Conor Clyne: From monoglot to hyperpolyglot round 2
Kris Broholm and Conor Clyne continue their discussion on language learning. They explore practical applications for using a language, focusing on effective speaking techniques. The conversation also delves into specifics about learning Russian.
November 7, 2014 · 29 min
EP 35: Conor Clyne: From monoglot to hyperpolyglot round 2
0:00 / 28:32
Guest
Conor Clyne
What You'll Hear
- 1 Welcome & Language Learning Blog Updates
- 2 Overcoming Real-Life Language Speaking Pressure
- 3 Practice Opportunities & Handling Speaking Nerves
- 4 Russian Patience: Immigrants vs. Train Stations
- 5 Expert Tips for Beginning Russian Learners
- 6 Mastering Russian Sounds and Keyboard Typing
- 7 Language Tsar's Next Challenges & Recording Tips
Links Mentioned
Questions Covered in the Show
What language should I learn next?- 4m
What are common challenges when speaking a foreign language spontaneously, and how can they be overcome?- 6m
How can I find opportunities to practice a target language if I don't live in a diverse community?- 11m
What are some essential tips for beginners learning Russian?- 17m
What is the best way to improve pronunciation in a foreign language?- 27m
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Welcome to the actual fluency podcast. The podcast that gives you the tools and inspiration to learn languages faster and more efficiently. And now your host, Chris Broholm.
Hello, hello and welcome to another episode of the Actual Fluency podcast. The podcast for language learners and aspiring polyglots, and everyone else who's interested in language learning and acquisition. Today I'm bringing the second part of the interview with Conor Klein, the language tsar. And I hope you all enjoyed last week's episode where me and Conor went into kind of how how he learns languages, sort of what he's learned throughout the years learning over 11 languages.
So, this week is going to be a continuation, but there was a natural kind of break in the discussion, whereas last time we talked about general how to learn and how to improve a learner and methods and habits and everything that's kind of part of the method. And this week we kind of shift the the kind of the perspective a little bit on practical applications. So I ask Conor about some how to use the language in sort of a practical setting and I we also go into, you know, when how to learn, how to speak the language, which is quite, you know, different from just learning vocabulary or reading a book.
Um, so this week is quite specific, it's very practical, and we also get into a lot of kind of Russian and we get into Russian because a lot of people love to hear more about Russian, and also because it's the language I'm studying at the moment. So that's uh, you know, one of those perks about being the host of a weekly podcast is I can always ask the guests about what's troubling me at the moment. And I get into a a funny story of that happened recently at the local library. And I'm not going to spoil it, so you'll have to listen to the interview segment in just a minute.
But before I let you go, I just wanted to give you a quick uh, kind of a what's been going on on the blog lately, you know, this podcast, Actual Fluency, is is part of a blog as well. And on the blog there's been some interesting uh, things happening lately. There's first of all, I added self-development as a kind of a category, and I wrote my first post, which received a a a lot of attention. So if you go to the the blog and look for the post called the from depressed to pumped at 5:00 a.m. or thereabouts, I'm paraphrasing a little bit. Um, you can read that post about my kind of self-development journey, or at least the beginning of it, and and why that's interesting for us language learners.
And the other thing I wanted to mention is that I've started publishing kind of uh, tutoring sessions from Italki, where I'm being tutored in Russian, and you can hear me. I mean, it's the whole session, there's no editing, there's no nothing. I sound like an idiot, and, you know, that was kind of my goal to put myself out there because that's one of the problems I've been having. And um, you know, people have commented that they really like this format of being kind of a fly on the wall for the tutoring sessions. So, and that mostly takes place over on the YouTube channel, although you can find some information about it in the blog posts. But if you are interesting in hearing me sort of stumble and fail miserably at Russian, then you can go to youtube.com/actualfluency and you'll find it, and I called it Chris's Russian Tutoring, uh, uh, sessions, but with the torturing crossed over instead of tutoring, so I thought that was kind of a a little funny pun there. Or maybe not even a pun, but a little play on words anyway.
