#AskSteve

As people who speak multiple languages, polyglots like to use those languages; we like to see how we do. But there is an element of performance. Are you better than me? Am I better than you? For some people that’s fine. I think a lot of us are very happy, in fact, when we hear somebody speak better than we do.

  I studied Mandarin Chinese 50 years ago. It took me nine months to reach a level where I could translate newspaper editorials from English to Chinese and from Chinese to English,…

Language learning depends mostly on three factors, the attitude of the learner, the time available, and learner’s attentiveness to the language. If we assume a positive attitude on the part of the learner, and a reasonable and growing attentivenes…

It is tempting to believe that we can just acquire a small number of very useful words and sort of get a jump start in a language. I have never found that…

In 1987, I decided I was going to put forth a major effort to learn German. I’m going to explain that to you in detail.   Long before I decided that I…

You have all heard me stress the importance of input. You have to get the language in you, meaning you have to acquire words, and you have to let your brain get…