Speaking in a group

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nooj
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Speaking in a group

Postby nooj » Thu Dec 21, 2017 2:11 am

I'm fine one on one conversations, or three people conversations, but the moment that it becomes 4 or 5 native speakers speaking French around a table, I find it extremely difficult to keep up, both on an auditory level (it's French turned up to level 11) and on a production level, because it's hard to get a word in. I find French and Spanish speakers take it for granted that people can talk over each or interrupt, whereas that's definitely not my cultural practice.

How do you deal with speaking in a group?
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Re: Speaking in a group

Postby Speakeasy » Thu Dec 21, 2017 3:30 am

I used to have a similar problem in French. Some 30 years ago, at my request, my employer transferred me to a small company town in the Québec interior. I was 40 years old at the time and my previous contact with the language had been limited to a two-year high school French Grammar class, during which no one other than the teacher spoke the language aloud. Nevertheless, a year following my arrival in Québec, having taken absolutely no French courses, relying solely on my full-immersion exposure to the language in the workplace, and without any additional preparation whatsoever, I passed the mandatory B2 exam in French for professionals wishing to practice in the province. I do not consider this to be an exploit! I suspect that most native speakers of English could easily achieve similar, if not better, results in a comparable situation. I was quite at ease speaking French in small groups in professional situations. And yet, ...

During business meetings with the plant’s managerial staff, I could easily hold my own. However, as a participant in large conferences with my professional peers, although I could follow the rapidly changing conversations, I had considerable difficulty “getting a word in edgewise.” Most of my peers were vying for the attention of the company’s VP Finance, a person who had enormous influence over their careers (but not over mine, as I have never cared about my career). These conferences were akin to “feeding-frenzies” with my peers displaying open hostility to one another, deliberately cutting one another off in mid-sentence, and changing the direction of the conversation so as to draw attention to themselves. It took me an additional year of full-immersion to achieve the rapidity of speech necessary to cutting my peers off had I wanted to, something that I chose not to do (from my perspective, life is simply too short for that kind of sh*t).

At the beginning of my second year at the plant, despite my progress, during social situations with my co-workers, I could not follow the conversation. They were not deliberately excluding me from their conversations, I simply did not understand what was going on! It eventually dawned on me that, in social situations, my co-workers were using a combination of vocabulary, colloquialisms, slang, cursing (I caught onto that part quite quickly) and common-amongst-themselves social references which they never employed in the office. It took me an additional year of “social exposure” to catch up to this parallel register.

So, my solution was: increased fluency gained through greater exposure in a full-immersion environment in all of the registers that I will ever need.

Addendum:
"...I find French and Spanish speakers take it for granted that people can talk over each or interrupt..." I would have to agree. Furthermore, if you remain politely silent, awaiting your turn to speak, or timidly asking requesting permission to add a comment to an on-going discussion, you just might be perceived as being aloof, distant, unfriendly, and anti-social.

EDITED:
Addendum.
Typos.
Last edited by Speakeasy on Mon Apr 02, 2018 2:55 am, edited 1 time in total.
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tiia
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Re: Speaking in a group

Postby tiia » Thu Dec 21, 2017 9:32 am

Group situations are difficult. They require a really advanced level of the language in speaking and listening. I even find them sometimes difficult in my native language. In English and German the difficulty is about the same for me, but in Finnish...

Some time ago I was at a local meeting with Finns and I could understand most of what was being said, but actively participating in the discussion, was almost impossible. It was like I suddenly became mute, and if I could say something it was so simplified, that it felt stupid and rude.
But I believe that this is one of the few ways for me to actually improve, because the issue in that case was not understanding itself, but the high speed processing that has to be done. In particular the high speed of producing sentences.

I'm not aiming to surpass the level of conversational skills I have in my native lang. That would be, most certainly, impossible to achieve, so one has to accept, that there are limitations that have nothing to do with the foreign language itself, but just with the type of conversation. If you're exposed to it often enough you will eventually get used to it, if not... then that's it. When coming to a new group there might always be certain jokes, sayings etc. a person from outside the group cannot understand. But you need the level to understand that it's only because of this, that you cannot understand what is going on.