And um, and and that's about, that's about it basically, you know, that's what's been going on. And I also another interesting post I recently posted was the question to answer what language should I learn. And you might be sitting out there not knowing what language you should study next. You might know I want to study languages, I I'm, you know, I want to learn more languages. But I don't have, you know, a German grandmother or a Spanish, uh, friend, girlfriend, or, you know, you don't have any connection to another language personally. But you still want to learn languages.
And this is kind of a problem that I had because I didn't really, you know, I'm born and raised in Denmark. As far as I know, my entire family is Danish. I don't know any family members who live abroad. And the kind of abroad friends I have are mostly from English-speaking countries, like England and America. So I haven't really had a personal connection, but I found it, uh, doing using some of the tips that I laid out in this post, I kind of, you know, got to grips with what language I should study, and I'm very happy with the apping up Russian. Um, I took it based on a video game. I've been playing a video game for a long time, and there was a lot of Russian players in it. A big Russian scene as they call it, lots of commentators and events and stuff. So I chose it based on that.
But if you want to read that post, you know, go to actualfluency.com/blog, and it's one of the newest posts there. If you are listening to this in the future, you can go to actualfluency.com/select. So selecting the next language. And that's a little um, shortcut for you there. But before I ramble too much, I just want to say thank you for listening, and as always, have a great day, learn some languages, and give them hell. But today, or right now rather, listen to the final part of the interview with Conor Klein, aka Language Tsar.
You mentioned that you were learning um, or I don't know if you're actively doing it right now, but you've definitely have been learning Russian at some point. And
That's right, yeah.
I am as well.
Excellent.
Yeah, excellent.
The dividing.
Da. That could be very interesting. I would do the actual Fluency podcast in Russian.
Awesome. Well, we can, we can, maybe you need a little bit of time to prepare for that, but yeah. I'm open, I'm open for it next time if I'm ever invited back.
Yeah, of course, you're welcome any time. Um, but I guess a a funny uh, a funny story about being put on the spot like you just did there was I was in the library the other day and there's a Russian section even in my little Danish town, you know, just a few hundred uh, a few hundred thousand people live here. And uh, you know, immigrants, there's not that many immigrants in Denmark and if they are, they're usually from the Middle East. Um, so there's not that many Russian immigrants, but there was a small Russian section and I was standing there, you know, looking at the easy readers for people with a thousand word vocabulary and and below.
And uh, a woman came over to me and and, you know, she said like, I mean, I obviously understand more than I can speak and I, I don't know if that's typical for Russian, but I I find that it's it's much harder to generate sentences than it is to understand them. But she asked me in Russian if there were any interesting books. And, you know, I was just so stumped to find a Russian speaker in my home city that I could barely say priyet, you know. And um, I don't know if you have any tips for me in in that scenario when I, you know, my problem is is generating, because I have a a pretty decent vocabulary, I think, at least well, decent depends on how you uh, evaluate it, but I should be able to, you know, have a two-minute conversation at a library. So what's my problem?
Yeah, I think I, I think you were just uh, caught off guard, right? I mean, sometimes it can be difficult to switch into a language, especially if you don't have that much practice speaking with native speakers. Um, and that that happened to me uh, a little bit, I think in Romania recently, actually, where I was kind of uh, where was I? I was at a uh, a bar with some some friends and all of a sudden they they they they wanted to hear me in Romanian, right? But uh, I've been speaking for the previous hour in English and German. And uh, they just turn around and said something very, very simple, um, but it just caught me a guard and I didn't understand from the intonation. I don't know. So I looked like a bit of a, I looked a little bit slow, at the very least in uh, getting started.
But um, I guess you just got to, what's important is to just stay composed and just give yourself a few seconds to think and
Right.
Then, uh, you know, just uh, start, start speaking. At least say something, even if it's wrong, normally the person will correct you. So then you'll get into the rhythm of uh, speaking the language. I mean, I would have the same problem probably in, I would definitely have the same problem in Ukrainian. It can be a little bit tricky. Um, to speak it, especially, uh, if you were, it's only really in certain parts of the country, of course, in you, if you travel to Ukraine, for example, um, not everywhere is Ukrainian the the lingua franca, the first language that people will speak to you on the street. A lot of times they will speak to you in Russian.
