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Language Learning Quotes

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Language Learning Quotes

“Meeting people whose life trajectories were so different from my own enlarged my way of thinking. Outside the school, arguments over refugees were raging, but the time I had spent inside this building showed me that those conversations were based on phantasms. People were debating their own fears. What I had witnessed taking place inside this school every day revealed the rhetoric for what it was: more propaganda than fact. Donald Trump appeared to believe his own assertions, but I hoped that in the years to come, more people would be able to recognize refugees for who they really were: simply the most vulnerable people on earth. Inside this school, where the reality of refugee resettlement was enacted every day, it was plain to see that seeking a new home took tremendous courage. And receiving those who had been displaced involved tremendous generosity. That’s what refugee resettlement was, I decided. Acts of courage met by acts of generosity. Despite how fear-based the national conversation had turned, there was nothing scary about what was happening at South. Getting to know the newcomer students had deepened my own life, and watching Mr. Williams work with all twenty-two of them at once with so much grace, dexterity, sensitivity, and affection had provided me with daily inspiration. I would even say that spending a year in room 142 had allowed me to witness something as close to holy as I’ve seen take place between human beings. I could only wish that in time, more people would be able to look past their fear of the stranger and experience the wonder of getting to know people from other parts of the globe. For as far as I could tell, the world was not going to stop producing refugees. The plain, irreducible fact of good people being made nomad by the millions through all the kinds of horror this world could produce seemed likely to prove the central moral challenge of our times. How did we want to meet that challenge? We could fill our hearts with fear or with hope. And the choice would affect more than just our own dispositions, for in choosing which seeds to sow, we would dictate the type of harvest. Surely the only harvest worth cultivating was the one Mr. Williams had been seeking: greater fluency, better understanding.”

FearUnderstandingEducationCourageLearningEmpathyGenerosityRefugeesLanguage LearningLanguages And Culture
Book:The Newcomers: Finding Refuge, Friendship, and Hope in an American Classroom
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“In a world where words are often mere amusement, it is imperative to forge a new dictionary that enlightens the masses on the true worth of spoken words. For those who underestimate its power, fail to realize the energy they emit and the consequences they yield. What we give with our words, we receive - a universal balance that demands understanding and respect.”

Inspirational QuotesLanguageInspirational LifeRespectInspirational AttitudeWordsLanguage LearningLanguage Understanding
Author:Yvonne Padmos
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“Let history handle empires. Learn a thousand words and handle the conversation.”

Personal GrowthCommunication SkillsPower Of WordsLanguage LearningLifelong LearningModern EducationUnderstanding PeopleRussian LanguageCross Cultural CommunicationGlobal Conversations
Book:In English as in Russian: 1000 words with explanations - ПО-АНГЛИЙСКИ КАК ПО-РУССКИ: 1000 слов с пояснениями
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“I have a friend from my graduate school days at The Ohio State University whom we nicknamed Aladdin. Aladdin and I took a number of Arabic classes together. Every now and then, we would play pick-up basketball at the university gym. Aladdin couldn’t shoot, but he was one of the quickest, most intense defenders I have ever seen. One day, he went high up for a layup at 100 mph, bumped a defender, and fell square on his head. Aladdin lay there motionless for a few minutes before gingerly getting up. He had apparently suffered a concussion. We drove him to the ER, before he decided in the reception that he felt okay enough to go home. I’ll never forget, while we were leaving the gym and during the car ride, Aladdin kept asking people to speak Arabic to him. I probably heard the phrase “Speak Arabic to me, Binyamin! [my Arabic name]” at least two dozen times. Aladdin, in his dizzied and confused state, waiting to be seen for a potentially serious injury, was afraid that he had forgotten Arabic. The next day Aladdin texted everyone saying he felt fine. In hindsight, this story is a comical illustration of every language learner’s worst fear: losing the skills they worked so hard to acquire. As it turns out, Aladdin didn’t forget Arabic and currently lives in Dubai.”

EducationLearningMemoryLanguage LearningMuscle MemoryForeign Languages
Book:The Art of Learning a Foreign Language: 25 Things I Wish They Told Me
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“If you look around the room you are in right now, you will observe a great diversity of items, shapes, sizes, textures, colors, and functions, with all their associated nuances and subtleties. Every career, hobby, occupation, sport, industry, philosophy, plant, animal, object, event, and sensory experience–visual and otherwise–corresponds to a specific language. Language, in a word, is all-encompassing, and there are numerous registers, dialects, idioms, metaphors, and synonyms that express the same idea in multiple ways. “Mastering” one’s native language is a lifelong pursuit. Mastering a foreign language is an even taller order.”