In my case I know that it also takes me a lot of effort to keep a conversation going when there's a lot of background noise. Even in German. So that's why I don't like to practice the weaker languages with too much noise around. It just makes everything more complicated than necessary. However, I don't know whether praticing one-on-one conversations with a lot of background noise would give any benefits for group discussions.
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Re: Speaking in a group

Postby Speakeasy » Thu Dec 21, 2017 2:23 pm

nooj wrote: ... I'm fine one on one conversations, or three people conversations, but the moment that it becomes 4 or 5 native speakers speaking French around a table ...
tiia wrote:Group situations are difficult. They require a really advanced level of the language in speaking and listening ... it also takes me a lot of effort to keep a conversation going when there's a lot of background noise ... However, I don't know whether praticing one-on-one conversations with a lot of background noise would give any benefits for group discussions.
One of the difficulties of keeping up in a conversation involving 4 or 5 native speakers is that there are often multiple conversations going on simultaneously. Active participants can, and are expected to, join and leave the individual conversations upon hearing a key word or phrase, or upon being asked to comment on, or to provide specific information in support of someone else's comment, even though they did not hear it and have not been following the individual discussion. The subjects of the individual conversations change with blinding speed. Nevertheless, everyone is expected to keep pace.

Background noise, raucous laughter, and louder-than-normal volume of speech increase the difficulties of clear comprehension. The use of colloquialisms and slang (which can differ by region, generation, social/cultural/ethnic group) is at its maximum. Jokes, and inside jokes, are injected with abandon. Few subjects are tabou and everyone is expected to offer an "instant" informative, or at least entertaining, opinion on the most recent current events, on the reasons for historical disputes, and on virtually every topic imaginable. What are effectively "code words" are used by participants to recall or reference shared experiences or events, generating laughter, indignation, and the full range of human emotions. Immediate productive access to a wide range of vocabulary is required, some of which will be used only sparingly in a lifetime. Attention to social/cultural cues and the sensitivies of the group, or even just one member of the group, is necessary to avoid the appearance of offering insult and the sparking of flash arguments. Depending on the unstated rules for a given linguistic/cultural group, professional discussions can take on the appearance of a social gathering. Participants are expected to switch instanteously between the professional and social registers and to keep pace with the others.

As tiia pointed out, active participation can be difficult even in one's own language. And, as she further suggested, praticing one-on-one conversations is unlikely to be of much benefit in preparing oneself for the rigours of (multiple, simultaneous) group conversations. I acquired my ability to "keep pace" in conversations through years' of participation. While I would imagine that intensive language training might be able to simulate the process, I suspect that only lengthy, expensive programmes would be of any assistance. To use a week methaphor, participating in multiple, simultaneously conversations as we have being describing above is rather like playing waterpolo against four other teams, uh, er ... simultaneously. Swimming in a lane (even strong, powerful, record-braking swimming) is excellent preparation, but it is insufficient.
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Re: Speaking in a group

Postby NoManches » Wed Apr 04, 2018 1:26 pm

I'm surprised this thread only has a few responses. It seems like the kind of topic that would generate a lot of discussion on this forum. Maybe it is only interesting to me since it is something I've had difficulty with for a while and something I've thought about before. I used to listen to a podcast called Gente de Confianza (no longer in production). No matter how great I thought my Spanish was, I'd listen to that podcast and would finish being really dissapointed in myself. This podcast involved at least four guys sitting around a table, often drinking beer, and just talking about funny/interesting things in the news. They were from Mexico so most of the topics were from the Mexican news or related to US news that affected Mexico. They used everyday language, lots of slang and idiomas, and would talk over each other all the time. Also, they'd change topics frequently and return to topics only to leave them again. Also, they'd bring up things from previous episodes or things that were popular with Mexicans on the internet (such as certain memes or viral videos). For me, this podcast was the ultimate test. They used Spanish the way I wanted to use it. I didn't care about having a 1 on 1 conversation with somebody about the weather or asking them for directions. I wanted to use Spanish the way it was commonly used everyday amongst groups of friends or co-workers.

I should probably revisit this podcast (Gente de confianza) tonsee if my improved listening comprehension will allow me to better follow along (although I think speakeasy's water polo analogy will hold true here).

