Language Fluency and Cultural literacy

Language Learning Chinese
1

I think this deserves it’s own topic. It will help keep the other thread on topic too.

Brian already got things started with a nice selection of definitions

[quote=“Sir Donald Bradman”]Merriam-Wevster
2 a : ready or facile in speech b : effortlessly smooth and rapid : POLISHED
(facile:adjective: arrived at without due care or effort; lacking depth (Example: “Too facile a solution for so complex a problem”)
adjective: expressing yourself readily, clearly, effectively (Example: “Able to dazzle with his facile tongue”)
adjective: performing adroitly and without effort (Example: “A facile hand”) )

(from Cambridge Advanced Learner’s Dictionary)
fluent adjective
1 When a person is fluent, they can speak a language easily, well and quickly:
She’s fluent in French.

2 When a language is fluent, it is spoken easily and without many pauses:
He speaks fluent Chinese.
He’s a fluent Russian speaker.


Able to express oneself readily and effortlessly: a fluent speaker; fluent in three languages.
Flowing effortlessly; polished: speaks fluent Russian; gave a fluent performance of the sonata.

Ultralingua

  1. Skillfulness in speaking or writing. , 2. The quality of being facile in speech and writing; <SYN.> volubility, articulateness.

Oxford paperback
"flu:nt/ adjective 1 expressing oneself easily and naturally, esp. in foreign language. 2 flowing easily. fluency noun. fluently adverb.

Wordsmyth
speaking or writing easily and smoothly.
Example She is fluent in several languages.

American Heritage
1a. Able to express oneself readily and effortlessly: a fluent speaker; fluent in three languages. b. Flowing effortlessly; polished: speaks fluent Russian; gave a fluent performance of the sonata. [/quote]

I found something that, if someone is up to it, I think it’s worth a glance (I haven’t read it fully yet myself)
[CLICK HERE]

I make a big deal out the the definition because of sciencetific reasons. If I were (when I will be) doing tests, I would have a way to determine if I would put someone into the category of fluent.

I suppose people can be “more” fluent in some areas then others, but I think that in order for a person to have a serious grasp of a language, they will be good in all areas of that language (ie a persons use of spoken is limited by their reading ability).

Here’s a cool little fluency test I found. [CLICK HERE]

2

I did have this label “Definition of Fluency”, but then I read that article that I linked. I guess defining fluency would only be scratching the surface. In order to understand fluency one most take a serious glance at cultural literacy and it’s connection to being fluent. Even if somene had all the right grammar and vocabulary, could speak smoothly and listen clearly, could that person be labeled fluent without having all the proper cultural understanding? Could someone even get to a level of smooth speech (etc.) with out being culturally literate?

hmmmm…

3

I think using two terms, “fluency” and “native fluency”, is very helpful in labeling linguistic competence.

4

I think it is important to distinguish between fluency in the spoken language and literacy, i.e. ability to read and write the language. Just to highlight my point most people in Taiwan can speak Taiwanese fluently but very few are literate in that language (regardless of the system used to write it).

Sorry, I couldn’t open the article that you linked to but this is a very interesting point. I often wonder how people who have studied a language at university for three or four years can have any real grasp of that language unless they have had a lot of exposure to native speakers and the language used in a natural context (i.e. everyday life in the country where the language is spoken).

5

[CLICK HERE]
Here’s a googlized version of the article. You probably don’t have Acrobat reader. I’ll be looking for more websites and information about this topic.

6

[quote]Over the years a number of definitions have been suggested for second language fluency.
Fillmore (1979) names four different skills that might come under the term fluency: a) “the
ability to talk at length with few pauses”, b) “the ability to talk in coherent, reasoned, and
“semantically dense” sentences”, c) “the ability to have appropriate things to say in a wide
range of contexts”, and d) “the ability…to be creative and imaginative in … language use”.[/quote]

Taht’s from the article Miltownkid linked to.

I more or less agree with the first one.

Fluency seems like an imprecise and varying definition. To me it means your language ‘flows’.

I htink with a language using another script, you could be considered fluent int he spoken language without being literate.

Another point in the article which is good, is contrasting fluency with accuracy. When evaluating your fluency, being able to talk abotu a lot of things without pauses, and communicate your meaningis more important than having perfect pronounciation, grammar and a knowledge of a lot of different words. So a lot of Taiwanese students are more accurate than fluent, whereas I’m quite the reverse with my Chinese.

It seems to me that fluency is more of a ‘quality to be measured’ than a ‘measure of competency’.

Brian Rawnsley

7

That fluency test’s harsh.

