The Polyglot Community / Conlangers / General Language Learning Autism - Attention seekers that barely speak the languages they claim, pretentious language creators, grifters shilling language learning scams and more!

[Super Saiyan Hitler]

In the OP you mention the alog language skeptic Sam and I think you are a bit unfair to him.

Funny enough, he also makes some claims about languages himself. While it is believable due to his accent that he knows at least one other language well, he makes the claim that he can talk and understand all the extremely-different Arabic dialects and understand all the languages from Scandinavia (including Finnish which is completely part of a different language family!). Ironically, including dialects and countries where their language is understood s a common thing polyglots do to try to inflate how much they really know.

In the screenshot he mentions being able to speak Egyptian Arabic and Fusha Arabic. Egyptian Arabic is obviously a dialect, but Fusha Arabic is a colloquial term for Modern Standard Arabic which is used in all Arab countries. Therefore, his claim about being able to communicate with all Arabs is true.

The Scandinavian languages are mutually intelligible, so I'm inclined to accept that claim as well. Finland isn't considered a part of Scandinavia, but rather the Nordic region or sometimes the broader or more narrow Fennoscandia or Baltoscandia regions. When he claims that he's able to communicate with Finns, it's probably not because he claims to speak Finnish, but rather because Finland has a large population of ethnic Swedes and teaches Swedish as a second language.

Of course this assumes that he speaks the languages he claims. I'm not detecting a Scandinavian accent, and he certainly doesn't look like Thor. His accent sounds vaguely Arabic to me, and his looks are a close enough match, although he's a little light skinned. Maybe he's a Copt from Egypt.

 

[Fialovy]

In the OP you mention the alog language skeptic Sam and I think you are a bit unfair to him.



In the screenshot he mentions being able to speak Egyptian Arabic and Fusha Arabic. Egyptian Arabic is obviously a dialect, but Fusha Arabic is a colloquial term for Modern Standard Arabic which is used in all Arab countries. Therefore, his claim about being able to communicate with all Arabs is true.

The Scandinavian languages are mutually intelligible, so I'm inclined to accept that claim as well. Finland isn't considered a part of Scandinavia, but rather the Nordic region or sometimes the broader or more narrow Fennoscandia or Baltoscandia regions. When he claims that he's able to communicate with Finns, it's probably not because he claims to speak Finnish, but rather because Finland has a large population of ethnic Swedes and teaches Swedish as a second language.

Of course this assumes that he speaks the languages he claims. I'm not detecting a Scandinavian accent, and he certainly doesn't look like Thor. His accent sounds vaguely Arabic to me, and his looks are a close enough match, although he's a little light skinned. Maybe he's a Copt from Egypt.

I guess my problem is that his claims to be able to speak with people in multiple countries is a bit misleading and makes it seem like he knows and can do much more than he really can when he puts how many countries of people he can speak. It is like saying I can speak with everyone in the US, UK, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand when you only know English.

Heck, if you know Esperanto, you could technically make the claim that you can speak with people in every country, but that doesn't mean the average person in those countries will understand you.

 

[Fialovy]

Okay, rearranged the OP a bit, all that is left is to archive the social media links and do one final proofread and I should be good

 

[Schwartz Bruder]

There is a variety of conspirologist conlangers and folk-linguists in former USSR, they're known as linguofreaks here.
There's database of them (russian, I guess, you can machine-translate this at least, bc it's huge amount of interesting info) and recently discovered these schizos (same as above, russian, but huge amount of images). Those guys demand paying for their lectures.

 

[lolcow yoghurt]

I think creating languages is cool, especially when you are doing it for a work of fiction.

 

[IAmNotAlpharius]

I knew one of these assholes in college. He’d take the first 100 level course of as many languages as possible and would gloat about how many languages he could speak. He was autistic and looked like a less retarded Chris Chan.

 

[Reddit Refugee]

I find language learning to be fun, so the fact that there are people out there trying to scam others with it kind of makes me mad.

The best tip I've ever seen for learning languages/becoming a polyglot was literally free, and it was this: learn related languages simultaneously. If you're learning Spanish, also study Italian, etc. The logic was that they can reinforce each other in their similarities, but also that their similarities build off of each other. I don't have fluency in any languages other than English, but I've found that there's some truth to this, at least in my study of Dutch and German.

I remember my high school Spanish teacher actively discouraging this. She spoke Italian with her husband but her mother tongue was English. Some of the boys were interested in learning Italian and she thought it was a bad idea because it would "confuse" them and hinder their progress in Spanish. They used to mess around with her by greeting her in Italian at the start of class and she would rage because it was getting her "out of the zone" for teaching Spanish. We also had a Scandinavian girl in the class and she stressed about it because she was learning a third language through her second language.

Anyways, thoughts on Language Simp? There's a hint of irony in his videos but the cringe slapstick non-comedy is a bit much.

