Category Archives: Language learning

76. Multicultures – communities of familiar strangers

Posted on September 7, 2014 by thormay

Thor May Bris­bane, 2014   Pref­ace: This is a dis­cus­sion paper, not a researched aca­d­e­mic doc­u­ment. In par­tic­u­lar, it includes a fair amount of per­sonal com­ment. Where a topic is of broad gen­eral inter­est comes up with friends, I have adopted … Con­tinue read­ing →

Posted in China, culture, economics, ethics, evidence, ideology, individualism, intellectuals, Language learning, law, lifestyle, merit, politics, reciprocation, refugees, regulations, religion, rules, value, war, wealth | Leave a comment

74. The Purpose of Education – a hitchhiker’s guide to the galaxy?

Posted on August 10, 2014 by thormay

Is edu­ca­tion most com­monly treated purely as an instru­men­tal tool (e.g. to get a job), or as a path to self-devel­op­ment, or both? How can a bal­ance between objec­tives be achieved in pub­lic edu­ca­tion?  Thor May Bris­bane, 2014   Pref­ace: This … Con­tinue read­ing →

Posted in culture, economics, ethics, ideology, individualism, intellectuals, Language learning, lifestyle, merit, motivation, philosophy, Research & Study, teaching, truth, Uncategorized, value, work | Leave a comment

71. Is learning “grit” is the best way to succeed?

Posted on April 6, 2014 by thormay

How have you man­aged your fail­ures, and has fail­ure made you a bet­ter per­son? Every­one fails at some­thing sooner or later. The impor­tant thing is how they han­dle fail­ure. A recent edu­ca­tional fad in Amer­ica is to teach stu­dents “grit” … Con­tinue read­ing →

Posted in competence, culture, ethics, ideology, individualism, Language learning, lifestyle, merit, motivation, philosophy, proportion, teaching, value, work | Leave a comment

37. Some Mysteries of Language Learning

Posted on May 2, 2005 by thormay

Thor May 2005 – 2012 An expert is a fool a thou­sand miles from home. Hav­ing suc­cess­fully failed to learn about nine lan­guages, I’m a vet­eran lan­guage learn­ing imbe­cile, always a thou­sand miles from suc­cess, and an eter­nally hope­ful begin­ner. I’ve … Con­tinue read­ing →

Posted in culture, Language learning, Machine translation, teaching | Leave a comment