I did see an improvement in conversing in small groups when I used to study in Mexico and would hang out with small groups of Mexican/American students who went to my school (went to school in the US, parents were from Mexico, they were 100% billingual from a young age). The key here is that because I was their friend and we had a lot in common, I was able to follow along with conversations. Also, it was more common for them to talk about things from a US perspective which made it easier on me If I tried to follow along with the Mexican students in a group, who I was only an acquaintance with, it was almost impossible.

Maybe my late response will generate more conversation on this interesting topic.
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Re: Speaking in a group

Postby garyb » Wed Apr 04, 2018 2:12 pm

NoManches wrote:I'm surprised this thread only has a few responses. It seems like the kind of topic that would generate a lot of discussion on this forum. Maybe it is only interesting to me since it is something I've had difficulty with for a while and something I've thought about before.


I somehow missed this topic first time round, so this is my first time seeing it, but I suspect that it's something that only a minority of forum members are interested in. As a whole, the forum is biased towards consuming media rather than interacting with people, and those who do focus on the interaction part tend to use their languages for travel and/or on a mostly one-to-one or small group basis with family or friends. All this is understandable since many of us are learning languages as a spare-time hobby and not living in a country where they're spoken. Opportunities to speak with one native can be rare enough, let alone several.

When I end up in a big group conversation I usually feel a bit out of my comfort zone. It can be a shock struggling to keep up after believing my comprehension was good based on small group conversations and scripted dialogue in films and TV. The only language I can comfortably keep up with them in is Italian, partly because I've had lots of practice as I was hanging around with native speakers from the start and partly because Italians tend to speak quite clearly when people in the group are from different areas of the country. If they're all from the same region, the language becomes less careful and standard, and it can become quite tricky.

The big question is how to practise for these conversations if, like for most of us, the real thing doesn't happen very often. Podcasts like the one you describe sound ideal, and it would be good to get some other recommendations. Most of the ones I've come across have been either focused on sport or just too inane. Anything with unscripted dialogue, like interviews or talk shows, is probably helpful too. And that's just the listening part; joining in is a whole other issue. In my experience, people will give you a bit of leeway as a non-native speaker, but only so much and bigger groups are less forgiving.

Learners who are towards the "fluency" side of the fluency-accuracy continuum are probably at an advantage here, while more perfectionist ones like me probably need to force themselves to just get some words out without worrying too much about correctness. The extra time to correctly construct your response can easily make you miss your opportunity entirely.
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Re: Speaking in a group

Postby nooj » Thu Feb 28, 2019 11:28 am

I want to bump this up again, because I find this to be true a reoccurring phenomenon with (Mallorcan) Catalan. I flat out asked a person why it was that when she was talking to me I understood her fine but when she and her friends and speaking, huge chunks missed me by.

She said that she modified how she talked to me compared to her friends, which provides another answer to why.

It doesn't have to take place consciously, but in an effort to accommodate the speaker in front. Think of the times you have 'dumbed down' your speech for a child, slowed it down a bit etc.
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Re: Speaking in a group

Postby tiia » Thu Feb 28, 2019 9:30 pm

Thanks for eido, for reminding me about my old post here. It's good to think about it again, now that I have lunch conversations 5 times a week. I may be getting better, but most of the days it's still... :?
I also started watching Finnish news every now and then, because it helps to understand some conversations topics a bit better.
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Re: Speaking in a group

Postby Elsa Maria » Sun Apr 28, 2019 7:45 pm

I went searching for this thread this morning :)

I belong to a Danish book club, and I have been a few times now. I estimate that I understand approximately 75% of what the others say. I really don't know how improve that. Maybe there is nothing to be done but to accept it. And keep working. 75% will eventually become 76%. It's not like I can increase the frequency of this (actually quite amazing) opportunity.

I did a lot of preparation this most recent time, and I think that helped a little. Preparation was helpful! Imagine that! But it only moved the listening needle a little bit. It did more for my speaking.

When I speak there, I continue to make stupid mistakes. I call the mistakes stupid, because they are things that I do indeed know how to say correctly. I have, at least, stopped being upset about the mistakes the whole way home.
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Re: Speaking in a group

Postby IronMike » Sun Apr 28, 2019 9:18 pm

Wow, Elsa Maria, lucky you. You found a Danish book club here in the US?
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