OK, I'm wanting to learn Latin now (I'm learning Spanish, Japanese, and Ancient Greek as well).
What's your opinion on Wheelock's Latin? I just purchased the textbook and workbook because I found it cheap at a store. There's another book called Thirty-Eight Latin Stories Designed to Accompany Wheelock's Latin which includes stories of ranked difficulty; however, I could not find this book in the store. Should I purchase Thirty-Eight Latin Stories Designed to Accompany Wheelock's Latin as well?
What should I get for speaking Latin? The books did not come with audio files, unfortunately.
>speaking latin
top kek
>>7873134
Why are you laughing? I want to learn how to read and speak Latin.
You can't really learn how to speak it unless you do some really specialized thing in a church or some shit
But "correct"/uniform pronunciation is important. Fortunately it takes like five minutes to learn the basic rules, and you can personally decide whether you give a shit about rolling r's or even pronouncing v's as w's and so on
>>7873161
I'll just learn to read it then. I suppose there's no reason I need to learn how to speak Latin, unlike with Japanese or Spanish. Should I get the book that I mentioned?
You're learning 4 languages at the same time and also interested in "speaking" Latin, top kek.
Classic faggot striver poor.
Wheelock is fine as a grammar handbook. Watch some youtube vids or something. The problem with Latin is that you can study it for 6 years and still not be able to read a Latin sentence because it's so different from how you're used to reading. A lot of teachers will tell you to "first look for the verb" and then try to make sense of everything, which is the worst thing you can do. Check out Lingua Latina for what they call the immersive approach, which aims to teach you Latin via direct experience that gradually gets harder.
>>7873235
You just need consistent and sorta-correct pronunciation, not really correct. It's not about sounding good, it's just about making sure you aren't doing a different thing every time you see a word. In my Latin class, there were people at the end who had never really done that step at the outset, and they kept stumbling, because they weren't doing it unconsciously.
Wheelock is pretty okay. Cambridge is also big but I have posted before that I don't think it is comprehensive enough, but you could still look at it if you want. I liked using Shelmerdine because it was more compact and very technical, but I don't see it mentioned a lot.
In the end, no method is perfect. You just want a good enough foundation + to stick with it no matter what.
For Greek, look into Hansen & Quinn (can be pirated, expensive/hard to find otherwise), or look into the JACT Reading Greek series, but ONLY its new edition - not the old one.
It isn't necessary by any means, but you might want to hold off on Greek until you do just a bit of Latin. Greek will burden your brain with a lot of memorisation when you could be getting grammar fundamentals down in a similar(ish) language, Latin. But don't let me stop you from having fun if that's what you enjoy doing.
>>7873253
Also I disagree with >>7873242 as I think Lingua Latina is snake-oil garbage.
>The problem with Latin is that you can study it for 6 years and still not be able to read a Latin sentence because it's so different from how you're used to reading.
This I don't understand at all. It's certainly hard, and some people will certainly struggle, but it's not that fucking hard.
Any Latin-reading scholar will tell you openly that 1) you're never going to read Latin "as the real Romans did," unless you're a native Italian cardinal at the Vatican, 2) some Latin is always going to be hard and confusing, even after decades of fluency, and 3) neither of these things matters and you can read texts comfortably enough to pass most PhD Latin exams within a year or two of reasonably dedicated university-level study.
Also nothing wrong with learning multiple languages if you have the facility for it, but yeah, be careful of burnout. Don't make the mistake many people do of flitting around the edges of a language for five years and never really biting into it! I did that and I regret it.
>>7873265
Are you literally retarded?
In one sentence you say "it's not that fucking hard" and then in the very next sentence you proclaim that you'll never read Latin fluently unless you're a cardinal.
Let me guess you studied it at uni, you spent years memorizing tables of forms, and now you think this is the normal way to learn a language.
>>7873242
Yes, I am learning them all at once. Memorized all the kana, now working through Japanese for Everyone which teaches to N4, Tobira will teach me N3, Images of Japan N2, and I have a Kanzen Master N1 grammar book. I'm planning to move to Japan after finishing my BS in computer science. With Spanish I have family members that speak it and help me plus I've taken classes on it, working through Breaking Out of Beginner's Spanish now. For Ancient Greek, I just started memorizing the alphabet. I supplement with Memrise courses.
>>7873253
I have Wheelock but I'm wondering if I should get Thirty-Eight Latin Stories Designed to Accompany Wheelock's Latin.
>>7873087
>(I'm learning Spanish, Japanese, and Ancient Greek as well)
You're not going to learn any of them.
>>7873581
Why not?
Instead of doing all those things badly, which you're going to, why not do 1 of them well.
>>7873301
Oh man you memorized the kana and are going to read some textbooks! Surely you will learn Japanese that way!
