Friday, November 11, 2022
Angela Lansbury's Speech; Why I want to Be Bilingual or Multingual and How You Can Do The Same
About the Author
I am a native English speaker, know Americanisms. I am almost bilingual in French. I have translated French into English at conferences, given bilingual thank you speeches on travel press groups of the English visiting France, and attended the French speaking Toastmasters Club in Singapore, giving impromptu speeches, and evaluating speeches.
I can read signs and muddle through basic Spanish, Portuguese and German. I know half a dozen words in multiple languages. I am currently (November 2022) learning Swedish daily on Duolingo. That's not all. I am also signed up for ten other languages. I follow the forums, the questions and answers, on Facebook Polyglots. My dream is to be a polyglot, to be able to chat in at least four languages, English, French, German, Spanish - and Swedish. I know a dozen words, road direction signs, transport signs, in Malay-Indonesdian, Hebrew. I learned Latin at school and can read Roman gravestones in museums and archaeological sites, which helps with Italian. I recognize most of the letters in the Hebrew, Greek and Cyrillic (Russian-Bulgarian) alphabets and can read slowly. My far off challenges are Japanese and Korean. I studied the simplest made up language, Esperanto but was not good at it. Lack of practice. I am pro Interlingo. I have numerous blog posts on American English, Australian and New Zealand English, and French, Spanish, German and Swedish on travelwithangelalansbury.blogger.com
I gave a speech to Singapore International Dynamic club, an online only club which I belong to as secretary. On Friday 11th November 2022. I have given speeches on being bilingual in the UK and Singapore and to the online club SGI.
I am a member of five Toastmasters clubs, meeting in person or hybrid in Singapore BHA an advanced club of which and TCA and NSS. In the UK I am a member of Harrovians.
I gave this speech several times on how to study languages, showing various books and flashcards. The feedback recommendation for improvement was, tell us why we should take all that trouble.
I had also given the speech on why you should be bilingual, and got the feedback, yes, it sounds a good idea, but in the past I found I was not good at languages. How should I go about it?
This time I gave a speech covering why you should be bilingual and how to do it.
I felt like I was sure I had given an almost identical speech previously and thought people might be bored, but my evaluator was ultra-enthusiastic.
Ananya's Evaluation
A really good evaluation enthuses the speaker to give the same speech again or to give another speech. It does not repeat the speech but says why each element was effective, so that anybody who missed the speech because they were late or had poor reception, or did not follow the English words, can still infer the gist of the speech from the evaluator's comments.
Ananya said, "This is one of the best speeches I have heard. It told me how to learn languages and why and gave me all kinds of new ideas. I was very interested in the idea that being bilingual helps postpone or prevent Alzheimers, because Indians are known to have low rates of Alzheimers, and we mostly are bilingual because we need to speak English to communicate with Indians in other Indian cities and states speaking different languages.
"I also thought the information on Duolingo was helpful to me personally. Although I had heard of it and several people in the audience said they used it, the information about how it works was useful to me. I never understood why it was better than just using Google Translate, I thought Duolingo was just another translating system. But now I am keen to go and look at it to find out more about it.
"I don't have any recommendations for improvement. You involved me and other members of the audience with a call to action and how to do it.
"I had been very busy working late and was tired, in two minds about whether to come to this meeting; but now I am very glad that I did. I am keen to come back and hear more speeches from you."
I gave this speech from the pathway Persuasive Speaking, Icebreaker, 4 to 6 minutes.
Useful Websites
Improve your English by Angela Lansbury
SID
Toastmasters international find a club
Facebook polyglots
Labels: bilingual, Cyrillic, Duolingo, India, multilingual, polyglot, Swedish