 

[Glad I couldn't help]

Very good OP. I was thinking about writing something like this, gland to see somebody taking up the torch. I might want more on r/languagelearning and r/learnjapanese, as they might be some untapped veins of autism that I am unaware of. On the other hand, that might be typical r*dd*t retardation.

Has anybody else read Babel No More by Michael Erard? It's a good book on polyglots and various issue around them. Even without the Internet, they were still a bunch of weirdos; the Internt just allowed them to assemble together, like everybody else.

Honestly, I feel like most people interested in languages would better of going deep into one or two languages instead of going shallowly with 30 or 40. At most, you should focus on the languages of one big area, like the Balkans or South-East Asia (those languages will often be related to each other, and have been sharing grammar, vocabulary and culture over the decades and centuries, making it easier to learn them). The people that go in depth will more likely have interesting things to say until the 40 year 'polygot' autist.

 

[Fialovy]

Very good OP. I was thinking about writing something like this, gland to see somebody taking up the torch. I might want more on r/languagelearning and r/learnjapanese, as they might be some untapped veins of autism that I am unaware of. On the other hand, that might be typical r*dd*t retardation.

Oh yeah, definitely a lot of autism to be had there. I have been meaning to put the finishing touches on the thread, but I have been distracted.

 

[Colonel Gaddafi]

Rate me autistic, but honestly I think it’s nearly impossible to master a language one did not grow up speaking (some people, like myself, are lucky enough to be exposed to multiple languages at a young age due to geography, religion, or politics). I can communicate in many languages at an intermediate level, but frankly I’m not going around saying I ‘speak them’. English still gives me grief ffs, my grammar is shit.

My wife (Allah love her) likes watching Xiaomanyc’s content. I’ve brought up inconsistencies within his videos before and her usual argument is ‘you just like bullying people, the little Asians are always super impressed and think he’s an Asian too, so there!’ Well yeah, if some Asian dude came up to me and spat out some Amazigh I’d be pretty impressed too. Not that he was fluent or anything, but impressed that an Asian dude was speaking to me in a language that’s unheard of for non ethnic Berbers to speak. If the dude was at a drive through I’d assume he was born in the US with parents from the old country, hence the wonky accent. The guy also has a chinky wife iirc, so I’d imagine he’s probably pretty good at whatever dialect she speaks, but the African stuff he posts is very cringe worthy. Even in his Chinese he has long pauses where he has to think hard about what to say back, which is perfectly fine, but definitely not a sign of advanced language proficiency. Fluent speakers think in their second language.

 

[Dread First]

RIP Laoshu505000, the only black man I knew of who loved China so dearly, but never got to visit before he died.

 

[Prophetic Spirit]

RIP Laoshu505000, the only black man I knew of who loved China so dearly, but never got to visit before he died.

Wait, why he's called rat in chinese?
i know what 'cus i named a character im my novel with Laoshu, which is... obvious: a fucking human rat in personality

 

[Dread First]

Wait, why he's called rat in chinese?
i know what 'cus i named a character im my novel with Laoshu, which is... obvious: a fucking human rat in personality

Truthfully, I have no clue. I think it was an inside joke that lost all context.

He was pretty much a cookie cutter YouTube polyglot but he had an insane love of Chinese culture. In addition to Mandarin and Cantonese, he also spoke many local dialects from places like Sichuan, Fujian, and I think Heinan at one point. Allegedly, he learned and taught Chinese over the course of 10 years.

He got married to a Taiwanese woman and he visited Taiwan once, but he really wanted to visit mainland China. He died before ever making that dream come true, unfortunately.

 

[rel=alternate]

I remember my high school Spanish teacher actively discouraging this. She spoke Italian with her husband but her mother tongue was English. Some of the boys were interested in learning Italian and she thought it was a bad idea because it would "confuse" them and hinder their progress in Spanish.

I 100% agree with this. My mother tongue is a latin language. I also learned Spanish and then Portuguese later on. I always struggled with differentiating the two with many common words. It's not an issue when it comes to understanding people, but it hurts the flow of the conversation on my side because I often have to second guess whether I am actually using the right language or not.

The more similarities, the more confusing it gets, especially if you don't practice both very often. Fluency is only really achieved once you're able to speak without having to think about the words you are using. Anything less than that, and you will be a pain to actually converse with.

Then again, when it comes to understanding a latin language, there is definitely an upside in already knowing another one with latin roots, it's undeniable. Even without knowing a word, you'll be able to decipher a ball park meaning just from that, most of the time. This does massively speed up the learning process.

RIP Laoshu505000, the only black man I knew of who loved China so dearly, but never got to visit before he died.

I am not sure it was him, but I seem to remember that he also overstated his abilities outside of the Chinese language though. If I remember correctly, it was always the same things with a few basic sentences like "Where are you from?", Do you speak X?", "How are you?", " I am trying to learn X", "I learned at home"

It all seemed super impressive until he tried that with my own mother tongue and I actually got to judge the level. It was poor to say the least.

Then again, I might be confused with another dude with the same schtick.

