If we know something about the history of sound correspondence (Chapter V, p. 185). To make the best of our knowledge we should also know something about the evolution of writing itself. The wonderful thing about The Loom of Languageis how ahead of its time it was in terms of understanding the right approach to language learning. The problem is that seventy years later the same misunderstandings and misapprehensions exist, as if no progress was made at all! It also includes how a man can communicate across continents and down the ages through the impersonal and permanent record which we call writing.

Finally, he provides a vocabulary of 500 words for the major Romance languages and for the major Germanic languages. His argument is that if a person learned the Latin and Greek vocabulary lists and all of the 500 word vocabulary lists of all of the languages he provides that a person could understand and make himself understood anywhere in Europe. Other similar books teach you to learn any language, including those outside the Indo-European language family that share literally nothing with your native tongue, English. The Loom of Language starts with multiple chapters about linguistics. (contra Benny the Polyglot, Fluent in 3 Months: How Anyone at Any Age Can Learn to Speak Any Language from Anywhere in the World who counsels speaking on Day 1, and Kaufmann, The Way of the Linguist: A Language Learning Odyssey who would have me reading text with native speaker audio on Day 1).limey75 Yellow Belt Posts: 76 Joined: Wed May 25, 2016 11:30 am Location: UK Languages: English (N); intermediate: German, Norwegian, Old English. YtownPolyglot Orange Belt Posts: 227 Joined: Thu Apr 14, 2016 9:42 pm Location: Ohio, USA Languages: English (N), French (C1), Spanish (B2), German (B2), Italian (B1)

Of itself, no such change can bring the age-long calamity of war to an end; and it is a dangerous error to conceive that it can do so. We cannot hope to reach a remedy for the language obstacles to international co-operation on a democratic footing, while predatory finance capital, intrigues or armament manufacturers, and the vested interest of a rentier class in the misery of colonial peoples continue to stifle the impulse to a world-wide enterprise for the common wealth of mankind. No language reform can abolish war, while social agencies far more powerful than mere linguistic misunderstandings furnish fresh occasion for it. What intelligent language planning can do is to forge a new instrument for human collaboration on a planetary scale, when social institutions propitious to international strife no longer thwart the constructive task of planning health, leisure and plenty for all.” urn:lcp:loomoflanguage0000bodm:epub:f6693c7e-f0b5-451f-8b6c-9630f8ff5de2 Foldoutcount 0 Identifier loomoflanguage0000bodm Identifier-ark ark:/13960/t0tr8m03r Invoice 1652 Isbn 039330034X Lccn 85015222 Ocr tesseract 5.0.0-beta-20210815 Ocr_detected_lang en Ocr_detected_lang_conf 1.0000 Ocr_detected_script Latin Ocr_detected_script_conf 0.9575 Ocr_module_version 0.0.13 Ocr_parameters -l eng Old_pallet IA-WL-0000197 Openlibrary_edition The third part of the book gives information on other languages in more detail, including non-Indo-European and constructed languages and leads into a discussion on language planning and a “true Interlingua” that would be “a passport to a wider international culture.” The last paragraph is still relevant today, though written during WWII. He has a very interesting way of presenting things, and drawing conclusions, and associating thing. Well... to me, at least.If you enjoy the tutorials on ielanguages.com, then please consider buying French, Informal French, Italian, Spanish, German, Swedish, or Dutch Language Tutorials as a PDF e-book with free mp3s and free lifetime updates. Buy French Tutorial There are examples like "I wash" (which means I'm bathing myself in that era) which are used to show how "English has evolved so much further than other European languages" by even being able to remove personal pronouns via the use of context. Given that I would never say "I wash" but instead, "I'm washing myself", I lost trust in a lot of what the book said about the "advanced evolution of Anglo-American".

This book is a combination of a reference book, with parts meant to be consulted as needed, and some chapters meant to be read from beginning to end. The sections of interest to me right now were written for a very specific audience: native English speakers intent on learning Romance and Teutonic languages. There are sections devoted to learning other Romance languages once you know your first one, I hope to make use of this someday! That narrow focus allows a degree of specific insight missing from similar books. International YouTube Star Nuseir Yassin, Owner of Nas Daily, Grows Russian Language YouTube Channel 35% with BLEND Matt Strach There is so much great information in here that it requires repeat readings over several years, especially Part II. Consider this book a meta-manual for learning how to learn languages.He wrote his PhD thesis in 1924 at University of Zurich on the topic Studies about a dialogue in Nathan by Gotthold Ephraim Lessing ( Studien zum Dialog in Lessings Nathan). After that he taught in Europe and at University of Cape Town. Later he held a position within the Department of Modern Languages at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). He was succeeded in his position at MIT by Noam Chomsky in 1955. [1] Bibliography [ edit ] When I first read Bodmer i assumed from his command of English and his typically British prejudices that he was a Brit of a certain era, generation, breeding and education (think ‘Tolkien’). Imagine my surprise when I discovered he was infact Swiss! Further more he proceeded the Great Chomsky (before whom all linguists bow) in his seat. Bodmer also knew seventy years ago that children do not learn new languages any more easily than adults, but this also remains a popular misconception. I personally think this idea prevails because it lends an obscure layer of magic to the act of learning a language – the idea of a preternatural skill only the very young possess, perhaps because they are closer to their origins or something equally silly. This excuses adults who have failed to learn, and more importantly excuses the techniques that have failed to teach them! Joy and Wonder