How To Learn Any Language Review

Our Editor's Review

How To Learn Any Language is a highly inspiring book for everyone, who wants to learn a foreign language on his or her own. The author is a self-taught linguist who can speak 25 languages with different degrees of fluency so you can say he's qualified to talk about the subject. The book has lots of tips on how to go about such a project and how to make learning as effective as possible. It’s a quick read, has nice little tips for helping to learn a language as well as comments on the ease of learning of various languages. Very motivational! Makes you want to study foreign languages straightaway! Great resource for language lovers! It's incredibly centered on European languages and Asian, African and other languages seem to be ignored.

The techniques here will have readers speaking, reading, and writing and enjoying any foreign language in a surprisingly short time. Barry has a sense of humor and a lot of practical experience on the subject. He has a real nice writing style and makes it seem that yes, you too can learn as many languages as Indiana Jones!

It makes one think to be a lot more proactive in language learning. If motivation in your language study is what you need, then this is the book.

Features:
The author of How To Learn Any Language focuses on using multiple tools: a newspaper in the language you want to learn, flashcards and listening tapes. He focuses a lot of attention on using "hidden moments" of your day to study. Though somewhat dated (e.g. Russian is viewed exclusively in connection with Soviet Union), but is still nice for motivation and outlining general language learning concepts. It also lacks crucial today element, namely, language learning in the context of modern technology. The author made presentable things that people hadn't thought about before. He alleviates the stress of learning a language by outlining the plan for you.

The first part of the book is more autobiographical. He recounts his many adventures in language learning as a boy and on through adulthood, including his failures as well as his successes. This part is short and a quick read, as is the book as a whole. It is here we begin to see his passion for languages and his motivations for learning them, from learning Chinese to prove he wasn't stupid for flunking Latin, to learning Swedish because he liked the looks of Swedish women. It is the rare person who has a language aptitude like Mr. Farber, but with just half of his drive, we could all reach our language aspirations.

The second half of How To Learn Any Language is the 'how' portion. He goes into some detail laying out a study plan for a student of a new language. There are a number of practical techniques to use in studying a new language. Some are obvious, but sometimes we fail to see the obvious and it certainly helps to be thorough. Other suggestions are insightful and not so obvious to the average person who expects a store-bought language method to provide all of their language learning needs. We could use some or all of these tips to supplement a learning method, but Farber goes a little further and presents an alternative lesson plan of his own, using a wide variety of language learning tools.

The real benefit from this book for a student of languages is motivation. It is difficult not to listen to a man who can converse in 20+ languages; he could actually be fluent in a few of those. One of his most important points is - "Do as I do now say, not as I then did" - as we can learn from his lifetime of failures as well as his many successes. In the chapter titled with the above quote he says - "I'm the only one who knows how much of my language learning time has been wasted, how little I've got to show for all those years of study, considering the huge hunks of time I've put into it." That ought to be pretty good to begin learning with some passion of our own.

Fundamentals: Start with a grammar book, he says. But don't make the mistake that turns off so many to grammar; if you don't understand something, skip it, and move on to the next point. The book's multiple-track attack ensures that whatever you don't learn through grammar books, you'll learn using audiocassettes, flash cards, foreign language media, and other resources.

Ease of Use: Quick read, nice little tips for helping to learn a language as well as comments on the ease of learning the various languages. Great ideas and lots of fun; humor about learning languages.

Teaching Tools: Farber prefers audio programs. He shows you how to create and use your own flash cards (flip them lengthwise, "head over heels," rather than sideways, to make them easier to handle). He encourages you to plunge into the "real world of language"—its newspapers, magazines, books, movies, radio and TV— for startlingly effective language experiences. He also illustrates how the Lorayne memory system with dozens of easily understood examples teaches you "eye-ear" and "ear-only" techniques for learning during those "hidden moments," and offers advice on how to judge your own progress.

Word Tools: Individual word frequency will vary between languages (especially pronouns, articles, and possessives), but differences are generally related to rank within either list, rather than omission and replacement with a different term not found in one of the above two lists.

Help/Support: The book is easily accessible in online stores and elsewhere.

Summary
This little text is a wonderful inspiration to aspiring polyglots. Farber's multi-track learning system is the highlight of the book. His techniques are sound, and his recommendations are effective, but it's his expression of the sheer joy of learning languages that oozes out of every page of this book that gives it a permanent place. The message is use many different methods concurrently, use any free moments you can find in a day to review new language, and speak the language in authentic situations whenever possible. That's it. It's an excellent approach, no doubt about that. However, the detail with which the book covers these ideas can fill maybe five pages at most. The rest is filled with the unsubtle bragging and anecdotes of an egotistical blowhard. Don't get too hung up on grammar. If you want to learn a language quickly, grammar is not the most important aspect of the language. The more you expose yourself to the target language, the more your grammar will improve

Remove the fear—the author has done it and makes you feel that learning any foreign language is actually easy. He says that anybody can learn a language each year just by using extra time inone's daily life.

- Inspiration and motivation—If you needed a kick to your inspiration to be fluent in Spanish, Arabic, Chinese, Indonesian or whichever language, this is it. This book might do it for you.

- A clear and practical method—The author has developed a system that works. You can learn on your own using a variety of inexpensive and readily available tools.

- A good guide to world languages—You will enjoy the section in which he speaks of the different advantages of each language and particual motivations to learn a specific vernacular.

Farber’s method consists of 4 techniques:

1. The Multi-track attack: Accelerate learning and eliminate monotony by using an arsenal of language-learning tools all at once (cassettes, flash cards, books, etc.)


2. Harnessing Hidden Moments: Using “down” time to study, such as when you are waiting or exercising.


3. The Magic Memory System: Committing lots of words to memory using his vocabulary-memory techniques.


4. Starting at the top: Plunge right in just as a child does when learning how to speak.