L-R vs Normal Reading

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Re: L-R vs Normal Reading

Postby sfuqua » Fri Sep 17, 2021 3:37 pm

As for the "people don't learn the language from subtitles" argument, I wonder if all of the pretty moving pictures don't add still yet another channel to the brain which stops one from paying attention to the audio.

I mean, I"ve watched "A bout de souffle" at least 50 times, and I don't think I've learned much French from it. I understand it a bit because of my mediocre French, but when I watch it I tend to read the subtitles in English, enjoy how lovely young Jean Seberg was in black and white, and not pay much attention to the French.
Now, if I could listen to the audio and watch the subtitles with "pictures" turned off, so that young Jean would not be distracting... which would force me to listen... :lol:
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Re: L-R vs Normal Reading

Postby lusan » Fri Sep 17, 2021 4:40 pm

luke wrote:multitudinario: well-used, disastrous, many, long
patraña: tale, story, fable, myth, subterfuge


Good luck learning those words.
Last time I heard patraña was about 1970, cuando leia 100 años de Soledad.
Though, I have no idea the reason why I know the meaning of those words
:lol:

Este es el problema eterno con Garcia Marquez and other Latin-American intellectuals.
It feels like reading Cervantes with language that few people care nor uses.

No fun for me at all.
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Re: L-R vs Normal Reading

Postby AllSubNoDub » Fri Sep 17, 2021 5:29 pm

Use L-R as an Adjunct
I've never L-R'd an entire book all the way through in the way it's prescribed. I think certain methods work better for certain learners. "Holistic" learners who are very good at tolerating ambiguity for a long time seem to jibe well with L-Ring. Being able to tolerate ambiguity seems to be a HUGE advantage in language learning (one that my left-brain dominant, analytical mind seems stubbornly opposed to).

I have done multiple methods for one book (broken down by chapter), including L-R. Example:

Ch 1: Find synopsis of chapter 1 in target language. Look up every unknown word in synopsis. Use translation if necessary.
Ch 1: First pass, read only, highlight (easy to do with PDF) and look up every unknown word. Reference L1 text only when absolutely necessary.
Ch 1: Second pass, L-R L2/L2 immediately after.

Ch 2: Find synopsis of chapter 2 in target language. Look up every unknown word in synopsis.
Ch 2: First pass, read only, highlight unknown words, only look up words that are critical to understanding and can't be discerned from context. Reference L1 text only when absolutely necessary.
Ch 2: Second pass, L-R L2/L2 immediately after.

Ch 3: Read chapter 3 in L1.
Ch 3: Blind listen to L2 and try as hard as you can to understand. Slow down audio, try not to pause a lot. Go through more than once if you find it helps and the chapter is short enough.
Ch 3: L-R L2/L2. Rewind over paragraphs that are hard to understand (don't make it a habit and don't do it more than once). Any parts you've noted that you're completely lost on, take a peak at the translation.

Ch 4: Find synopsis of chapter 2 in target language.
Ch 4: Traditional L-R. Ok to slow down audio. Repeat the whole chapter if you want.

Ch 5: Traditional L-R.

.
.
.


What I lack in my ability to tolerate ambiguity, I make up for it in my ability to grind, so take this with a grain of salt if you find this too intensive. The point (for me) is to ease into ambiguity. A lot of the vocabulary you'll need will be in the beginning of the book. Once you "get used to" an author (or translator), it significantly eases comprehension later on. When reading I like highlighting, even if I don't do lookups, because I can go back at the end and see how much progress I've made and I can choose to SRS certain vocab at that time.

Subtitles comment:
Language reactor makes it such that you can have L2/L1 subs on simultaneously, you can blur out L1, you can click on L2 words in the subtitles and get pop-up definitions with audio, you can configure it to pause after every line of speech, you can configure it to automatically fast-forward when nothing is being spoken, you can save unknown words, you can make words as known in order of frequency, etc. etc. etc. Not sure of a reason not to use.

The point of using subtitles is to ease into L2 comprehension using only the pictures as context. Use your L1 as a tool in the beginning, not a crutch, and discard it ASAP.

Other tools like Migaku make it such that you can automatically convert dialogue into SRS cards (not sure if you can do this with Language Reactor). Language Reactor also has a catalogue of videos/shows with exactly matched subs to speech. Sorry for the WOT.
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Re: L-R vs Normal Reading

Postby jeff_lindqvist » Fri Sep 17, 2021 5:39 pm

hasen wrote:
jeff_lindqvist wrote:
hasen wrote:As for audiobooks vs movies generally, well it's obvious that movies and tv shows would be better for learning to actually speak the language since they are 100% dialogue, whereas books are mainly descriptions and in the past tense. The slang you mention is also required for general speaking and understanding everyday speech. There are also ways to get around the density problem you mention. Personally I only watch the parts with dialogue the second time around.


100% dialogue, alright, but fewer words per spent minute. That has always been the reason why I've spent more time reading, listening to podcasts or audiobooks. More words per minute.


Like I said, there are ways around that problem. I only watch the parts with the dialogue, so no it's not fewer words per spent minute.


Fair enough. I'm sure there are books with a lot of dialogue, too. And while I'm at it, the majority of crime fiction I read (albeit in Swedish/English) is in the present tense.
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Re: L-R vs Normal Reading

Postby luke » Fri Sep 17, 2021 5:43 pm

lusan wrote:
luke wrote:multitudinario: well-used, disastrous, many, long
patraña: tale, story, fable, myth, subterfuge

Last time I heard patraña was about 1970, cuando leia 100 años de Soledad.
Though, I have no idea the reason why I know the meaning of those words
:lol:

Este es el problema eterno con Garcia Marquez and other Latin-American intellectuals.
It feels like reading Cervantes with language that few people care nor uses.

