The Benefits of Bilingualism

[Slava]

A nice piece from the NYT on how language knowledge can be of use:

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/18/opini ... alism.html

I wonder what effect further numbers of language might have.

[Philip Hudson]

Learning a multiple of languages, along with all kinds of learning, benefits the entire life. I believe the article assumed the learning of two languages was done as a child. Learning language as an adult might not give the same results. When you really know a language you think in the language. People who speak different languages think differently (The inscrutable Chinese). Learning two languages in childhood surely makes you a bilingual thinker as well as speaker. I am not sure how this would work with multiple and especially adult-acquired languages. Sometimes I think in Spanish and sometimes in German, but I can’t do it consistently. I am proficient only in English and redneck.