I gave myslef a 46% and I was going easy on myself. It’s the written that drags me down.

Brian

8

Just curious, Sir Don, did you paraphrase the following definition from the Cambridge dictionary or was the grammatical mistake theirs? Don’t mean to pick nits – just curious whether they screwed up.

from Cambridge Advanced Learner’s Dictionary)
fluent adjective
1 When a person is fluent, they can speak a language easily, well and quickly:
She’s fluent in French.

9

Do you mean the ‘they’? There’s a long history (I think) of they being a sort of indeterminate third person singular in UK English. It’s ok.

Defining fluency as being able to talk smoothly and uninterruptedly makes the word pretty much useless. By that measure, I was fluent (in the Roxy) within 6 weeks of arriving. “My name is … I am not married … I am from …” I could rattle it all off. ‘Fluency’ has to be a measure not just of facility with the language but the breadth of that skill.

10

MT, direct quote.

I like the idea of fluency as a skill in itself rather than a measure of skill.

Brian

11

Don’t know as to the origin and length of usage, but I can certainly testify that ‘they’ is often used as a neutral gender third person singular pronoun. I don’t know if it’s just in the UK or in other Commonwealth countries as well.

12

Third person singular they is definitely used all over the world, and has been for many centuries.

13

Do you mean the English speaking world? I don’t think foreigners would use this construct because no English textbook contains it. Well, it’s still wrong, and even if it’s acceptable as “kou yu”, the last place where it should be permissible is in a dictionary entry. There’s no graceful alternative, you have to write “If a person is fluent, he or she can…”

On the topic of 3rd person singluar object pronouns, has anyone noticed how difficult it is for most locals to use “he” and “she” correctly. They are very likely to say something like “my mother and his friends”, and visa versa. It sometimes seems that the errors are more than random, but that they systematically swap the two pronouns, as if a standard textbook used throughout the island for the past ten years had been printed wrong and never corrected …

14

Er, no :unamused: It’s a British dictionary and it’s written in British English. It’s not a colloquial usage.

15

From a NZ/AUS background - I think “they” (in the singular context) faded from use. along with “one”, as slightly pompous pronouns.

If not, we would not have our knickers in a knot over the “non-PC” - “he” includes “she”

16

How does colloquial knowledge bear on fluency?

Like a crossword question - Russian Mountain in Paris? (or Rome)

Would not knowing the answer make you less than fluent in French or Italian (I only found out yesterday)

17

Do you mean the English speaking world? I don’t think foreigners would use this construct because no English textbook contains it. Well, it’s still wrong, and even if it’s acceptable as “kou yu”, the last place where it should be permissible is in a dictionary entry. There’s no graceful alternative, you have to write “If a person is fluent, he or she can…”
[/quote]

To be more precise, I should say, “Third person singular they is definitely used by native speakers of English from English-speaking countries throughout the world, and has been for many centuries.”

Just having finished a degree in Linguistics, I must disagree with calling the regular speech of hundreds of millions of native speakers of a language “wrong.” Try to remember that there have been native speakers around much longer than there have been grammar books. For my own part, I am an unrepentent user of singular “they” – I love the way it lets me talk about somebody without disclosing their gender, which is especially useful when you don’t know the gender of the person in question. However, it is somewhat colloquial, and it does seem somewhat out of place in a dictionary.

18

This conversation about they is very interesting, but, I was wondering if a mod could break those posts off into a thread of it’s own (mabye titled “They talk about they”).

My 2 cents on they.

Person A: Hey miltown, did your friend ever find a job?
miltown: They just got one.
Person A: Good for them. :smiley:

19

In American English, “they” is never a singular pronoun – it is plural only. Admittedly, it would be nice if we had a gender-neutral third person singular pronoun, but we don’t. Therefore, the following sentence is wrong in American English:

When a person is fluent, they can speak a language easily, well and quickly.

Better to rewrite it as:

A person who is fluent can speak a language easily, well and quickly.
One who is fluent can speak a language easily, well and quickly.
Being fluent in a language means being able to speak easily, well and quickly.

or some other such variation.

Last case scenario, when there is no other possible way to phrase it would be:

When a person is fluent, he can speak a language easily, well and quickly.

But obviously that is sexist and should be avoided if at all possible. Still, it is better than using “they.”

20

Miltown, you’re joking right?

Surely you know if the friend is he or she and can use the appropriate pronoun, right?

On the other hand, I still find it strange that everyone in Chinese is ta, and knowing so little Chinese I still imagine that it would often lead to misunderstandings.