>>7873669
He's probably about 15 years old. Notice he's just started all these things and he's already looking for excuses to tell people about it. He'll give up everything with a month.
>>7873661
Yes, I will. What are you saying? The textbooks will bring me to a grammar and vocabulary level to N1. I'm using Michel Thomas for speaking. I also said I'm moving to Japan. Is this not learning Japanese?
>>7873624
Because learning even a single language requires a huge commitment, and three out of the four languages you're learning are notoriously difficult for English speakers. Unless you have the devotion of an autist and the time of a NEET, you're going to experience a series of false starts, plateaus, and failures. I want to learn all the languages you're learning, but I only have the time or energy to learn one of them.
>>7873690
>Yes, I will.
No you won't.
t. English speaker who learned Japanese
>>7873703
I have no doubt I am capable. Right now I'm also memorizing 100 kanji a day.
>>7873624
Because you have to invest a certain amount of time to get fluent in a language and you are dividing it among several languages, two being rather difficult and all three being very different.You're not just trying to fill up three pots of water at once, more water is spilling out because you have to go between three, if that makes sense.
As you've said here>>7873301 you are still at square one for the most part with the hard languages. Trust me, intermediate hell is a thing and it requires a lot of time outside of just studying from books. Once you reach that you will wish you only had just one language to deal with it. I can't imagine getting to the point where you need to consume native material to advance and you're trying to do it with three languages at once. If you want to know all three you'll get there faster going one at a time, once you are bilingual you learn other languages faster.
>>7873690
Learning Japanese involves getting to a level where you can consume japanese and then reading/listening through a ton of material while studying on the side. It's one of the hardest languages for an english speaker to learn. You can not get to an N1 level just by bookwork, you need to be able to understand the language intuitively, which comes with tons of work and practice. Otherwise you will end up like the textbook case (haha) of those people who read in a foreign language by sitting down and translating everything. That kind of reading is for academics evaluating texts and it's absolute dogshit, not for people who want to cold read a book without a dictionary.
>>7873713
I have no doubt you will fail badly.
>>7873713
Even with a ton of quantity it takes forever. Look up FSI and their language difficulty evaluations. They cae to those conclusions from students who already knew several languages studying like a full time job with the assistance of native language speakers and language instructors in a group environment, basically the pinnacle of efficiency when it comes to the book work perspective. Still japanese is listed as Hardest+ with an estimated 2500+ hours to reach native fluency.
>>7873738
FSI doesn't even estimate how long it takes to reach native fluency, just "proficiency." You probably need 2500 hours just to get to N1 level, let alone near-native level.
>>7873718
I understand but I think you fail knowing anything about the books I'm using. I'm not telling you the whole method either. I can spend over 10 hours a day learning a language. It took me a day to memorize the kana with mnemonics. With Spanish I have grown up with it because my family is from Mexico and they are native speakers. I'm moving to Japan which will boost me significantly in my understanding of Japanese. I'm not really too serious about Ancient Greek at the moment, I was just memorizing the alphabet at the moment. I understand it will take thousands of hours and that's no problem for me at all. I spent 10 hours a day for a couple years studying solely rigorous math (with textbooks like Rudin).
>>7873750
You sure are eager to give us your life's story!
Why do you feel the need to justify yourself like this unless you're just seeking approval? Let's be honest, we all know that was the point of your thread. If you really just wanted to know about Wheelock you would have checked the archives instead of making a thread, and you wouldn't mentioned that you're trying to learn 3 other languages at the same time.
>>7873703
You're a total fucking faggot
If he wants it, he will do it.
He seems to have the necessary resources and drive.
>>7873773
If only it were that easy, friend
You say you study 10 hours a day.
Any tips on how you're able to do that? I have a wish to learn high level math(need to start from scratch though) and a language(perhaps Korean, since I do enjoy their movie industry). But I can never get myself to study it enough, there are too many distractions(4chan, games, movies,books)
Any tips or should I just have been born with autism?
>>7873767
I wanted a general thread, just thought it could lead to some interesting discussion. I mentioned the other languages because I was going to ask about them as well. Maybe I came to the wrong place.
>>7873784
It is, pal.
>>7873801
It isn't though tovarisch
>>7873807
Why are you being such a retard? Just trying to maintain your idea of being a special snowflake because you learned a language?
This is highly irregular.
>>7873807
>sch
The fuck is this sound supposed to be anyway? In some words it sounds like they're saying sh-sh, in others its the same as the 'sh' sound and then sometimes it has that faint 'ch'.
>>7873794
Not OP but I did it when I was NEET
Do 1.5 or 2 hours of work (whatever works for you), take a 30 minute break
Make sure some of your breaks are physical and take you outside your environment, like a walk or bike ride. Those will wake your brain up and trick to you get back to working without feeling like you've been in a swamp made of math for thirty thousand yaers.
