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Transcriber: Susana González
Reviewer: Keira White
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(applause)
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Learning a foreign language
is good for you for so many reasons.
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Why should I learn English?
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It’s not a question people ask themselves
a lot these days, is it?
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English is probably going to become
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the world’s lingua franca,
if it’s not already.
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Today, English is the most
widely used language for newspaper,
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book and scientific publishing,
international telecommunications,
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international trade, mass entertainment,
diplomacy, and, of course, the Internet.
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There are now more than 8,000 courses
taught completely in English
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by leading universities
in non-English speaking countries.
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So for people like me,
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non-native English speakers,
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it would seem that if we want
to keep up with the world,
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learning at least one foreign language,
namely English, is a must.
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We learn it to find a good job,
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to be more successful,
or even to immigrate.
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I’ve been learning English
since I was little.
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At first it was my parents who taught me
which is kind of funny because
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neither of them
spoke any English back then,
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and they have successfully avoided
learning it for the past 25 years.
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In fact, when I got
my bachelor’s degree in linguistics,
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my mom said: ″Good job, honey,
what’s next for you?″
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″Are you now going to get a real degree?″
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After my studies
I worked as an English teacher,
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and whenever I taught
an introductory class,
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I would ask my students:
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″Why do you want
to learn a foreign language?″
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The answers I would usually get
were more or less similar,
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but before I share them, I would like
to ask you to go back for a moment.
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Think of a time you first started
learning a foreign language,
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Do you remember why?
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The answers my students would give were:
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″My parents make me″,
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″I want to understand
social media content″,
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″I want to travel″,
″I want to get a good job″,
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and a lot of people also acknowledged
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that learning a language
is good for you in general.
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But if we stop and think about it,
work, travel, good marks at school,
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watching films, are all amazing,
noble reasons to learn a foreign language,
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but can you get all that
without actually learning?
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I think we probably can.
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If we go along with this idea,
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it takes only a little thought
to grasp what you can actually do,
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even if you don’t understand a word
in English or any other foreign language.
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For example, with the technology
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we have today, software can
translate a whole web page
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into your native language
in a split second.
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There are apps that can translate
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almost any text captured
by your smartphone camera in real time,
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and most media are served to you
with subtitles or a voiceover,
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available almost immediately
after the recording is made.
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Not to mention those lucky enough
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to be born into English-speaking families.
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They should be fine, right?
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And, here we come back to this vague
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″Learning a language is good for you!″
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And it is!
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It can bring many benefits,
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including those that can improve
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the quality of your life
and indeed your health.
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Which is a nice bonus for those of us
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who started learning it
for something else.
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It’s like when you buy
a pack of breakfast cereal,
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and ″here’s a free sticker inside!″
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Let’s move on now,
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and take a closer look
at some of these benefits.
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I like to visualize concepts,
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it helps me give form to abstract ideas
and make them more simple.
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I like to imagine
every person as a musician.
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Let’s start with somebody
who can only speak one language,
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you probably even know someone like that.
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Can you picture them in your mind's eye?
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Let’s assume that this person was born
and raised in their native country,
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they have been able to get by
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with their native language,
be it for work, travel and leisure.
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Now, if we visualize some more
and give this person an instrument,
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in some sense we can compare
their brain to a music box.
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Now, how does the box work?
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You spin the handle and magic happens,
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beautiful, does the trick.
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But the thing about the box
is that it can only play one tune;
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the mechanism is kind of embedded
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into the box, so changing it
is a lot of work.
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You repeat one and the same movement
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all over again.
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Now, we have bilinguals,
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in comparison to monolinguals,
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they have twice as many choices
on how to deliver an idea,
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but it’s not that simple.
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When bilinguals use the target language,
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they actually activate
both languages that they know.
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It means that there is always
this competition going on
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in their heads between the two languages.
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They have to be constantly ready
to respond in one language
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and suppress the other one.
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Instead of a music box,
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I would give them
a tape recorder and two tapes.
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Not quite an instrument,
but it can play music too.
