strewn on my desk.



Hard copies for my beloved Uralic languages.

I've spent a small fortune over many years when I count also classes taken. The amount of stuff not in the picture above has only grown, and sometimes wish that I could get my money back on some of my transactions, though. At some time in the future, I can easily imagine that many of my books will end up as donations to the public library, if not some lucky linguaphile. Write-offs are write-offs...

See here for more discussion.

I've never seen such a collection of language books. It's impressive!

Speakeasy: "Hold my beer."

[zjones]

For French, I bought Assimil NFWE $80, Easy French Grammar $10, Harry Potter paperback $20, several audiobooks from Audible $16 total (includes the free trail and a sale subscription), some iTalki lessons $50, a month of Kwiziq $20, CLE grammar $60. So that's about $256 over the course of 9 months to get to B1+. Not bad, really. I spend $80/month on strength-training classes so that helps me put the prices in perspective.

My B1 exam will cost about $140 if I remember correctly, and we will have to make a trip to Seattle to take it. That's going to be the largest chunk of money spent on French.

If I had no self-control I'd have spent several hundreds more and I'd have a giant bookcase full of awesome French books.

[Decidida]

There have been times that I have self-educated with almost nothing for resources. Just because I succeeded at my goals, it does not mean that was the best way or a fair way. I should not have had to work as hard as I have sometimes had to work. Yes, the effort made me creative and flexible and compassionate in ways that reach far beyond the individual subject that I was trying to learn, but ... I really appreciate that I have moved on to a life where I can purchase things that make my load lighter.

The word "can" is very different word from a lot of words that comfortable people use interchangeably. I "can" do all sorts of things, and have done all I "can" in some pretty incredible circumstances.

People have learned languages in some unusual circumstances, but there is no shame in purchasing language resources at a level equal to the comforts that you enjoy in other areas of your life. I have lived in multiple very different subcultures. I have found life to be the most comfortable and efficient and polite when I adapt to where I am. Right now, having some stuff feels right.