Profesorado aburrido

Si hay algo que me saca de quicio es eso de que la gramática es aburrida y tediosa. Nos dicen que no hagamos "ejercicios de gramática aburrida." Nos comentan que vayamos directamente al idioma, que no es aburrido.
¡Los aburridos son ellos, los profesores!
Son aburridos porque no saben plantear el estudio de un idioma de manera racional y práctica.
Son aburridos porque no preparan sus clases.
Son aburridos porque creen que todos los alumnos tienen la misma facilidad y la misma inteligencia lingüística.
Son aburridos porque, para ese profesorado, una hora en clase es un martirio terrible y suelen llegar tarde y marcharse pronto.
Son aburridos porque cuentan sus aventuras e interioridades en clase.
Son aburridos porque permiten que un alumno acapare la clase mientras el resto escucha, cautivo.
Hay excepciones, claro.
¿Puede usted añadir algo más?

Version vs translation

Reading a translation is always an act of faith, almost a religious act of faith: we must believe as fact and truth that the "translation" is a veritable reflection of the original. And we accept as Gospel truth that what we are reading is a good rendering of the original because we have no way of knowing otherwise. So I was thinking we should do away with translations and install "versions" instead.

This is what José María Carrascal has done in his novel Un sueño irlandés, An Irish Dream, where he did two different versions of it, instead of simply translating.  (https://www.amazon.es/Irish-Dream-English-Maria-Carrascal-ebook/dp/B07C1DQJ1P)
 But, of course, Carrascal is the author, not the translator and he knows both languages well.
If a "version" of a Spanish novel appears in English, we cannot complain if it differs slightly from the original, after all it is not a "translation."
Methinks this is either a wonderful idea, or a a hackneyed, harebrained proposal.
I will let you be the judge.

Translations and women

 

When I was a spry boy, full of pep and curiosity, my German teacher at Duquesne University, Dr. Reinkraut, gave me Thomas Mann´s Dr Faustus to read. Try as I did, the novel was beyond me, even though it was a translation. All these years, that reading was pending and the other day I picked up my 1949 translation by H.T. Lowe-Porter intent on tackling it finally.
But I read the "Translator´s Note": "Les traductions sont comme les femme, lorsqu'elles sont belles, elles ne sont pas fidèles, et lorsqu'elles sont fidèle, elles ne sont pas belles."
Not content with that, Mrs. Lowe-Porter quotes the Bible, Proverbs: 31:10 "Who can find a virtuous woman? for her price is far above rubies."
Some other day I will delve into translations... but I will not compare them to women and their "virtue" and "fidelity", whatever that may mean.
Mrs. Lowe-Porter´s remarks did not raise a brow in 1949. In 2019 she would have been kicked in the butt by employees at the Publishing House, Penguin Books, and booed out of the place. "O tempora. O Mores."
Can you imagine comparing women to translations? Ellen Tracy Lowe-Porter was no feminist, of course.

Métodos de aprendizaje milagrosos

Los métodos milagrosos se dan en todo: en la pérdida de peso, en la puesta en forma del cuerpo un mes antes de las vacaciones… y muy especialmente en el aprendizaje de idiomas. Durante mi carrera profesional he visto cómo aparecían y desaparecían todo tipo de métodos milagrosos para aprender sin esfuerzo (Hay un texto que se titula El inglés sin esfuerzo), en pocas horas, cómodamente escuchando grabaciones, viendo escenas de la vida cotidiana en televisión, hablando por skype con el profesor, sentándose en la academia delante de un ordenador… El colmo. Había un texto que prometía hablar inglés en diez días. Ahora le ha salido un competidor que promete hacerlo en ¡siete! En sólo siete días aprende usted inglés. ¿Quién da más? ¡Parecen charlatanes de feria! ¡Timadores! Trileros.

¿Y qué prisas tiene la gente? Todo requiere su tiempo. Las mujeres siguen gestando en nueve meses. El día sigue teniendo 24 horas. La tierra tarda 365 días en dar la vuelta al sol.  Lo importante en idiomas es perseverar porque la tarea es de por vida. Perseverar y disfrutar de su aprendizaje, de poder comunicarse con otros en idiomas diferentes. Y es el mejor ejercicio neuronal para los cerebros maduros.