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Now, if you’re bilingual,
your native tape is the one you know best.
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Depending on how well
you know your second language,
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the other one could be secondary.
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So each time you need
to play a word or a phrase,
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it takes you time
to get the native tape out,
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insert the other one,
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and then find the word
or phrase that you’re looking for.
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In addition to that, you sometimes
forget where exactly it is,
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or even if this word is even on the tape.
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Each time there is this switch
between these mental tapes,
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it takes you mental effort.
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It’s an exercise,
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and like with all exercises,
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it gets easier and easier
the more you do it,
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until you know the tape inside out.
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And with each new language,
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your musical instrument
gets more elaborate,
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like adding new keys to a piano.
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Some of them you know better, some worse,
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but each time you switch,
you get more fluent,
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and as you learn
another third, fourth language,
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you pick it up faster.
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You understand the logic
the languages might share,
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and you are more likely to overcome
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the barriers to speaking
with your next foreign language.
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And that mental effort translates
onto the other areas of your life,
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it opens your mind
for greater opportunities,
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and prepares you for possible challenges.
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And, that is not only true
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for those who started
learning a language early in life.
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That’s right! You can pick up
a new language today
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and start enjoying
all the amazing benefits it brings.
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It can even influence
your life indirectly,
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opening new paths for you.
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In 2020, like many others,
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I found myself in quarantine,
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my boyfriend, my cat and I
in a tiny one- room apartment
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for several months.
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I figured I needed
a new hobby to stay sane.
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It needed to be a one-person indoor hobby,
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and it needed to be cheap.
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So I decided I would start
learning a new language.
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I didn't have a preference.
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So I did several rounds
of flipping a coin,
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and it turned out to be Finnish.
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I armed myself with YouTube videos
and learning apps,
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and soon enough, I learned some stuff
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about some Finnish delicacies,
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some Finnish towns,
one famous Finnish poet.
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Having this tiny connection to the culture
made me want to dig deeper,
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and before I even realized it,
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it’s December, and I’m applying to study
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at a Finnish University.
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What started small,
became this huge change
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that helped me out of depression
and gave me purpose.
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Our brains are picky,
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our brains love new things;
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it gives us that handsome
reward of dopamine
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in exchange for novelty,
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that’s why I have so many pairs of shoes.
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Usually when you learn something new,
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the brain-boosting benefits decrease
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as soon as you get your eureka moment.
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For example, you want
to learn to ride a bicycle;
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you start trying, you go,
and it feels great,
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but, as soon as you get the hang of it,
it’s not the same satisfaction-wise.
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It’s just going.
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But that doesn’t happen
when you learn a foreign language.
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Instead, your brain needs to keep working,
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constantly plan, concentrate
and make decisions,
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every day is a school day,
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it never ends, which to me,
can be both amazing and frustrating.
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I have been learning English for ages.
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I have been teaching it
as a second language for several years,
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and I still make mistakes.
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And there are still words
that I don’t know.
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Not so long ago,
I was watching some British TV
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and I saw the word ″satsuma″ in a joke.
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Of course I didn’t get the joke.
I’d never heard nor seen this word before.
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At that moment, I felt almost angry
at all the English people
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who decided to adopt
this word into the language
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just to make my life more difficult.
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But, I did make a mental note;
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apparently, it’s a kind of fruit
like a mandarin or tangerine.
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I can never tell
the difference between them,
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because in my native language,
we have one word to describe all three.
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Later, I was abroad in a supermarket
and I saw this sign: ″satsuma″.
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I pointed to it and I said out loud,
there were people around me,
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″You little piece of fruit. I know you″
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and it felt really good.
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Our brains like to be proud,
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we like achievement,
we like to be the best,
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and this is the best kind of achievement
because it’s not competitive.
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The only person you are trying
to out-best is you,
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and each new word, phrase
and sentence brings you victory.
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It doesn't have to be a big victory.
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It can be as small as understanding
a joke in a foreign language.
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It’s never too early to learn,
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and it’s never too late.
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Thank you.
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(Applause)
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