The Principles of Language-Study

by Harold E. Palmer

Do these considerations apply only to one who has already studied the language faultily, to the user of pidgin-speech? Are we to take it that the raw beginner is exempt from unnatural or vicious habits? Unfortunately this is not the case: more often than not, the student (even the student unspoiled by previous defective work) will tend to let his first language influence his second. If he is English, he will tend to insinuate English sounds, English forms, and English thoughts into the new language, which will therefore tend to become pidginized. This tendency will be greater with some than with others; much depends on the attitude of the student towards the language he is about to learn; he may already have studied other foreign languages, and in doing so may have acquired the wrong attitude towards foreign languages in general. If he considers them as branches of study similar to mathematics, history, or geography; or if he considers them essentially as orthographic systems of which the phonetic form is an unimportant detail, he will already have become one for whom a corrective course is necessary. We shall have to remove his prejudices and to modify his point of view; a certain amount of preliminary work will have to be done in order that he may see languages as they really are, in order that he may see the nature of the task before him. This preliminary work will be of the studial order, but will be succeeded at the right moment by the more normal and more spontaneous methods. On the other hand, many students start with no preconceived ideas whatever; children, the less intelligent adults, and those who have been unspoiled by the traditional classical fallacies will slip easily and naturally into the right attitude. They will recognize the necessity for learning new sounds and combinations, for assimilating foreign material without at each instant comparing it with the material of the mother-tongue; for retaining by the auditory memory strings of words and sentences, for reproducing orally what they hear, and for forming the right semantic associations. Such students will be immune or nearly so from the vicious tendencies which so characterize the average language-learner; they will merely have to be put on their guard at certain critical moments; we shall at such moments observe certain reasonable precautions in order that bad habits may not be acquired.

A fourth reason why we must not neglect the studial methods may be mentioned here. Many set out not so much to acquire the capacity for using the language as to learn its structure and peculiarities, just as a mechanic may wish to become acquainted with a machine without having the intention of ever using it. Phoneticians, grammarians, and philologists must in the ordinary course of their work become familiar with the characteristic features of many languages or dialects. For this purpose it is by no means necessary that they should acquire the capacity for understanding, speaking, reading, or writing the languages which interest them.

In such cases the spontaneous methods would obviously be out of place; no call need be made or should be made on the students’ natural powers of language-assimilating. They would proceed by way of analysis and synthesis, and instead of retaining the actual language-material itself would retain merely the laws which govern the functioning of the language.

We might place in this category of students those whose subsequent intention is to teach the language to others. It may not be necessary for the language-learner to know much about the theory of phonetics, but the language-teacher must possess a considerable knowledge of phonetic theory both general and as applied to the particular language in which he is an instructor. The learner need know little about the sciences dealing with inflexions, sentence-construction, or meanings; but the teacher must know a good deal about these things in order that he may foresee the special difficulties which his pupils will encounter, and devise the necessary exercises to overcome them. The technical side of language will therefore be of importance to all who are or who intend to become teachers, and such knowledge, like any other technical knowledge, is acquired by methods unrelated to our spontaneous capacities for assimilating normal colloquial speech.

The four series of considerations set forth above are sufficient to show that it would be either unwise or impossible to proceed by the sole aid of nature or by the reconstitution of natural conditions. Language-study is such a complex thing, with so many aspects, and it requires to be looked at from so many points of view, that we must enlist all our capacities when striving to obtain the mastery we desire; we must not neglect our spontaneous powers, nor should we despise our intellectual powers; both are of service to us, both have their place in a well-conceived programme of study, each will to a certain extent balance the other and be complementary to it. An excess on either side may be prejudicial to the student, and one of the more important problems before the speech-psychologist is to determine in what circumstances and on what occasions each should be used. More will be said on this particular phase of the subject in Chapter [XV] (“The Multiple Line of Approach”).

CHAPTER IV
THE STUDENT AND HIS AIM

What is the best method of language-study? This fundamental question is one which is continually asked by all those who are seriously engaged in teaching or in learning a foreign language. We say ‘seriously’ and lay stress on the word, for among teachers and students there are many, unfortunately, who are not disposed to take their work seriously, who see no necessity for any earnest consideration of the ways and means to be adopted. They are content to teach as they themselves have been taught, or to learn as others have learnt before them, without inquiring whether the plan or the programme is a sound one, without even inquiring whether the method is one which is likely to produce any good results whatever. But the serious teacher or student, who wishes to perform efficient work, must of necessity ask himself whether the path he has chosen is one which will lead anywhere near the desired end or ends. He may experiment with various methods and try a number of different systems in order to ascertain which of these secures the best results, and after many such trials he may either hit upon what seems to be an ideal type of work and stick to it, or, dissatisfied with everything he has tried, he may once again seek counsel and ask once more the old and hackneyed question: What is the best method of language-study?

The first answer which suggests itself is: “The best method is that which adopts the best means to the required end,” and indeed this is perhaps the only concise answer which can be furnished off-hand. But the answer is not satisfactory; it is too general, and so true that it ranks as a truism; it is resented as being a facetious manner of shelving the question. The inquirer has every right to return to the charge and to put the supplementary question: “What is the method which adopts the best means to the required end?”