Precerpt from My 20th Language: The Incredibly Important Role of University Studies

 

Precerpt (excerpt prior to publication) from My 20th Language by Betty Lou Leaver, Ph.D. -- 

Chapter 1
The Incredibly Important Role of University Studies

By the time I graduated from Penn State University shortly after my twenty-first birthday, I was definitively fluent in five languages by any reasonable definition of fluency: English, French, German, Russian, and Spanish, listed in order of proficiency at that time (though today Russian would rank right after English). I had completed advanced courses in literature, stylistics, linguistics—including morphology, syntax, and advanced grammar—and composition in all of them. I had also taken teaching methods in Spanish under a professor widely considered the best in foreign language pedagogy.

My proficiency extended well beyond basic communication. I could write essays, poetry, and fiction in all five languages, tailoring my language use to specific audiences. I could read virtually anything and grasp cultural implications, and I possessed solid knowledge of the history and chronology of literary development in the "mother" countries, plus reasonable familiarity with other nations where these languages were spoken. Several years later, when I took U.S. government proficiency tests in all four foreign languages, I achieved Level 4 (near-native) ratings in French and Russian, and Level 3 (professional) in German and Spanish.

The Linguistic Foundation Expands

While pursuing my core languages, I had dabbled in six additional ones: Greek, Hebrew, Italian, Japanese, and Portuguese through enrolling for varying credit hours (two to twelve, depending on the language) or auditing courses. I studied a seventh, Yiddish, at the Hillel Foundation Center in State College, where other students complained that I was learning too quickly and "cheating" by leveraging my strong German background. Well, of course I was—that's precisely how language learning should work! I was already well on my way toward those twenty languages.

Initially, I studied one language after another (after a semester or so, several at the same time) at the university, uncertain which should be my major. Eventually, I realized that general linguistics—a relatively new discipline at the time—would allow me to combine languages however I chose. That flexibility appealed to me enormously. I earned my BA in linguistics; my friend Al and I were the only two linguistics graduates in 1971, making us the first at Penn State. The program has since become robust, thanks initially to Dr. Simon Belasco, my advisor and department chair, who brought the linguistics program to Penn State.

Discovering Cognitive Advantages

As a first-generation college student from a rural community and a scholarship recipient, I was always looking for ways to earn a few extra dollars to make life more comfortable. Penn State paid undergraduates to participate in psychology experiments, and I eagerly volunteered. However, after participating in several studies, I was restricted from any language learning experiments or memory experiments—restrictions that would prove illuminating.

My exclusion from language learning experiments was understandable: most experimenters focused on acquisition errors to determine how learning occurs and identify error patterns, but I didn't make errors frequently enough to provide useful data. In studies where participants received 40-50 sentences with translations (not word-for-word, as word order might differ in the constructed language) and then had to generate sentences in that language, I could typically perform the task after just five sentences. After 50 sentences, I was bored, and since all my generations were correct, the experimenter learned nothing from me.

Similarly, I was restricted from memory experiments. I probably had decent memory to begin with—I was schooled in the traditional way where English classes included memorizing long poems, social studies classes required memorizing political documents like the Preamble to the Constitution, and math classes involved learning extensive arithmetic tables. However, language learning itself appears to improve memory. Given lists of 20-30 words that I was supposed to reproduce after the first look-through, then after a second and third exposure, I proved useless to researchers because I had no problem reproducing all words in order or rearranged after the first exposure alone.

This pattern persisted into later life. As a 60+-year-old participant in a mass study related to Alzheimer's research (volunteering out of kindness to help researchers), I again scored 100% on word lists during first, second, and third exposures. This time, rather than simply excluding me, researchers asked me to donate DNA as a significant outlier for my age group. I protested that language was my career—I had been paid my entire professional life to learn words—so my word memory probably had little to do with genetics. They got my blood, anyway!

The Science behind the Art

Two courses proved particularly significant for my later language studies: historical linguistics and descriptive linguistics. Historical linguistics taught me to trace language evolution and relationships, showing how languages change over time and how they connect to common ancestors. This knowledge became invaluable when encountering new languages—I could often predict vocabulary, sound changes, and grammatical patterns based on a language's family relationships.