>>7873824
Joke's on you man, I only know English
>>7873738
Those are bullshit. They don't take into account student's personal interest, and different learners can have widely varying needs and strategies for achieving fluency.
Japanese isn't that bad; it's very logical and has few exceptions compared to many European languages, and kanji aren't entirely memorization (which you can speed up using mnemonics anyways) and can be broken down into Bushu for added readability.
Going from N2 to N1 is difficult, because at that level they're teaching you old literary grammar you won't really be able to see even if you're reading/watching news or reading 1900's /lit/.
The big thing to remember is to never underestimate yourself; if you want to read lit for instance, order some promptly and start making your way through it. Same with movies, ditch subtitles as soon as possible.
Source: JLPT1 living in Japan.
PS: Living in Japan isn't necessary for JLPT1, I actually went through a rut of finding it harder to study here than home for a very long time.
>>7873844
So you're just a failure
>>7873843
This. Personally I go 10 minute break every 50 minutes.
>>7873849
Yeah pretty much. Why else would I be posting here?
>>7873843
Thank you, i'll give it a go!
>>7873794
When I was studying math I didn't have any internet, games, or fun books. I lived in the sticks in a poor neighborhood. I was bored. I genuinely enjoyed working through the textbooks as well, at least more so than doing nothing at all.
You have to make it a habit; starting is the hardest part (especially if you have lots of distractions like the internet). Then somehow make yourself think that what you are doing is enjoyable.
I recommend looking up "learning how to learn," it's a course on coursea (never done it myself but I've heard good things).
>>7873800
Yes, you did come to the wrong place. Now delete your thread.
>>7873933
Did I come to the wrong place?
if you have no problem with a strictly academic approach, wheelock's is the most popular choice.
the cambridge latin course is a more "fun" approach. it covers a bit of Roman culture, which makes the whole experience feel less isolated, and has a story line between translations.
having done both wheelock and cambridge, i think cambridge is more satisfying and wheelock is faster (almost militant)
>>7873943
ofc not senpai
i've enjoyed this thread
>>7874034
Thanks, I'm glad.
>>7873087
Keep learning it, I'm proud of you, you will carry on what's important through to the future. Ave Victoria, Ave /lit/teratura.
>>7873087
From what I understand, Wheelock's Latin is just a grammar, so you should absolutely get some experience actually reading.
>>7873087
Wheelock's is bad, man. Latin works completely differently from English because of its inflections and the ambiguity of cases only makes it more alien (i.e. "manus" could be any one of four cases). So when you read Latin, any sentence could technically be construed a number of different ways, only one of which makes sense, and you have to train the mental capacity to figure it out quickly.
Latin's not the only language that works like this. Russian is even worse I've heard. But at least with Russian you can immerse yourself in Russian-language media.
Because you can't do that with Latin you must get lots and lots of reading practice. Wheelock's doesn't provide anywhere near enough. You end up "knowing" the language, knowing the rules and some vocabulary, but not really being able to read anything real with anything approaching comfort. Some people do overcome the deficits Wheelock's gave them but it takes time and effort.
Orberg's Lingua Latina Per Se Illustrata, or another "natural method" book, is the only way IMO. You also need to learn the grammar formally on the side, I don't believe you can naturally absorb the complexities of a language like Latin by exposure, but those "naturalist" books give a lot more practice.
>>7875677
so ur saying use wheelock on the side of LLPSI?...
Man, a lot of negativity on /lit/ today. Why not encourage OP to follow through with all his learning instead of being cunts?
>>7875885
Cause OP is a faggot just like you
>>7875885
Because it's exhausting to entertain every anon who's at the planning stage of what will be a huge enterprise, when we can't know if he has the tenacity to succeed. If he had simply asked "what's the best way to self study Latin" this would have been a cordial and informative, if uneventful, thread.
>>7875885
OP is a faggot. Assuming this thread wasn't started as elaborate bait he's a self-assured ass who's convinced he can learn 4 different languages at the same time against the better wisdom of his peers.
>>7875831
Nah just use Allen & Greenough on the side.
>>7875677
>So when you read Latin, any sentence could technically be construed a number of different ways, only one of which makes sense, and you have to train the mental capacity to figure it out quickly.
uhh, duh. context is key, just like in english. anyone who is versed in latin, even the slightest, knows this. it takes time to harness your skills. this is how learning a language works.
>>7873704
Honored to have de ball sack on /lit/
>>7873290
>It's not that fucking hard
to "The problem with Latin is that you can study it for 6 years and still not be able to read a Latin sentence"
>you're never going to read Latin "as the real Romans did," unless you're a native Italian cardinal at the Vatican
not "you'll never read Latin fluently unless you're a cardinal"
Don't enter a conversation about Latin until you've got a good grip on English
