15 September 2009

Learning a foreign language as an adult

This hits a little too close to home. From Coming Home Crazy: An Alphabet of China Essays by Bill Holm. (A very good book from a superb writer.)

When you begin learning a language or try to use a new one, your adult power and resourcefulness slip away, and you sound to yourself, and to others, like a drooling child or an idiot. In a new language, you are first a baby, then a little child; then, if you work hard, a badly educated teenager with a low IQ.

2 comments:

Chris Schuette said...

What a great quote...and frighteningly humbling!

Good to see your blog again. I've been woefully neglecting my feedreader, so I have some catching up to do!

Sophzilla said...

Thanks Chris! I've been neglecting the blog. Silly since it's so much fun to do!