Descriptive linguistics taught me to analyze language structure systematically, breaking down unfamiliar languages into manageable components: phonology, morphology, syntax, and semantics. Rather than memorizing endless lists of vocabulary and rules, I learned to identify patterns and systems, making language acquisition more efficient and logical.

Real-World Experience and Return to Academia

After graduation, I spent time in the "real world," teaching languages from preschool through high school and serving in the U.S. military. These experiences showed me how academic language knowledge translated into practical communication and pedagogy. Eventually, I returned to school—this time, the University of Pittsburgh—to pursue a PhD. Ironically, I completed that degree at the Pushkin Institute in Moscow rather than at Pitt, but my time at Pitt proved invaluable for language acquisition purposes.

Though enrolled in the Russian program, I continued taking linguistics courses. Among these, field methods stands out as the most important course I've ever taken for learning how to learn languages. Unlike traditional language courses that focus on established curricula, field methods taught me to record and analyze an unwritten language I didn't know. This process of discovery—working with a native speaker to decode an unfamiliar linguistic system from scratch—developed numerous strategies I later applied to learning already-documented world languages, often under time pressure.

Reconstructing the Past, Building the Future

My linguistics coursework led to an invitation to join Linguistics Department professors working on reconstructing Proto-Indo-European (PIE). This project built upon my historical linguistics knowledge and taught me to fill gaps in languages through systematic comparison and reconstruction. More important, it prepared me for intelligent guesswork when learning modern Indo-European languages new to me. Understanding the common ancestor helped me predict where gaps in my knowledge might exist and how to bridge them efficiently.

Working on PIE reconstruction also deepened my appreciation for language relationships. When I later encountered unfamiliar languages, I could often identify their family connections and use that knowledge to accelerate learning. A word that seemed completely foreign might suddenly make sense when I recognized its connection to a PIE root I'd studied.

The Art and Science of Language

For most people, linguistics represents the science of language—systematic, analytical, rule-based. For me, linguistics is also the art of language. This combination of art and science has been critical to my ability to read and parse dozens of languages, understand almost as many to a survival extent, and successfully study twenty to various levels of proficiency.

The scientific aspect provides the analytical tools: understanding phonological systems, recognizing morphological patterns, parsing syntactic structures, and tracing historical relationships. The artistic aspect involves intuition, pattern recognition, cultural sensitivity, and the ability to make creative leaps when systematic analysis reaches its limits.

The Multiplier Effect

My university linguistics education created a multiplier effect that continues to benefit my language learning today. Rather than approaching each new language as a completely separate challenge, I can:

·       quickly identify family relationships and leverage known languages;

·       recognize common patterns across languages;

·       predict likely areas of difficulty based on typological differences;

·       use systematic analysis to break down complex structures;

·       apply field methods techniques to unfamiliar languages; and

·       make educated guesses about meaning and usage.

This foundation transformed language learning from a series of discrete challenges into an interconnected system where each new language builds upon and reinforces previous knowledge. The 20 languages I've studied formally represent just the tip of the iceberg—the underlying linguistic competence, combined with what appears to be enhanced memory capacity and rapid pattern recognition, allows me to navigate many times that number when necessity arises.

The psychology experiments revealed something important: my language learning advantages weren't just about linguistic knowledge but also involved cognitive factors like memory efficiency and processing speed. Whether these abilities developed through language study or were innate traits that predisposed me toward language learning remains unclear—though I suspect it's a combination of both, with extensive language practice strengthening already-present cognitive advantages.

Without this university linguistics foundation, enhanced by what I discovered about my own cognitive processing, I doubt I could have achieved the breadth and depth of language knowledge I've developed. The combination of rigorous academic training and practical application created the perfect conditions for a lifetime of successful language learning. For anyone serious about becoming an effective multilingual communicator, I cannot overstate the value of solid grounding in linguistic principles.

For more posts about language learning, click HERE.

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