NatureLearningCommunicationMasteryLanguage LearningForeign Languages
Book:The Art of Learning a Foreign Language: 25 Things I Wish They Told Me
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“Your fragments of knowledge will lead to competence. Your competence will lead to fluency. Your fluency will intensify to higher and higher levels of fluency. The best attitude, however, is that your attempt to master the foreign language, should remain perpetually unfinished business. You'll succeed if you make sure you never go to bed knowing no more of your target language than you did when you woke up!”

MotivationalLanguageMotivational QuotesLearningLanguage Learning
Book:How to Learn Any Language: Quickly, Easily, Inexpensively, Enjoyably and on Your Own
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“Lydia's English is a help, but there are many different languages in el norte. There are codes Lydia hasn't yet learned to decipher, subtle differences between words that mean almost, but not quite the same thing: migrant, immigrant, illegal alien. She learns that there are flags that people use here, and those flags may be a warning or a welcome. She is learning.”

LanguageLearningIntegratingLinguisticsLanguage LearningCultural DifferencesAcculturation
Book:American Dirt
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“Daring soul has five diaries; gratitude, work, inspirational, prayer and language diaries.”

InspirationalDesirePurposeMotivationWorkInspiringDestinyAchieveSelf EsteemPositive ThinkingAdventurePrayingGratitudeSeekingPraySelf DeterminationDaringUniquenessJournalWishesWriting LifeWriteDiariesPositive OutlookJoyful LivingDetermined SpiritJoy Of LifeLanguage LearningThankful HeartSeeking FateSelf SeekingSelf StudyShine Your LifeNotekeepingUnstoppable ForceStrong SoulUnstoppable BlessingsKeep A Notebook
Book:Pearls of Wisdom: Great mind
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“Even this lower new data amounts to a grand average of more than six thoughts per minute, or a thought every ten seconds, which, to my mind, is an incredibly high number. There’s a reason almost all humans are proficient in at least one language. With that much action in between the ears comes a lot of opportunities to improve language skills. . . As linguists and language learners, we can channel our brain’s verbal activity to improve or maintain our language skills, without making any major modifications to our lifestyle or environment.”

ThoughtsLanguage LearningForeign LanguagesLearning A Language
Book:The Art of Learning a Foreign Language: 25 Things I Wish They Told Me
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“In a foreign language, a lot of social and psychological conditioning gets thrown out the window. First, you begin to interact with people who do not know you outside of the target language. The blank canvas effect here is true of any new people you meet, in general. Second, every language is a world unto itself. It is common to hear people comment on the particularity of an individual’s foreign language skills. “She speaks French well. His Spanish is formal or funny. I want to hear them speak Arabic.” In other words, people expect there to be some differences between the native-language version of yourself and the target-language version. If you want to exaggerate these differences, then more power to you. As the saying in the intro goes, the multiple personalities effect with people who speak more than one language is real but bears none of the oft associated pathology.”

PsychologyPersonalityLanguage LearningForeign Languages
Book:The Art of Learning a Foreign Language: 25 Things I Wish They Told Me
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“The brain is more like a muscle and less like a storage area. If you really want to be a writer, you should want to write a lot. If you want to write a lot, then you need to be in training. You are preparing to run marathons, not emptying a suitcase. Learning new languages, acquiring new vocabulary, keeping yourself in various forms of constant logocentric discipline is one of the best things you can do. And language acquisition is nothing if not logocentric discipline.”

WritingPracticeDisciplineTrainingWritersLanguage LearningLogophileVocabulary Building
Book:Wordsmithy: Hot Tips for the Writing Life
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“Sonnet of Languages Turkish is the language of love, Spanish is the language of revolution. Swedish is the language of resilience, English is the language of translation. Portuguese is the language of adventure, German is the language of discipline. French is the language of passion, Italian is the language of cuisine. With over 7000 languages in the world, Handful of tongues fall short in a sonnet. But you can rest assured of one thing, Every language does something the very best. Each language is profoundly unique in its own way. When they come together, they light the human way.”

Diversity And InclusionLinguisticsCultural IntegrationLanguage LearningLanguages And CultureMulticultural PoetLanguage StudiesLinguistic DiversityPolyglot PoetryLanguages Psychology
Book:Amantes Assemble: 100 Sonnets of Servant Sultans
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“There are those who eagerly learn another language to be one with another culture, then there are those morons who insist on the exclusive glorification of their so-called native language. The world is beautified by the former, whereas the latter only sustain disharmony - the latter only act as a prehistoric impediment to the unification of humankind.”