Um, because I speak, uh, reasonably good Russian and very little Ukrainian, it can be tricky then when I go to uh, a part of the country where people speak, uh, Ukrainian in everyday life, in restaurants, on the street and I don't have the words just so quickly to to reply in Ukrainian and then you I start speaking in Russian and of course they understand, they will reply in Ukrainian. Um, but yeah, it would be better if I could just get those words out, of course. So it just depends on your comfort zone and what you've been used to. And uh, if you're used to switching languages an awful lot, several times a day it becomes less and less of a,
Right.
A task or a difficulty, definitely. It's just uh, I think the important thing is to stay composed. Right.
And not be put off.
Take a deep breath. I mean, uh, it's a bit barrier, it's more a spontaneous social interaction, right? In the library, but for example, I noticed a lot of especially English speakers who are learning language are very intimidated because uh, they're in a country, for example, where English is widely spoken by the local population, and they go to order the bar and the people just reply in English. I'm telling you that in the Netherlands, um,
Denmark.
Probably in Denmark, I've just been to Copenhagen. Um, I don't know what happens in the rest of the country, uh, and I don't speak Danish, so for me it wasn't, uh, uh, difficulty I experienced for myself, but, um, there you just got to take a deep breath and just reply in the in the local language, right? I mean, it's it's not so, most people if they continue speaking English, you can kind of shame them a little bit and say, well, actually I came here to learn the language. I appreciate if you reply in the the local tongue, right? Or having this kind of battle, um, where you reply in English and I speak in in Danish, if we're in Denmark, and it doesn't make sense because you're the person who's Danish and I'm the person who speaks English as their native language.
Uh, but these people have got to sell you something. So the way I look at it. So ultimately, they're going to have to find a way of communicating if they don't, for example, if you don't have the words in Russian, and you find yourself in, um, St. Petersburg, yeah, you're going to have to find a way of communicating. So eventually it will come out. It's just uh, the confidence that you gain from me from having done these, being in these situations multiple times and, you know, the world doesn't end because you can't find the words in Russian.
No, no, no, not at all.
I'm sure and I'm sure next time you go to the library, she will still be nice to you and still try to speak to you in Russian. So, yeah.
If she's there again, I don't know. I could just wait around in the Russian section, I guess, for some somebody to come over.
You'll loiter in there hoping to, yeah.
It's a bit of an It is genuinely a bit of a problem, you know, I see people from uh, much more culturally diverse cities, and they just go out and they just find 15 different languages in 20 minutes and, you know, I I'm lucky if I hear two during the day. So it's it is kind of hard and that's also why I, I guess I I I kind of kick myself a little bit because I was like, you know, you're looking for opportunities to practice your Russian all the time. You're doing tons of, you know, memorizing, you have weekly lessons, and then you just walk away from such a beautiful opportunity to practice because you couldn't get the first sentence out. So, you know, that was also part of the annoyance. It wasn't so much my own ability. It was just that I didn't kind of like you said, take a deep breath and persevere and and then enjoy that I actually got an opportunity to speak it because it doesn't happen often around here and I think many people have it exactly the same way. They might live in a in a community where it's it's mostly the same sort of ethnic background or the same language.
Yeah. I think I mean, when you start speaking about um, the opportunity to converse and say 15 languages within 20 minutes, I reminded of uh, the short documentary film about Tim Doner, uh, who's uh, from New York City and in a, you know, a short number of years, he's learned to speak in a huge number of languages. And part of that's because he lives in New York City. So he gets the opportunity to go to the, I don't know, a bookstore, a Farsi bookstore and chats to them in Farsi and then goes to, I don't know, a Russian neighborhood, you know, probably not very far away and gets to speak in Russian in the shop. Um, so I, I would definitely.
Must be fantastic.
Fantastic. So if you don't have that geographically, uh, at your disposal, then you can also create it in a virtual world for sure. Um, there are enough opportunities online to find people who speak those languages. But, um, my own uh, experience with that was I spoke to a lot of people in the beginning who spoke this language using these sites where you can find native speakers of the various languages. I mean, I helped them with English, they're supposed to help me with say Spanish if they're from Latin America or Spain. Um, but I ended up speaking to a lot of people. I was not so interested in maintaining contact with, um, just because it's a lottery, um, who you end up speaking to and that meant I had a lot of very superficial conversations that were very basic and no motivation to maintain contact with a person.
