Reply With QuoteDuolingo is a great - and addictive way - to learn new languages. I would be surprised if it didn't support HindI.
Hello
I don't have any noticable talent for languages. French lessons from the age of 10-16 has given me a tiny facility to read write and speak very basic things.
I'm probably going to have to learn Hindi. As I already spend a considerable time in India I have picked up some basic commands and questions and most of the commonly used swear words.
Can anyone recommend a good way to learn a language. I don't really have time for lessons and this would be more the self taught course type thing.
Duolingo is a great - and addictive way - to learn new languages. I would be surprised if it didn't support HindI.
I agree that Duolingo is good, but I don't think that Hindi is an option.Originally Posted by jwillans
Reading, writing, speaking and listening. The 4 obvious parts of a language. Decide what you want to do first/ want to learn first. Speaking and listening come first (like small children), the other two follow. I suppose that reading is third on your list.
Overhere in Holland you find Regina Coeli https://www.reginacoeli.com/about-us...-of-vught.html Originally a language school run by Catholic nuns, nowadays, the best language institute in The Netherlands. I am sure that there's a British equivalent somewhere, more on the fact that there a cultural and historical connection between Britain and the country/countries where Hindi is the leading language.
Three weeks with the nuns makes provides you with lot of knowledge. A friend started French there, three weeks later his speaking and listening skills were awesome.
Menno
It will be soon: link.
A top tip I once got from a language teacher. Once you have a basic grasp of the language, subscribe to a magazine in that language on a subject in which you are already interested. It will motivate you to look up and remember new words and phrases.
Pity you aren't learning English. Plenty of experts willing to help with SPAG on here.
More usefully, looking at a familiar book or film in another language can help - or is at least interesting - once you have the basics.
To the OP, you are probably more advanced than you think as the key point to studying a language is to be able to understand the words in a sentence, i.e. to identify what is said, even if you do not know what it means.
In other words, the main thing is to train your ear to the language, even before engaging your brain actively. This is why immersion is so important, and why staying in the country (and actively learning) will be the most productive avenue.
Good advice here: certainly the 'immersion' tip. Although Hindi looks very difficult to me! There's no connection with what I know already. That makes French harder to study for us than English or German. And Danish is easy because it's nearly the same as Dutch.
Dutch kids watch TV and the internet and all foreign TVshows and films are subtitled; that's how I started learning English. And when my kids are on family visit in Can or the US, their language skills are a lot better when they return!
Like Luxembourg and the Baltic countries, we are a small county with a lot of contacts abroad. Dutch education has a history of teaching languages at school. Most kids leave school with a Cambridge Certificate (from FCE to CPE for kids that are really good). And a lot of school are 'bilingual': so all lessons (apart from our own language lessons Dutch) are in English; including maths etc.
Back to the immersion: a lot of kids go on a summer camp and speak English all day long for a few weeks. Dutch isn't allowed there during those weeks. I am sure that Hindi can be learned the same way!
The result of this?
As an anecdote, we had a young Dutch girl at work who spoke excellent English, but with a clear American twang. She had never set foot on the other side of the Atlantic but had watched a lot of TV in Holland during her childhood...
The Dutch amaze me with their grasp of foreign languages. Four days in Amsterdam, and everyone I met spoke perfect English.
I've always wanted to speak Spanish, but always so busy/lazy. Is dualingo as good as people say?
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
I'm Scottish and bilingual, though English isn't my first language/ mother-tongue. However I've always found it beyond me to pick up a third language, beyond the basics - even though it's supposed to be easier when already fluent in two.
Sent from my HTC One dual sim using Tapatalk
The biggest thing is 'how committed are you to learn?'
If it is high enough you will put up with the frustration/pain/time needed. Having seen how my wife has done it it is really down to commitment/effort. All techniques come back to this whether it is immersion/pillow (!!)/learning as a kid (my children spent 7 hours a day at a non mother tongue nursery and became fluent in a year).
So, be honest with yourself, do you really, really, really want to speak Hindi and what are you going to do to achieve this result.
When the locals switch to Hindi during meetings I'd like to be able to keep abreast as it were.
In which case I would say it is vital that you don't let on that you are learning it. I've been in many, sometime quite comical, meetings where suppliers didn't realise that they were in a room full of polyglots.
Immersion - sorry but learning a lingo in classes only works for classes, if you then don't use what you have learned it gets lost v v quickly.
I know lots of ex-pats here who have done their 3 months or 6 months of Mandarin in classes + on-line but the only ones who are any good or even graduate beyond buying food and getting home are those that join a club and use it there or live with a Chinese speaking spouse and use it there or have kids in local school and practice with them. Their kids in the locals schools speak like locals because that's all they hear for 10 hrs a day.