Overall, these "polyglots" all benefit from the fact that nobody is going to tell you that you speak like shit when you're clearly trying to make an effort. It's kind of like telling a child that you are impressed with the drawing they gifted you. There is no upside to being mean or even genuine.

 

[Glad I couldn't help]

Okay, so I added the social media. Apparently Ikenna has his own language course on his website that claims to teach you any language. There are some choice quotes from it like "most language learning techniques are one size fits all" yet he tries to sell you that his way is way better than any of the other ones. How does that work? There are a few other things. Will archive it and screen cap some choice paragraphs later.

Also, it is almost 100 dollars and it won't even teach you an actual language, just how to learn a language. Sounds like a good investment.

I will include people on Duolingo fans who like to show off too, I admit, it is quite annoying when people flex how much of a streak they have yet can barely say anything. I will have to find some good examples though.

Ikena has released a new video launching his language learning app. It's called "Fluyo", features a dolphin mascot and will have flashcards, 'battles' and social messaging features. It's going to launch with French and Spanish, with Japanese as stretch goal (GIVE US YOUR MONEY, YOU FUCKING WEEBS). There's going to be a kickstarter in "Late Fall/Winter" of this year.

I'm not going to lie, assuming that it's not complete scam like AJATT Silverspoon or Project Uproot … I would feel bad if it failed, and I would wish that provided good and effective product. But I kind of doubt it.

 

[Markass the Worst]

小马在纽约 (xiaomanNYC) posted a video about his near death experience on an airplane as he was travelling to Ghana. He claims his plane was possibly leaking fuel and the pilot came back into the cabin to check the wing to see what was happening. He starts crying on video about how he might die, might never hold his baby again etc.

He starts panicking to his wife
View attachment 3536137

Everything was fine. Pilot even knew of him. Big fan! It was a fuel imbalance, which is no cause for panic in an airplane making a cross-Atlantic journey out of the USA. Boeing even says that following procedure should allow for a flight to carry on to its destination. If an engine goes out, Boeing and Airbuses are able to fly on one engine. It was just his airline's policy to return should this failure occur.
View attachment 3536219

Found his flight
DL9923. 2 hours in they noticed a problem and returned.
View attachment 3536280


TL DR; he panicked his wife and started having a breakdown in the plane because of a simple issue that was likely communicated to him while in air. This is not a big issue and he is click baiting a disaster to gain sympathy from his fans

An actual pilot made a response video basically refuting all the fearmongering and misconceptions that Xiaoma did in his video:

Spoiler: Archive

 

[Dread First]

I am not sure it was him, but I seem to remember that he also overstated his abilities outside of the Chinese language though. If I remember correctly, it was always the same things with a few basic sentences like "Where are you from?", Do you speak X?", "How are you?", " I am trying to learn X", "I learned at home"

It all seemed super impressive until he tried that with my own mother tongue and I actually got to judge the level. It was poor to say the least.

Then again, I might be confused with another dude with the same schtick.

Overall, these "polyglots" all benefit from the fact that nobody is going to tell you that you speak like shit when you're clearly trying to make an effort. It's kind of like telling a child that you are impressed with the drawing they gifted you. There is no upside to being mean or even genuine.

Laoshu was a pillar of the YT Polyglot community from my understanding. The only languages he had a truly fluent command over were Mandarin and Japanese, but even before he died and showed off his Pashto skills, I sincerely couldn't find any grievous fault with it. His pronunciation's actually better than mine, and by quite a margin. Hell, I admire his bravado by not editing out his stuttering because it showed he had no shame in his mistakes.

The two biggest YT polyglots I'm familiar with are Frankie Light and XiaomaNYC, though that's entirely because (at the risk of PLing here) they're local social media celebrities here in the NYC-Long Island-Westchester metropolitan region. I've certainly seen friends of mine sharing clips of their videos on Instagram, Snapchat, and Facebook. Frankie and Xiaoma both took heavy influence from Laoshu, with Xiaoma even giving his own impromptu eulogy for him the day after he died.

Honestly, both Frankie and Xiaoma are charlatans (to an extent), but I still respect the hell out of them for not being afraid of filming their mistakes (a habit they picked up from their mentor). They might not be speaking flawless Mandarin/Japanese/Hindi/Swahili/Bengali/whatever the fuck but you know what? At least they're trying... somewhat... kinda...

Also, let it be known that the sight of a black man speaking Mandarin, Cantonese or Hindi better than 1st generation immigrant children is quite endearing.

 

[Agent Abe Caprine]

Is there an English version of these guys? I'd love to see a Chinese guy's video about "ORDERING in English! They were SO impressed!" so I can understand what it's like without doing any work.

According to a serious crime drama, yes. GO GO GO GO YOUR WAY! BELIEVE IN YOURSELF!

 

[Reddit Refugee]

 

[A Hot Potato]

View attachment 3679693

Being able to say "I'm a faggot" in 6 different languages does not make you a polyglot lol