So, um, the advantages if you travel a lot then you have, you build up friendships with people who speak from different countries, who speak different languages, then you don't even have to make much of an effort. You will be, you know, chatting to them excitedly about something you're interested in because they're your friends and you will get the feedback from just watching how they reply and what they write in the chat or what they say to you in person or on Skype or, or Facebook chat.
But it's just so different in real life, I feel like. I feel like when I'm on Italki and I sit here, I can kind of hide a little bit behind my computer and, you know, I can take a little bit longer for every answer so it doesn't feel as kind of difficult, but if you're in real life, I feel the pressure is really on and I guess that's one of the things I should be working on uh, to improve that.
Yeah, but being exposed to these pressure situations will allow you to develop the tools to cope with them. As long as you have the right, uh, I guess reaction to it, right? That okay, you missed one opportunity. You're kicking yourself after your, uh, Russian library uh, yeah, uh, missed opportunity, but there will be other opportunities. Next time you'll be more determined to to to chat with a little bit in Russian, maybe you won't understand. You know, that's that's that's unfortunate reality if you don't speak a language very well that a lot of times you're going to, you know, just not get what they're saying, but, you know, people are speaking to you, then slowly but surely, most people are friendly and uh, helpful when you try to speak their their their language.
I really hope so. Oh, for sure. I mean, I have, I've worked together with with with a person from Russia and now lives in in England. And I think I said like, uh, you know, hello, my name is or something, you're a very basic, and he was almost applauding me as a native speaker, you know. Russian people are so friendly I found and and they're very patient with me uh, everyone I've talked to anyway. Um, so that's at least a huge plus.
That's great. Well, they're used to, they're you're not in Russia, so they they understand that you clearly don't speak it or shouldn't necessarily be able to speak it so well. So, try going to a train station in the former Soviet Union and not being able to speak good Russian and see how patient they are when you're trying to buy your ticket. Uh, it's a lot less so and there you have real pressure. Real, uh, I've had several friends who've uh, uh, called me from train stations and asked to be rescued because they just could not buy a ticket. So, I had to get in a taxi and go to the train station, uh, and there they just don't get that, yeah, I don't understand what you're saying. So.
So Russian immigrants are very very friendly at least.
Uh I would say most Russian speakers wherever I've gone to, have been friendly. I think it's just that in these kind of, uh, I guess the train station, when someone's serving you, uh, or supposed to be serving you, there's not really uh, service in the train station. There you're trying to buy a ticket and they they're annoyed by your your presence, the fact that you you're like the hundredth person who's come in the last hour to buy a ticket, and you don't know, you know, what kind of, uh, uh, carriage you want to sit in, the type you want, first second class, you don't understand anything, and uh, just uh, with the what I've seen from a lot of my friends or ordeals in the former Soviet Union is that they don't really make much of an effort just to sell you a ticket. They just keep mumbling about what kind of ticket. So, you have to be prepared for that a little bit. Um, but yeah, you'd go through it once, uh, I once the very first time I bought a train ticket, uh, in Ukraine, I got the wrong ticket. So, yeah, you make you just learn from this and then the next time you're a little bit extra careful about what kind of ticket you get. So.
Right. Yeah.
Yeah. It's not a problem.
Fantastic. And uh, of course, that's a uh, that's a traveling or a social top tip, but do you have any sort of here last minute, do you have any top, let's say top three tips for people learning Russian. Like what's your, what what kind of aha moments did you come across whilst you were learning it?
Well, I think if someone's approaching it for the first time with no experience of a Slavic language or a language written in Cyrillic, which I guess they're probably all except for maybe Moldovan in Transdnean, they're all Slavic languages written in Cyrillic. Um, oh no, actually, in Central Asia, there are also some. Um, don't be scared by the alphabet. It takes about a week and you'll become perfect. Start using the, I personally don't spend, didn't spend a lot of time learning how to write the letters by hand, uh, because I don't need to write them by hand. It's extremely rare. I write anything with a pen. So, learn how to touch type in the in Cyrillic almost immediately. I would focus, even if it takes you, it's very frustrating in the beginning, I would not use a phonetic keyboard because I just think that's a little bit distracting. I think ultimately, you will get more out of it. You just spend the time in the beginning and learn how to touch type, um, with with the Cyrillic, right?