I'm in India for at least 6months of the year so immersion isn't a problem.
I'm also out in the real world not some AC board room so my exposure is unfiltered .I usually handle it better than the locals and I'm usually the one in charge. I'm well regarded in the local industry over here.
My hindi is limited to phonetically swearing and telling people to hurry up or I'll crush them. I want to broaden it a bit.
Writing and reading Hindi I'm not sure is so important. I know many Indians who freely admit that they cannot write in Hindi beyond phonetically in the English Alphabet and are unable to read properly written Hindi script.
One of the problems I face is ironically most people speak English as a bridging language. If I'm on a crew of people who speak Telegu , Hindi ,Gujuratti and others they usually all speak English.
My reasons for learning Hindi are entirely to deal with those underhanded wise asses who deliberately revert to Hindi in an attempt to denegrate me to my face without me knowing (this actually isn't such a problem as I know all the commonly used swear words, one person who thought it was funny to call me a "Gora Madhur Chod" ( Honky Mother Effer ) was quite terrified when I grabbed him by the collar and hit him with "Hey gandu , pagle ho gaya hai ? Ku Chel Dunga Ban Chod" (Hey Dickh..d , Are you mad/stupid? I'll crush you ...sister effer).
I'd like to be able to quietly monitor the back channels when the Hindi gets used to obfuscate . I get about 50% most of the time anyway. I suspect I'll be quite a fast study at least in terms of comprehension if not speach and writing. The actual sentence construction most hindi speakers use seems quite blunt. The problem is many words sound almost identical to my western ear.
Gora : white/cracker/honky, used both descriptively and as an racial insult.
Godha :also ladder . Pronounced Gora, used most frequenyly by Bengali people with the dh sounded as an "r".
Last edited by Mr.D; 20th January 2017 at 05:34.
You sound like such a pleasant person. Hurry up or I'll crush you.
Your understanding of Hindi swear words is rubbish. Hindi speakers don't curse the same way English speakers do. But well done for extrapolating your standards on to others.
"Speach"
If you knew anything about Indian working culture you would understand the humorous tone of such epithets.
Those of us who get our hands dirty and work for a living will use these terms back and forth for comedic effect and cameraderie.
But it is true that there are a lot of snowflakes in India ready to pounce on any percieved criticism especially coming from a gora. I tend to ignore them for the inferiority complex riddled Mummy's boys they are.
I really like Memrise. It is free for a basic account but if you find it works well for you, you get lots of great learning features for a small fee. I've used Rosetta, Duolingo and Memrise and find Memrise the easiest one to keep going with, which is always my biggest problem.
Sent from my iPhone using TZ-UK mobile app
Extrapolation again. Not surprised really
For context, my family employs hundreds of weavers in and around Bhadohi near Varanasi. Pay fair wages and give respect and you get respect. I've never known weavers to refer to the boss or each other in the deregatory terms you speak of.
Furthermore, my brother buys old
furniture in India and has it restored there by working folk. No reports of any foul or humorous use of foul language.
But what do I know. You're the one who handles heat better than the locals so clearly know better.
I did a very low paid job in the UK for about 18 months and didn't see it here either.
But you carry on grabbing collars. It sounds hilarious. So much fun.
Thank you to all for the info . I'll definitely check out Memrise and Duolingo.
That's more than enough for me to be getting on with.
Cheers
13th Warrior language learning scene
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lnnREr8BV24
Last edited by Mr.D; 20th January 2017 at 10:09.
http://www.littleindia.com/commentar...ke-a-joke.html
http://www.urbandictionary.com/defin...term=Snowflake
They do Esperanto - the only language you'll ever need, surely.. ?
I have done the Duolingo Swedish course - I thought it was simply brilliant.
You could always yell at everyone in English? I think people around the world kind of expect it, so don't let them down.
Esperanto?... only if you are the Stainless Steel Rat 😉
They are used to me yelling in in English the shock factor has worn off. I need to keep themon their toes.
To be fair I'm alright yelling at them in Hindi. I was reaching to expand my repertoire though.
Find yourself local GF/BF, it's the only way to learn new language properly, or so I was told.
Fas est ab hoste doceri
Been there done that. How do you think I know all the swear words?
Good advice aplenty on the thread. I would also add that you should try to find a broadcast station (preferably news) in Hindi, to watch on a regular basis. You would be surprised at how much you pick up by hearing oft-used phrases and matching pictures with words to make sense of each item.
Lastly, find a local (to you) Hindi speaker......and take them out for coffee/tea on a regular basis. The more you hear and speak a language, the more automatic it becomes...
Eventually, I even dreamed in my second language....(I talk in my sleep).
Best of luck, and don't give up. If children can learn it, so can you!
Posting Permissions
