Learning foreign languages helps not only to better understand the people and culture of other countries, but also develops thinking, makes the psyche more stable and allows you to see the world from an unexpected side. This polyglot Dmitry Petrov told in an interview with Boris Vedensky. And Lifehacker took notes of the conversation.
New grammar and vocabulary help to include both logic and feelings. The brain begins to analyze new connections, and emotions help to consolidate what has been passed.
To learn a language, you need to understand the mentality of the people who speak it. This means to immerse yourself in a new worldview, to try other ways of communication. This greatly expands the picture of the world and helps to assimilate fresh thinking strategies.
There is a popular technique for comparing two languages: calculate their vocabulary. And to conclude: in which of them there are more words, that one is more perfect. But mechanical comparisons don't work.
For example, in English there is an adjective brown — brown. It can be used to describe someone's hair and eyes ‑ you get brown hair and brown eyes. The same adjective is used when we talk about horse color or the color of shoes.
And in Russian we would say: brown hair, brown eyes, a bay horse. And finally, brown shoes. So, when it comes to some descriptions, the Russian language can be more diverse.
But let's talk about money. And it turns out that for the Russian words "income" and "profit" there are more than 30 equivalents in English. Their use depends on who paid and when, what kind of income it is, and so on.
It turns out that the more attention people paid to a certain area of life, the more words they created for it. The richer the vocabulary in this area, the better the mentality of the people works in it. By learning a language, we begin to think like its creators and native speakers and expand our own boundaries of the world.
Another example. In Russian, free word order in a sentence is possible. We can swap them, and we'll still understand each other perfectly. In most other languages, the order is clearly fixed, and it cannot be violated.
I have repeatedly read the arguments of respected linguists that a certain confusion and chaoticness of Russian life, not only in a negative way, but also, for example, a more creative view of reality, are associated with this free order of words. There is such a theory, and I see a grain of truth in it.
Every nation has advantages in thinking. When you learn a language, you get to know them and add new ones to your skills.
The opportunity to see the world from a different perspective allows you to experience a new and unexpected set of emotions.
For example, psycholinguistics tells us that speakers of dissimilar languages perceive the passage of time in completely different ways. For some it is a straight line, for others it is repeating cycles. Some peoples represent it as a top—down movement, others - from the bottom up. This affects both the philosophy of life and the way of life.
We don't think in words. From the point of view of psycholinguistics, we think in images. And then we try to turn the pictures we see and the emotions associated with them into words.
This means that we have a chance to see the world with the help of images that are new to us — those that are close to native speakers of the language being studied.
It can be noticed that when a person plunges into an unfamiliar language environment, his manners change, his facial expressions become different, he begins to gesticulate in a completely different way. This is a consequence of a new attitude.
In an unfamiliar environment, a person's mood changes. He begins to experience a different set of emotions and perceives different habits. Sometimes even the timbre of his voice changes. And there are definitely new taste preferences.
I want this food and these drinks. I have not been in China for so long, but it was very tasty for me. I even ate such exotic foods there that it's scary to remember! But I don't remember a single case when I wanted to go to a Chinese restaurant in Moscow.
We know that in some languages it is customary to write from left to right, as we do. In others — from right to left. There are peoples who display hieroglyphs from top to bottom.
The direction of movement in which we are used to writing is perceived by us as natural, correct. Therefore, for Europeans, for example, a line pointing from left to right and up means growth. And for someone who writes from right to left, it will also show a decline.
Psychologists say: there are manipulation techniques when moving an object in an unusual, unnatural direction can confuse a person. When you speak another language, you can rebuild. And then learn to perceive what is happening from the point of view of other rules.
If a person can easily adopt a different frame of reference, then his psyche becomes more flexible and stable. This quality helps a lot in times of uncertainty.
The ancients moved a lot. They were hunting, looking for food, running away from predators. Then people had to fight for living space, work a lot in the fields, on farms or in workshops. And the soldiers and workers really needed physical strength and agility.
But there came a time when people no longer needed to over-load their muscles. Then, to keep the body in order, people invented sports and martial arts. Maybe they did it intuitively. But it is sport that over the centuries has become a way to develop physically, not degrade.
Today we delegate to gadgets many tasks that previously only our brain was able to perform. Nowadays, good memory, the ability to navigate in space or intuition are no longer so important. Moreover, this revolution happened very quickly — in recent years.
Today, everything that previously needed to be remembered is in our smartphone. And if our ancestors had centuries to develop sports , then we have very little time to come up with adequate loads for the brain. But we cannot deprive him of training: we will still need the ability to think very much.
A person will inevitably have to find an analogue of mental sports. And the best way to keep your brain in good shape, your ability to think, is to learn foreign languages.
Before taking up dictionaries and exercises, it is worth looking for pleasant associations that language evokes. For example, one learns Italian because he likes music and movies. The other is delighted with the kitchen. And the third has a friend from Rome with whom I would like to chat.
Then you need to think about how to create a comfortable language environment for yourself. It is not necessary to go somewhere for this. You can find native speakers with whom you can communicate in person or via the Network. Or watch TV shows, listen to music and read books.
Only you need to do it not from time to time, but every day. This is enough for a restructuring of thinking to take place. Time will pass, and you will not notice how sometimes you even start thinking in a new language.
If you are going to study the language seriously, use five simple rules:
And don't stop — keep making new linguistic discoveries.
This is not just an idle interest. This is something that can help in business communication. This can prevent many situations of mutual misunderstanding. And I am sure that in some cases ‑ even to prevent political conflicts and wars.