Um, one tip to to learn that is actually there's normally on-screen keyboards that will come up as a small window in the corner of your screen on the computer and then you can see it at the same time. So you don't have to look down at the keys. Uh, so that's something I've found very useful. Um, don't be so worried about, uh, things, uh, like, um, perfective and imperfective at the beginning, uh, because people will understand you. So I think if you're approaching it first time, just make sure that you're able to say one of them and then you will notice after a while that they they there are differences. Um, but the people, the important thing in the beginning is always to be able to communicate, uh, get things, you know, get the ball over the net. And then you'll get the feedback from people. Um, so it's important just to be able to to um, to make some progress in the beginning rather than get too tied up about whether you're using the right, uh, you know, um, prefix, uh, to the verb or not.
And then you want a third tip, uh, for learning Russian. Um, um, I think like all languages the pronunciation is quite important. There are certain sounds, uh, that are very different if your native tongue is say, uh, something Germanic in root or Latin in root. Um, so that's just important to get right. There's they're just made in a different part of the mouth. Um, so you need to get those right in the beginning because you will have problems with people understanding you if you if you use the wrong one. But I think in general, Russian people are pretty, um, they give you a lot of leeway. They're not so strict. People in general tend to understand more or less what you what you what you need. And take every opportunity you can to travel to countries where the language is spoken, get as much into the the culture and the actual places where the language is spoken and then you'll definitely be maintain your motivation a lot more. So that's what I would say is tips specifically for Russian. Uh, that's what I would say.
Great, great, that's a a good little uh, top four I got it to at the end there I think.
Great, I gave you one one one extra for free there.
You got a a bonus. And uh, yeah, I I I think the pronunciation is something that I've also been, I've been listening more intensely now on the on the Memrise uh, I'm using a course with audio and I'm been paying more attention and I still have trouble with um, I I know you're not supposed to give me a Russian lesson here, but I'm the the things that I are very interested about is the difference between uh, soft sign T and just a T.
Uh, yeah, yeah.
And then the difference between the sh and sh.
Oh, yes. And very difficult.
Very curious and you know, obviously there's spelling rules, which help when you have to type a word. You can remember then if there's a cage, you know, I I Y and not I um, E. You know, that's that's very helpful. I think that's uh, I I'll probably just add that as a as a note on on the um, you know, that goes kind of with pronunciation that that if you're trying to type a word by ear, knowing the spelling rules, it's very I found that very helpful.
And there are also well, but you know, I've been typing um, I'm doing I'm doing this crazy challenge with uh, you know, 70 new memorized words a day. Okay, wow. Yeah, it's pretty insane. I don't know why I'm doing it, but I've been slacking off and in the beginning of the year, so I decided to go crazy and, you know, I'm typing a lot of Russian words lately and I'm discovering all sorts of connections and I find that really exciting about Russian. Um, you know, how how all the roots kind of mean something and then you can kind of if you know what the root means, then you can kind of interpret it. So you don't necessarily need to know every word, but you can, you know, there's noun endings and there's of course verb endings as well, but it just starts to make sense when you do a lot of typing, I feel like, so I would, you know, kind of echo your statement with with the typing.
Um, and, you know, I probably did it the worst way possible. I did like you said with the I I learned the alphabet immediately, I didn't do any phonetic writing. I thought that was pretty pretty silly uh, but I what I did was I took that on-screen keyboard, and you can just Google Cyrillic keyboard, whatever, and it'll come up as the first hit, but and then I just kind of started to guess with my fingers. And it took literally years to learn and I'm still pretty slow, but I think that by putting in a lot of effort in the beginning, I'm kind of I mean, it feels pretty natural now for me to write in Russian to people on Facebook and stuff, you know, seven months in and stuff. And I I don't know if I want to recommend it, but some person said to me that you can go on Amazon and buy a $2 sticker set where you can actually put the Russian keys on your own keyboard. I I would probably recommend that. Instead of I.
