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Ask HN: Can someone talk me out of learning new languages

14 points by zerotosixty ↗ HN
Hey folks, I'm thinking of learning 3 new languages for 2021 and hopefully i can converse in those languages by 2022

I'm just not sure if the trade-off is worth it for me to aggressively pursue it or if i should put it on hold for another year so i can learn more practical skill that has an immediate impact to those around me

19 comments

[ 3.0 ms ] story [ 52.0 ms ] thread
mattmanser
How did your learning music go? You said 5 months ago that's what you were going to do.

Is this ridiculously unrealistic or are you actually disciplind enough to pull this off?

Why do you even want to learn 3? There's not that much point learning 3 at once, try learning one.

eesmith
To say nothing of the "Certifications [OP is] planning to obtain by EOY: GCP, Kubernetes, Google Ads, Salesforce, Quickbooks, aPHRm, HubSpot, CAPM, fb Blueprint, AWS" - https://www.linkedin.com/in/kevin-de-asis-593876102/

I can see that someone who wants to be a professional historian of Scandinavia might want to learn Danish, Norwegian, and Swedish; and a historian of Spain might learn Catalan, Spanish, and Galician at the same time.

At least, those makes a bit more sense to learn together than, say, learning Quechua, Xhosa, and Tamil.

I don't think it will be hard to talk the OP out of this challenging task.

EDIT: I just remembered a friend of mine got a Master's in Classics, which included learning to read (not converse in!) a half-dozen or so languages over a couple of years, including French, German, ancient Greek, Latin, and Sumerian. She spent almost all her time studying, surrounded by dictionaries.

kevindeasis
The music lessons are going really well!

I dont think im disciplined at all, its mostly what im interested in. I know most people spend leetcode 4 hours a day after work and all day on the weekend. I used to do that, but i stopped doing that as that's not for me. Now i have too much time

keyle
How about you work on 1 for 3 years and try to become as fluent as a native as opposed to speed racing through life like a powerboat on crack? /s

There are so many subtleties and history in a language, it's worth diving into one culture at a time.

garmaine
Based on your post history, you might have ADHD. Consider speaking to a psychiatrist.
sushshshsh
Nice diagnosis! If I talk about food, I might have binge eating disorder and should seek a nutritionist
garmaine
I know it can come off as harsh and off-topic, but I say this when I see the signs because I wish someone had done the same for me. I spent the first 35 years of my life bouncing around from topic to topic, taking on far too much, achieving far too little, and generally turning my life into a hot mess. No one ever told me I could have ADHD, nor would I have known the signs to recognize it (since the reality of executive disfunction disorder is not the popular image of ADHD).

OP is asking if he should try learning 3 new languages over the next year. If he has the problems with focus that his post and submission history indicates, then he has a snowball's chance in hell of succeeding without medication. But properly medicated he probably could.

So OP: if you want to learn 3 new languages in 2021, consider seeking psychiatric help. Not a dig, just advice from a fellow ADHDer.

grep_name
This is the first I've heard of executive disfunction disorder, but your post really describes the struggle of a lot of my life experience. Do you have any advice for coping with it? I used to be medicated for ADHD but went off the medication in my 20's because of the anxiety it induced
rococode
I'm biased as a language lover and wannabe polyglot, but I think new languages are a great skill to learn and certainly practical (if your goal isn't only to learn something that helps you make more money). Learning a language unlocks a whole new culture for you - both online and if you travel to a country that speaks it. Depending on the language it can also help at home (Spanish in the US, for example). For traveling in particular, if you speak the native language fluently it really opens up a very different experience than going around as an English-speaking tourist, it's very cool and fun.

That being said, focus on just one new language. Three at once is extremely hard to balance without committing a very serious amount of time and having a high level of natural language learning talent. The easiest languages to learn with English as your native language take around 500 hours to reach conversational proficiency [1] which is an hour or two a day, try to learn 3 languages at once and that's nearly a full time job. If you dedicate yourself to spending an hour every day it's realistic to reach conversational fluency in a year and a half or so, if you go more casually it might take 3-5 years or longer.

[1] https://www.state.gov/foreign-language-training/ (this is for full professional proficiency, you can probably converse smoothly with less than that)

kevindeasis
I see so 1 language is a more realistic goal

Thanks for the advice

garmaine
It matters a huge amount which languages you're looking at, and which languages you already know. Learning Spanish is a heck of a lot easier than learning Chinese for an English speaker, for example.

What languages are you looking at, and which do you speak already?

You might find this forum helpful:

http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/default.asp

sushshshsh
Just learn 20% of the things required to be conversational in your favorite languages and everytime you finish scratching the itch of wanting to learn more, go do something else :)
djhaskin987
Rich Hickey thinks a better use of your time to get better at languages you already know [1].

My favorite quote from his article:

> Musicians get better by practice and tackling harder and harder pieces, not by switching instruments or genres, nor by learning more and varied easy pieces. Ditto almost every other specialty inhabited by experts or masters.

1: https://gist.github.com/prakhar1989/1b0a2c9849b2e1e912fb

burnthrow
The OP is talking about human languages...
eindiran
It's definitely worthwhile to try to learn 1 new language. But learning 3 within the span of a year is very unlikely if you are an adult (and not someone extraordinarily good at learning languages like eg Kenneth Hale[0]). Try out learning one language in 2021, actually stick to it and practice every day, and if possible save up some money to visit a place where you can speak it immersively for a few weeks.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kenneth_L._Hale

kevindeasis
Thanks for this, sticking to 1 language instead
chrismcb
Why do you want to learn three new languages? Why three, and why those three?why not two or for? Learning a new language is great, but i don't know if learning more than one more is going to do you a lot of good, unless you plan on using them. Or you are young enough to just pick them up.
valbaca
Nope. I don't know you, so why would I?
senorsmile
It's definitely all about what your goals are. If you haven't done this before, you probably won't know what it takes to get to certain levels(i.e. how much effort and time). Also, the distance of the language from your native language plays a key factor.

I have reached b2-c1 level myself in only 2 languages, plus b2 in a few more, and a2-b1 in a few more. Some languages I just want to be able to have basic interactions with to speak with a neighbor or a person I always see at a restaurant. Others, I have a personal connection to and want to get to a really high level. It all depends on what your goals are.

If you intend to study 3 languages at once, make sure you're very organized. You should track everything and have a plan for exactly what you intend to do in each language before your day starts. Also, realize that each language will move no more than 1/3 the speed that focusing on a single language would.

Final comment: if you've never learned another language before, I highly recommend to just take 3-6 months and dive into whichever one interests you the most.