Dealing With a Language Barrier | my tips & advice
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 2 ส.ค. 2024
- A few things I've learned from speaking French and Spanish and traveling abroad 🌎
✦ Website: andreaheckler.org
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Hi, I'm Andrea! I'm an American expat currently living in Paris, France. I make videos about writing and creativity, living abroad, traveling, and all the wonderfully nerdy things I love. Also...I'm a bit of an unashamed coffee addict ☕️
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Currently Writing: my third YA fantasy novel
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Music:
“Carefree” Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License
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To me no language course, school or textbook can replace the real experience of actually going to a country that speaks the language you're trying to learn.I'm a french native speaker, I went to the UK for an internship and I went from barely, hardly understand anything to understand 99% of what was told around me in 2 weeks.
I'm not saying this is easy, that was actually frightening to me to imagine going to a country I could barely speak the language of, but in the end it's just an incredible experience that's totally worth living.
I completely agree!! It's impossible to get that experience any other way.
Robin Cherix I totally agree with you! So much easier when you are confronted to actually natives.
As a language high school teacher, I can say that this video is full of very practical and great advice! thank you Andrea! As I usually say to my students: "if you want to speak fluently, you have to pretend that all the words that you don't understand don't even exist and focus on what you do understand. Then, connect those words together and you should understand the basic ideas of the conversation/ video/ text etc". Thank you for this very interesting video! One question about French: did you have more difficulties understanding people from "Province" or Parisians?
RamaghSeeker I know that I'm French myself lol ! I wanted to have a foreigner's point of view on that. Thank you for your answer !
To be honest, I didn't really speak with many locals when I was in Province! But generally I find a neutral accent or a Parisian accent the easiest, since that's what I hear the most 😁
thank you for your answer! that's understandable. English-speaking people usually say that I have a very strong Southern French accent so you would probably hate my way of speaking lol!
As an American learning French, the only accent I've really struggled with is Québecois. It's ironic since my grandparents were from Quebec. I've visited southern France and spoken with people from southern France without too much trouble. I noticed that the silent "e" in many words is not silent. Of course, I may never have spoken with anybody with a really strong accent. I did hear people near Bordeaux pronounce "vin" like "vang".
I have never heard of color coordinating clothing with coffee mugs. LoL. Always enjoy these videos. I cant really find anyone else out there that talks about things like these.
I don't usually color coordinate, but I always notice when I turn on my camera if the mug is a clashing color :P
Well...it happens I guess.
I like the way you're talkin super-quick and it gets me better in english.
I LOVE these linguistic videos! I just got back from aupairing in Italy, and oh my...these tips would have been helpful a month ago 😂 one tip I have is confidence, it is so important, especially the confidence to say something that you aren’t sure is right! Keep making these videos please, I relate so much 😂
When you’re trying to order a Taco Bell and the intercom employee only speaks Spanish. *Goes to Google Translate to use the robot voice to place an order.*
Great advice!! I moved from NY to the domincan republic and have been here for a year. I still find the language barrier extremely frustrating, and I am pretty good at speaking spanish. It's harder when I am out in a group of friends and they're all talking quickly together-I find I can barely follow along sometimes! I have to get used to looking out of it haha, but now I am taking lessons which is helpful! I'm so glad I already knew a good amount before moving here.
Learning a new language is always a challenge! I had been learning English since I was in like preschool, & still the first time I had to use it in US with native speakers (when I was 15) I had several struggles with la gauge barriers! I’m an English teacher now, & while- as you said- you can’t really be prepared with what you learn in a class, I slays try to encourage them to speak & am always teaching them the modisms & ways of speaking of native speakers!
That's great! It's what is so often missing from standard language classes, and it will prepare your students so much better for the "real world"! Plus...it can be a lot more fun than just the textbook stuff :D
Can completely relate. Great video Andrea. =)
I'm from Brazil (so I'm fluent in Portuguese), but I love English, French and your channel! Thank you for being so great! ❤
I totally agree! I think it's just about accepting the situation and trying to "get used to" the language and stop fighting it. If something's been missed in understanding, it's (usually lol) not the end of the world. And it's important important to be realistic about where you are, where you're going and how long it will take to get there as well as to be ambitious with your goals. I'm aiming for C1 in French at the moment and I'm thinking about taking up German afterwards. I think it'll be interesting getting used to being a *complete* beginner in another language again: liberating because being a beginner means I have no pressure on myself about "what I *should* know/be able to say by now" and also intimidating because there's so much to learn!