I actually did that. I I had both. I had both. I had the stickers. I ordered them online. I had put them on all my computers when I started learning, so my laptop, my work computer, everything. And I also had the on-screen keyboard. I don't see why you can't have both.
Exactly. Yeah. Yeah.
Um, yeah, definitely. And then yeah, the elements that you you pointed out about the soft sign, uh, and the other things like what the the the two different the very close sounding sh and sh. They are things that are very different to what you've been exposed to in other languages. So they just take a little bit of time. You should listen to them, try to It's not easy to identify the differences in the beginning, but I find that if you listen to it, you you you record yourself saying it, and then you have a tutor who's going to point out exactly where in the mouth that the two sounds are made differently. Then over a a little bit of time, you're going to start to pronounce it, and actually hear the difference yourself.
Uh, but those things then it's the same in Romanian, I I really struggle with a lot of the different kind of vowel sounds that are made in awkward parts of the mouth for a native English speaker. Um, so yeah, it's the same thing everybody goes through. I think if you do the heavy work, put in the time in the very beginning, like learning how to touch type in Cyrillic, and learning how to pronounce these awkward sounds in in the very beginning, it may take be frustrating and it may take you quite a long, you know, investment of time right up front. But then afterwards, it's just a lot easier. You're going to not struggle as you, you know, as you go on.
Um, going forward, I mean, I'm currently focusing on Russian, Romanian, Ukrainian. So I'm trying to make progress, um, at the moment in those three languages, uh, while spending, uh, as much time as I as I can in the region where where they're spoken. So trying to get expose myself to it as much much as possible. Um, so that over time you're going to see more and more videos in those languages, and people can who follow language Tsar can can judge my progress and see where I need to need to improve. That's one great thing about having the website and doing the videos is that a lot of people write really constructive, uh, tips and feedback to to how I sound in their in their native language and that that's great. Something that I didn't really expect, but a lot of people are very helpful to say, Conor, no, you need to do it this way. You're slightly off. And that's great because um, I in the beginning, I never recorded myself, not even for my own personal reasons and intuition. And now I realize that, yeah, of course, you do a video and then you say, why does my accent sound slightly off? Why in Italian, do I sound like I'm my first language is German or something and not even English, you know, where you don't don't realize these things until you see yourself a little bit more objectively and you can, yeah, uh, review what you've been what you've been, uh, uh, how you've been sounding. Uh, because in the moment you don't really realize it. So that's another tip I would give people is record yourself and and listen to it. And maybe take a very short dialogue, just a few sentences that you can hear the native speaker, maybe speak. Either you got a tutor or you heard it online, you have it recorded, and then listen to yourself several times, repeat it until you can get closer and closer to their pronunciation. I think that's I found that quite useful, um, you know, you can do that.
So um, yeah, Russian, Romanian, Ukrainian are the ones I'm focusing on at the moment. Maybe in 2015, I'll take on a a new language. I've been looking at several. I had a great time at the Polyglot conference in Novi Sad in Serbia last month, and I had really it was fantastic. The Balkans hospitality. It's got me very much, uh, interested in the in the the region's culture again. I also studied a bit of university. So maybe perhaps I will try to learn one of the Balkan languages in 2015. We'll just have to see.
Cool. And of course people can uh, follow your progress on language Tsar. And that's a t s a r.com. And.
Exactly. I I have both the domain names for both spellings, so it will redirect even if you write it with American spelling, there's no problem.
Okay, cool. Or even Russian spelling. Did you get that one?
Well, that's a good point. I mean, that's true. They're now released in uh, Cyrillic, right? If uh, so I need to go and buy that.
Yeah, definitely. But Conor, thank you so much for coming on and you know, we've had I've at least had a a lot of fun talking to you today and and and we've we've gone a little longer than uh, than I originally asked. So I want to thank you for, you know, taking the time and giving these uh, these great discussions about language learning. I really appreciate it.
My pleasure, Chris. And uh, I will listen on to the to the future episodes of the podcast. It's been great to uh, I think you're up to something like 35 in the last uh, what is it, half year. So really enjoying it and then keep it going.
Exactly. Thank you so much. See you later.
Bye-bye.
Thank you for listening to the actual fluency podcast. For more information, be sure to check out actualfluency.com. Until next time, enjoy learning and have a great day.