Japanese English learners quotes of the day
“A recently retired schoolteacher, he spent his free time reading English dictionaries. ‘I read ten pages a day. So far, I have completed three lexicons of vocabulary. It keeps my mind busy and increases my abilities.’ It also explained the extensive, if somewhat eccentric, vocabulary.”
or alternatively
“Mac [Makoto] had been to America and his English was good, but idiosyncratic. ‘Florida was hot excellent. They had alligator crossing signs down on the highways. Crazy wild.’”
The first type of Japanese language learner matched the stereotype and was no surprise to me. The second was more so but is actually far more common…
And a far more academic quote on the same thing:
“During a three-year observation period, Wes [a 33 year old Japanese who moved to Hawaii]’s ability to communicate orally in English increased at an ‘impressive rate’, although… his grammatical control of English ‘hardly improved at all’” Lessons from Good Language Learners pg 37- a highly recommended (so far, only read 50 pages so far) new book from CUP.
First two quotes quotes from Hokkaido Highway Blues, the second funniest book about Japan
July 11th, 2008 at 2:31 pm
wow, alex…
you work for [EDIT] in japan? no idea why it took me so long to work that out. i clicked my own link to your site from my own blog and got your bio which i hadn’t read before and the penny dropped!
i worked for [EDIT] in chiba in 1998. sdos was paul douglas and ian wilkinson was working in some capacity in the nishi funabashi head office. do these names mean anything to you. i have a million stories about that time but do they still get you to phone up the person who has to cover you when you’re sick instead of doing it themselves?
alternatively, if it’s your standby day, you nervously watch the clock tick round to 11am hoping no one phones you and tells you they’re sick and you have to go off to a school miles away for 8 classes in a row as it seems the sick guy chose his busiest day to fall ill?
happy days!!!
Mike Long