It's not a bug, it's a feature :)

So, in case it was unclear - and I'm sure it was because I didn't explicitly state it - looking at the words used by the original author and the translator can be part of the art of the translation.

Edith Grossman did a translation of Don Quixote a few years back and her notes as a translator were interesting. Basically, she wanted to create for the modern reader the modernity of the language that Cervantes used back in his day.

That's one very valid approach to translation.

And I hope my comment and humor didn't get our conversation off track in any way when I said something like "the house wants to steal our television". It was just a fun thought. Reminded of the criticism we sometimes hear about Duolingo. Just a funny nonsensical sentence. But some pedagogues - and I hesitate to call them that because perhaps they're not - think crazy sentences help you remember!

And in case anyone is picking up the thread part way through, the nonsensical sentence was mine, not yours. Yours was just inspiration for my sentence.

Continuing on the theme of your inspiring posts below...

un grito multitudinario estremeció la noche=6
a multitudinous scream shook the night=6

For me, the value of my example translation - and you're comments help me understand this even better - is that both "multitudinario" and "multitudious" are super rare words. By capturing the rarity of the word, additional information about the author's style is communicated.

"Multitudinous", which I've not heard for many many years reverberates, just as perhaps "multitudinario" might for Spanish speaking afficionados of Gabriel García Márquez.

That's the beauty.

And you also helped me in thinking about Anki - which I use daily - but have had extreme reluctance to turning it on Cien años de soledad. I'm not going to do it now, but if I ever do get to the point where I think that would be fun and helpful, you've helped me with understanding this is exactly how to use Anki with that book! So your post was extraordinarily helpful. Thanks again.
Last edited by luke on Fri Sep 17, 2021 8:41 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: L-R vs Normal Reading

Postby german2k01 » Fri Sep 17, 2021 8:14 pm

I always mean to ask a question in relation to the L-R method. It is more like curiosity. How come during the whole process of L-R you get to see the written text-only once in your target language (Step 2)? How are you going to develop a strong intuition for grammar structures if you get to see them only once? Is it possible to acquire all the grammar knowledge just through listening alone?
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Re: L-R vs Normal Reading

Postby sfuqua » Fri Sep 17, 2021 9:32 pm

I believe the original designer of the method suggested doing step 2 3 times.
In another part of the post they suggested a beginner might want to alternate step two and step three three times for a total of 6 trips through.

I doubt that you could learn a language with only L-R :D
I think you might learn to read and listen at a pretty high level if you could keep it up long enough.
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荒海や佐渡によこたふ天の川

the rough sea / stretching out towards Sado / the Milky Way
Basho[1689]

Sometimes Japanese is just too much...

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Re: L-R vs Normal Reading

Postby german2k01 » Sat Sep 18, 2021 8:17 am

Now your explanation is making sense to me. L-R is a legit system.

Do you know any book series or authors in English who have written edge-of-the-seat plots in English? /Detective/Crimes/Murder/mystery?
I would read them in German. Translated ones of course. You need a compelling story plot to stick with L-R every day.

My brain does not like Harry Potter, Game of Thrones (it was a slight upgrade over Harry Potter but could not go beyond book2).
No science fiction please.No Sherlock Holmes. I am already done with it.


I doubt that you could learn a language with only L-R


If you are using Anki and doing sentence mining like appending sentences from books you are doing L-R. It will teach you some language as well. That's my impression of it.
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Re: L-R vs Normal Reading

Postby DaveAgain » Sat Sep 18, 2021 1:19 pm

german2k01 wrote:
Do you know any book series or authors in English who have written edge-of-the-seat plots in English? /Detective/Crimes/Murder/mystery?
I would read them in German. Translated ones of course. You need a compelling story plot to stick with L-R every day.
Lee Child's Jack Reacher series?
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Re: L-R vs Normal Reading

Postby lusan » Sat Sep 18, 2021 1:53 pm

luke wrote:
Continuing on the theme of your inspiring posts below...

un grito multitudinario estremeció la noche=6
a multitudinous scream shook the night=6

For me, the value of my example translation - and you're comments help me understand this even better - is that both "multitudinario" and "multitudious" are super rare words. By capturing the rarity of the word, additional information about the author's style is communicated.

"Multitudinous", which I've not heard for many many years reverberates, just as perhaps "multitudinario" might for Spanish speaking afficionados of Gabriel García Márquez.

That's the beauty.


Agree. However, I read for fun and pleasure, those almost forgotten words are, for me, awful distractions. I target 40+ pages/days. I prefer not to have them in front of me if I cannot deduct them from their context. I believe that writers do it with the pretension of renewing the language or because of pedantismo.-ah, I have not used this word in 45 years! An excellent example of pedante!

luke wrote:And you also helped me in thinking about Anki - which I use daily - but have had extreme reluctance to turning it on Cien años de soledad. I'm not going to do it now, but if I ever do get to the point where I think that would be fun and helpful, you've helped me with understanding this is exactly how to use Anki with that book! So your post was extraordinarily helpful. Thanks again.


By the way, I used Anki as a general tool. For reading, I choose words/chuncks for Anki according to these questions:
"When was the last time I saw it in English? Will I see it again? Is it cool or useful?" If not, no way Jose. It is a waste of time. If selected I create a Reading card, L2>L1. I use this strategy for books that I read at 98~ %. And I check in the dict. every single unknown words when I read. -Of course, kindle reader.
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