The Native Speaker

I believe that the native speaker, the one who has been using a language since birth, and normally speaks no other, is the genuine representative of that language. She is subject to linguistic, grammatical, sociological, phonetical studies. The native speaker is grouped, divided geographically, tested and analized by experts. Native speakers set the standard by which we judge a language socientifically.
Nevertheless, foreigners who wish to acquire the native´s idiomatic skills must demand certain qualifications. Any native won´t do as a teacher.
1. "The native speaker must be literate." An illiterate native has a handicup as a teacher.
2. "The native must have an educational background, especially literary." A person who knows the literature, the history, geography, customs, etc. of her
country, where the language is spoken, will be more suitable. A background in chemistry won´t do.
3. "The native who acts as a teacher must be certified." His word will not sufice, and the possession of a diploma, degree, certificate or the like will help us make a choice. A degree is law won´t do.
4. "The native must be humble about his language" and realize and admit that language has no horizon, and no single person ever has all the answers.
5.  "A native teacher must know languages." Each learner has different problems depending on the language she speaks. The instructor must know himself the problems his students are encountering.
Although I feel that 95 percent of native speakers are no good as teachers, the other 5 percent will do.
Is the above controversial or good? Or both? 

Go to the country to learn the language.

Language students complain and whine that they have been studying English (or Spanish) for "20" years, or "30" years with poor results. They have no fluency, faulty grammar, laughable pronunciation and have decided that the best way to learn is to go to the country.
Of course, after questioning it turns out that, although true they started studying 20 years ago, they have taken altogether about 40 or 50 hours of instruction, of classroom instruction. The on-and-off language student drops out for some months, takes it up for a a fortnight again, forgets it for a year, and changes teachers often... No wonder!
So, the amateur language student comes to the conclusion that the only way for her to learn is to go to the country. The balmy air of Madrid, or the humidity of London, spur the learning process. Native speakers are waiting for foreigners in order to instruct them, converse with them. correct them and guide them through the maze of language mastery. 18 hours of daily street practice will work miracles and in three months the target language will be mastered! And effortlessly, without studying.
My idea is that after having mastered the basic grammar, basic phonetics, basic vocabulary, basic phraseology... go to the country! But not to study English or Spanish. Go to study photography, or ballet, or history, or cooking. In any of those classes you will meet native speakers, you will learn in the target language, you will practice. Do NOT join an Academy or language school full of foreigners like you.
What do you think?

YouTube and English teachers

A certain Vanessa, self-appointed teacher of English, declaims on YouTube about proverbs. She says that foreigners find them difficult to learn because they have "many words together" (?). She also says that many "native" speakers do not know English proverbs, so why bother? She tells us "not to use A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush" because it sounds "pretentious, snobby" and native speakers might think you are not a "normal person."
Vanessa is a very young woman and we must make allowances for her youth and enexperience. She is also a native speaker, and so she depicts all the misconceptions people have about English monolinguists, those who manage in one language only.
"A bird in hand is worth two in the bush" has been in the English language for centuries, since 1530 when it was rendered as "A byrde yn honde ys better than three yn the wode."It is part of the cultural and linguistic lore of English and of many European languages.
If you doubt this, go to Pennsylvania and visit a beautiful place in Lancaster County by the name of "Bird-in-hand" where you will see a Bird-in-hand Bakery, a Bird-in-hand Family Restaurant, a Bird-in-hand Inn... and as they are mostly Amish, they will not be "pretentious or snobby."
Beware of all those Vanessas who "rush in where angels fear to tread."

La gramática, el camino más fácil

La gramática es el estudio del armazón de un idioma. No es una disciplina para confundir, molestar y enturbiar las aguas de los idiomas. Al contrario. Por medio de la gramática, simple, escueta y al grano, básica, sabremos en qué consiste el armazón o anclaje donde se asienta el idioma inglés y cómo difiere del nuestro. Aprender idiomas es compararlos. Si yo digo que el adjetivo castellano concuerda en género y número con el nombre: una chica alta, un chico alto, dos chicas altas, dos chicos altos…  y luego digo que el adjetivo en inglés no cambia y que además precede al nombre siempre: a tall girl, a tall boy, two tall girls, two tall boys… ¿Qué más hay que decir? Ya tenemos una estructura, un andamiaje aprendido en dos segundos que nos va a servir para siempre, sin necesidad de adquirir frase tras frase. para llegar a esa conclusión. El estudio formal de la gramática simplifica el dominio de los idiomas.

Santiago Ramón y Cajal y la voluntad

Santiago Ramón y Cajal (Premio Nobel de Medicina) dijo de la voluntad y del trabajo: “… la religión de la voluntad soberana; la fe en el trabajo; la convicción de que el esfuerzo perseverante y ahincado es capaz de modelar y organizar desde el músculo hasta el cerebro, supliendo las deficiencias de la Naturaleza y domeñando hasta la fatalidad del carácter, el fenómeno más tenaz y recalcitrante de la vida.”  No hay fórmulas mágicas más que las que nos dan la voluntad y el trabajo.

Refrán del día / Proverb of the day

Desgraciado en amores, afortunado en el juego  
Lucky at cards, unlucky in love.

Creo que las personas son supersticiosas por genética y han inventado incontables supersticiones, en todas las culturas, para fastidiar a la gente o para consolarla, como es el caso de nuestro refrán de hoy.