Brainy QuotesDiversity And InclusionCultural DiversityLanguage LearningLanguages And CultureLanguage BarrierBilingualismLinguistic DiversityPolyglots
Book:The Gentalist: There's No Social Work, Only Family Work
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“Language is Highway to A Culture (Diary of A Polyglot Neuroscientist, S.2392) Languages are not ornaments, languages are organs, channeling spirit from the heart. Language is highway to a culture, language requires a vessel, not translator. Soon earbuds will feature instant translation, which will render crosscultural conversation seamless, but at the same time, lifeless, hollow and cold. Until we develop the brain technology to communicate meaning telepathically without talking, no amount of translation can carry the warmth, nuances and sentiment of a lived language. As added perk, speaking more than one language delays age-related cognitive decline. Therefore no matter how you look at it, one broken second language is far more valuable than all the mass-produced subtitles.”

LanguageLinguisticsTranslationLanguage LearningPolyglotLanguage BarrierMultilingualismBilingualLanguage Studies
Book:Kral Fakir: When Calls The Kainat
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“Pilgrim of Language (Sonnet) How will you know if you can speak another language? If you can curse someone on impulse without memorizing, you got the language in your gut. If you can console someone in pain, the language nestles in your heart. No es necessario que hablar guapisimo, solamente necessario que hablar amable. All those pedestals of language levels, a, b, z, and what not, are elitist garbage. Chase after form, and you'll miss the soul - throw yourself into the soul, and neurons will regrow. Forget grammar, forget vocabulary, let the language seep into your bloodstream. In a world infested with medal-seeking mules, stand odd, stand ablaze, a drunken pilgrim.”

LinguisticsLanguage LearningPolyglotLanguage BarrierMultilingualismNeuroplasticityBilingualLanguage AcquisitionLanguage StudiesLanguage Proficiency
Book:Hazrat-e Humanity: The Uncultured Polyglot
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“Wambach's concerns raised questions about the impact that deaf signers could have on Project Nim, and perhaps inadvertently about how Terrace's study might compare with the work done by the Gardners in Nevada, who had expressly designed their experiments to include deaf signers. Simply having Falitz sign at the weekly meetings and interpret for Wambach in the discussions brought a new dimension to their work. Wambach was not particularly critical of Terrace, who was older and far more established than she, but she wanted the staff to have a better understanding of the world of deaf speakers—those who used ASL because they needed a language. Thanks to Wambach, the chimp project began attracting deaf volunteers (including one who is remembered for having love and hate tattooed on his knuckles), who formed a small subculture within Terrace's staff. In an attempt to bridge these two worlds, one night the deaf volunteers arranged to plug up the ears of the hearing staff and take them out to a restaurant for dinner. They were instructed to communicate exclusively in ASL from the moment the plugs were placed in their ears on the way to the restaurant, during the meal, and all the way back to Delafield. The hearing group found the experience to be a terrible struggle. But what made an indelible impression on Johnson was the way that everybody in the restaurant spoke really slowly and loudly to them, treating them as if they were all mentally incapacitated.”

ChimpanzeesLanguage LearningSign LanguageAslNim Chimpsky
Book:Nim Chimpsky: The Chimp Who Would Be Human
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“Even though English is the universal language of earth, due to its primitive colonial escapades, and indeed the most convenient, it is neither the most beautiful nor the most soulful language on earth.”

ColonialismEnglish LanguageEnglishLanguage LearningColonial HistoryLanguage BarrierLanguage StudiesColonial MentalityEnglish Translation
Book:Bulletproof Backbone: Injustice Not Allowed on My Watch
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“My only comfort was the knowledge that I was not alone. Huddled in the hallways and making the most of our pathetic French, my fellow students and I engaged in the sort of conversation commonly overheard in refugee camps. "Sometime me cry alone at night." "That be common for I, also, but be more strong, you. Much work and someday you talk pretty. People start love you soon. Maybe tomorrow, okay.”

HumorStudentsLanguage LearningClassmatesFrench Language
Book:Me Talk Pretty One Day
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“If you wanna know about a culture, you can read about it in any language - but if you want to experience that culture like your own, you gotta do it as one of their own - through their own native language.”

Cultural IntegrationCultural DiversityLanguage LearningPolyglotLanguages And CultureLanguage BarrierCultural StudiesWorld CulturesLanguage UnderstandingLinguistic
Book:Rowdy Scientist: Handbook of Humanitarian Science
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“When someone recommends a book to you, you know two things; that it is a good book and you have a good friend. If you listen to everybody, you will be nobody. Judge a man by what he tried, not by what he accomplished. People hate what they know but fear what they don't. A curious mind is never bored. Parents, teachers, and politicians should not be judged by their popularity. People believe in everything except the reality.”

KoreanForeign LanguageLanguage LearningLanguage AcquisitionKorean Writers
Author:Min Kim
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