I did a bit of German Duolingo before visiting Germany and it was so weird being a total beginner in a language again! Like you said, both liberating AND intimidating 😅
Great advice esp. reprioritising what you need to know. When you learn in school you're a kid and don't need to know adult vocabulary. I've learnt so much just by looking at French websites: supermarkets, electrical stores, estate agents etc. and using my common sense to work out meanings. Magazines are also good for the latest buzzwords tho' some overdo the Franglais. And us older people never learnt IT-related vocab because it didn't exist when we were at school.
I'm moving to France in four days for school, and your videos have really helped me this past year while I've been trying to prepare. Thanks for sharing your knowledge!
I'm really glad to hear that! Best of luck with your move :D
How's your French now?
I think that comfortability of not ever having to think about whether you understand the majority of the language going on around us is the big key there; very nicely said. Yeah, it's scary, but the reality with learning a new language is that you're starting over from scratch, and there are so many situations where you can neither follow a conversation, nor express how you really feel.
Thanks for the advice! I'm in relationship with someone I do love, but we have a language barrier. I speak English and hindhi and know very little spanish. She knows Spanish, and I'm working on trying to learn spanish to be able to communicate. I learned it in high school and using what I learned as best I can and applying that but it's been challenging. Out of a 10, I'm at a 5 of understanding and especially speaking spanish. I can understand better than speak it. But, I'm committed and trying to get better at Spanish and she will try English. But, I'm afraid of not grasping it well enough. This helped me relax a little more about overcoming this barrier. Thank you!!
Let's build up Tower of Babel, Destroy a Language Barrier, I am not afraid in that situation because I believe that when I try to translate the passion for what I really like, the language barrier cannot stand in the way. I may look bold from the outside, but the reason for that is that I am just willing to do anything for what I love.
One French phrase I know very well is "Je ne comprend pas" It's forever fluent on my tongue or at least my texting fingers LOL But I love your perspective and totally agree. Textbook learning is great; but it has to applicable to an actual life situation. There needs to a somewhat natural immersion in it for it to begin to stick. At least that's how I have felt with the learning process. Oh? American's have accents? LOL! I once saw something that said French people find the southern American accent sexy. Being from the south that made me laugh. I have no clue if that's true or not.
Oh wow that's hilarious and if it isn't true still hilarious if it is than what about north America's 😂 (if they have an accent)
I'm moving to France in 6 weeks! I'm so scared about staring at people blankly and them being frustrated when I can't understand them! This video had some great advice, thank you!!!
Best of luck with the move!! I hope it goes great :D
Holly Findlay honestly don’t be scared! People are gonna love that you’re trying to speak French. It’s adorable. And if they get frustrated that is their problems. I love when people come to France and try to learn my language.
@@manonbtravels6343 That's very reassuring, thank you! :)
Holly Findlay welcome!!
So glad that I found your channel! I speak Mandarin and English, currently learning French. I totally relate to your experience! Just out of curiosity, do you ever feel a different person when speaking a language other than English?
Great advice! After hundreds of hours of listening to French, I no longer get trapped by the word I don't understand or recognize. Now I get trapped by the word that I know but can't recall at the moment. It results in the same problem you mentioned in that while I'm saying to myself, "I know that word! What does it mean!" I miss the rest of the sentence. My biggest (and obvious) tip is to listen to a lot of different types of content in your target language and dispense with prepared language teaching sources as soon as possible. Watch TH-cam videos, listen to podcasts, watch TV and films. You can't start with those things as a beginner but as soon as you go beyond the basics try all those things. You need to hear how real people speak not simplified school type stuff.
