Modern Languages for Ancient/Medieval Historians

>>1960020
If your latin is good enough just read the french texts, For german can you read old english? Just look up in what different directions the languages went.
A general question from my side didn't you have to learn any modern language in school ? I always find that hard to believe that, to start my undergrade studies in history here in Germany I had to know atleast german, english, latin and a 2nd modern language of my choice

>>1960045

This is the thing. I can bumble my way through French and Italian off of my Latin, but I am a bit fed up with bumbling.

I think what you have said demonstrates the difference very well - we do not have to demonstrate any facility with languages to embark upon undergraduate study. Even at a postgraduate level in Britain, you don't have to prove any facility with languages - although at that level you will be expected to pick up Latin/Greek/Coptic/Sanskrit/Old Church Slavonic etc. etc. depending upon your research. But you can make it to a DPhil without having ever studied Latin/Greek/Coptic etc. much less a modern language.

It always seems to me that something has gone wrong along the way - it seems that as late as the 70s most undergraduates at good universities would arrive with at least, say, French and Latin. The majority of undergraduate classicists will have been ready to hit the ground running upon arrival. Now Oxbridge have to run remedial classes - the TOP graded students of Latin and Greek from schools are no longer capable of meaningful engagement with real texts in Latin or Greek when they arrive and so have to be intensively prepped by the university before term starts.

I don't know what the hell has happened, but the state of modern language knowledge is abysmal in this country - and the knowledge of Latin and Greek is even poorer. And no, I did not have to study a modern language at A-Level (highest 'high school' qualifications pre-university). At A-Level no subjects are compulsory.

If I had had even an inkling about how useful French and German would have been to me as an historian I would have made sure to take one of them!

Do you have any tips for German? Like I say I have Latin and Greek and found neither a problem - but I just can't get my head around German, it seems so alien. And the way adjectives and nouns are compounded!

>>1960020
bump for other peoples' takes.

>>1960058
What you are telling me about the state of language knowledge, is in Germany said to be same. But as I hear from you and others, and also experience in Spain where I'm living right now, elsewhere it seems to be far worse!
For learning German I find it hard to give any usefull advice cause I never had to learn it but here's some thoughts and expirence I had by learning foreign languages:
Focus on stuff you know, for the vast majority of german grammer you gonna find something you know from english/latin, maybe even greek
German doesn't have as far as I know any times or modi that these languages havn't.
For vocabulary just listen to music, read, watch tv/films maybe with english subtitles or even the other way round(Audio eng/sub ger). Or the Best thing as always is to go to a german speaking country and try to learn it there.
If it feels so strange to you look at the shared past of english and german. Look up what went different, language vice, for the Saxons that left the continent and the ones who didn't. For me that helped when I tried to unterstand some dutch articles without speaking any dutch.
I know our compounded words are a little bit strange but maybe it helps if you look at germanisms in the english language like: Kindergarten= garden (more in an old unterstanding of save place)for children, Sauerkraut =cabbage that tastes bitter/sour.
German and english aren't that different!

>>1960020
>I have about 6 weeks off for the Christmas vac
Can you somehow erasmus into Fribourg? French/German bilingual city in Switzerland with a nice university and lots of historic sites?

File: Fribourg.jpg (180KB, 800x533px) Image search: [Google]

180KB, 800x533px

>>1960187

>>1960183

Thank you for the tips. I can't speak for Spain but in Britain the situation is dire. Here a lot of the best students now are Dutch, German, Italian or from eastern Europe - they arrive for postgraduate study with perfect English, their native tongue and usually another modern language helpful for research in ADDITION to an ancient/medieval language. I am truly in awe - something must be barbarically wrong with out educational system/attitude to language learning. And like I say is what is interesting is that the previous generations of scholars didn't seem to have this problem.

I just worry that at 24 I'm too late!

Thanks for the tips again German-bro. Just, if I could ask - I have met online and in real life many people from Germany/Austria who say they learned English by doing as you say, watching TV with subtitles. I have tried this with German but it seems like the speech is so fast - I'll get one or two words a sentence, but I certainly don't get any grammar/syntax from it.

Is there a certain way to do it?

>>1960187
>>1960188

Jesus Christ that is beautiful. I don't think I could Erasmus at this point unfortunately. But it sounds like hell of a place to visit.

>>1960189
A fair warning, English is about the easiest language to learn there is from the Germanic language family, German is much harder because of the sexes and declination. French is also a bit more complicated, but is better structured, plus as a native Anglophone you likely develop an accent that is strangely attractive to native French speakers.
Also in continental Europe it is more important to know more than one language, for most people the next border isn't to far away, your country is small or speaks more language than one, or nobody understands your native tongue and so on. The incentive on an island that speaks the worlds lingua franca anyways to learn a different language is just somewhat smaller.

>>1960187
>>1960187
I would not recommend to travel there without knowing at least one of the two languages. It would rather confuse you. Also, they do not speak the standard german there.

>>1960210

That is interesting to know. Yes, the island mentality is certainly somewhat to blame - I just lament that it has rendered me and others like me, poorer scholars.

I think the thing I have found most difficult about German is the vocabulary and the pronunciation. Cases and declensions and genders aren't too much of an issue after Latin and Greek. But the vocabulary seems largely so alien.

>>1960189
Sound's like I'm going to GB if I fuck up my bachelors thesis because I'm to lazy/stoned.

I wouldn't recommend it for grammer if you don't understand anything at all. Learn some major verbs and the times till you more or les recognise what is past/present/future with tables like this (like you probaly did for latin/greek):
https://www.google.es/search?q=konjugationstabelle+deutsch&client=firefox-b&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwidxNL66arQAhXCSBQKHR-UAWoQ_AUICCgB&biw=1366&bih=657#imgrc=aWgNv_i8_x5idM%3A

The rest will come by time! The Syntax in German today is even more free than the english one, while being more or less the same. Everything can be put almost everywhere without being wrong. It often just changes the meaning of the sentence or put's stress on one part of the sentence:
>Ich gehe am Morgen zu dem Haus.
I go to the house in the morning.
>Am Morgen gehe ich zu dem Haus.
In the morning I go to the house.
>Gehe Ich am Morgen zu dem Haus?
Do I go to the house in the morning?
>Zu dem Haus gehe ich am Morgen.
To the house I go in the morning.
(I think this one should be incorrect in english)
>Zu dem Haus am Morgen gehe ich.
To the house at the morning go I/(better do I go) Just changes the time to a second place which in this example for the sake of making sense would be called Morgen/morning....
Sorry for the ridicoulos example I looked for a sentence in which englisch and german share the vocabulary.

>>1960234
Don't focus on a correct pronunciation to much if your biggest concern is to read texts.

Latin and Greek you say OP? Curious, is it possible to self-teach yourself to any extent, or is it a fool's errand? Fellow Anglo with only a smattering of entry level French and German, for what it's worth.

>>1960436
Imo, to an extent, yes. It's just not an over night thing, it takes atleast 10 years of some kind of rigourous study.

>>1960445
Thanks, didn't imagine it would be easy. Are there any resources that are good for entry level Latin or Greek? Don't imagine original texts are that easygoing for a beginner.

>>1960020
>So, tl;dr share modern language learning tips, reading strategies, discuss the monolingual Anglophone millenial scholar problem - a result of English's position as the new lingua franca resulting in too few taking up modern languages at school, or something else entirely?
I study Arabic and I find Anki to be extremely useful. However, make sure that you input all of the vocabulary yourself and don't just download an already-completed deck.