I’m English and talking to a beautiful Brazilian woman, she is helping me learn Portuguese ✌🏽✌🏽
Thanks for the tips. I’m a native of Korea and I’m trying to be fluent in English as I will work abroad. in my case, the accent of English makes me so so so frustrating...it is very varied -i.e UK, India, Africa, and so on. When I talk with an American or someone who has a general accent, I can understand like 90% but when I have to talk with others, I don’t have any clue what they are talking to me... So I need to listen to the various types of accents so that I can understand more and communicate with them
Cool subject
Great video, fellow dweller on embarrassing moments
I am a native French speaker, studied English at Uni and went to live in Scotland twice (once as an exchange student and once as a language assistant), I remember vividly my first night at the dorm, there was a meeting to talk to us about security, rules, dinning halls and all that good stuff. I was alone in a crowd of 100+ students chatting away, trying to listen to the guy with the very strong Scottish accent talking in the shitty mic... I was already textbook fluent in English but I did not get a word that was said that night... I remember thinking "what the hell am I doing here ?"... I agree that the best way to learn a language is definitely not textbooks, you cannot function in a different country on just textbooks knowledge...
Also I remember that same year we states watching CSI with another French girl, at first we were looking up all the science/criminology words... then we realized that we don't even know the French for these words so what use is it to look them all up... I totally second your focus on what you understand and not what you don't...
I love hearing you talk about language barrier and living abroad... it takes me back 10 years !
Also another tip you missed is definitely don't get past tipsy when going out... tipsy made me so comfortable with talking English even though I hated my accent... when I reached drunk I started speaking French to everyone thinking I was talking English... I had a few mornings when I was mortified thinking back about the night before...
So sorry for my comment the length of a novella... also, would you consider writing about your experiences as an expat like "a year in the merde" type book ?
I'm currently working towards fluency in Spanish, and it's an uphill battle. But like you said, it's important to let go of inhibitions and just go for it. Mistakes = chances to learn and grow. Out of curiosity, do you find yourself thinking in French much when you're not around other French speakers, or do you tend to still think in English? I've found forcing myself to think in my target language helps me better stay on that line of thought. Anyways, thanks again for a great video!
I mostly think in English, but if I'm reading/writing something in French or listening to French (even in the background) I often will start to think in French too. It's still not as natural in English, but I'm getting there! And as you said, it's great practice, so I try to whenever I can 😃
To me I'm originally Arabic but I lived in a foreign country since I was a kid and my daily conversation is usually just in English but when I came back to my hometown I couldn't speak Arabic fluently and this caused me to just not have many friends and be super introverted and I don't know what to do exactly to improve..
dude.... purple is still purple -- the class looks good! like different shades of the same colour growing side by side in nature..... check out a veggie garden....
Have you ever traveled somewhere that you didn't know the language *at all*? For me such a place would be Thailand. I've been in Prague, but since I've taken Russian, I had no problem understanding "východ" (exit), which sounds just like "выход", or numbers. I don't even know Thai writing, and the only chance I have to understand a Thai word is if it's borrowed, most likely from an Indic language, and just happens to be minimally mangled and I happen to know a cognate.
I've traveled to Sweden a few times for work as well as Amsterdam twice -- in both of those places, my experience was that pretty much everyone could speak English, but most signs, menus, etc. were still in Swedish and Dutch respectively. I've not yet traveled to a country with a completely different alphabet, though! That's a new kind of challenge 😄
I’m here preparing myself because I don’t wanna get hurt on Tinder-dating 😭
Some dudes seem to speak and understand English well thru text, but meeting them irl is something different with dialogue. And I was sad I couldn’t work with this guy on our language barrier. I felt unprepared lol
Me and my girlfriend have a language barrier and we seem to find love for one another. It is clear to me that she just loves the way I look and not the way I feel, maybe I'm wrong. She speaks French i speak English and croatian, do you think its possible to be in a relationship with her and learn french at the same time
This can be frustrating when one is the customer attempting to convey a message and ultimately the order, directions, etc. are incorrect. We have to do better.
You are pretty
is english barrier a big factor for LDRelationship ??
thats why she txt a short message or maybe she doesnt interested in me 😔🤔
Ju Mapelle Danny, Bonjour!
Sarah Connor?
6:35 "Sorry, I didn't get that" - Siri
I've a fucking bad German n I'm dating a German man.. The speaks only German (original German) God help me our fist date is in weekend..
If you want to just hear a girl vent, keep listening