'I'm Willing To Fight For It': Learning A Second Language As An Adult

Short Wave

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4.7 • 6.6K Ratings

🗓️ 16 June 2021

⏱️ 15 minutes

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Summary

Becoming fluent in a second language is difficult. But for adults, is it impossible? Short Wave hosts Maddie Sofia and Emily Kwong dissect the "critical period hypothesis," a theory which linguists have been debating for decades — with the help of Sarah Frances Phillips, a Ph.D. student in the linguistics department at New York University.

You can watch a related video about Emily learning Mandarin here. It's part of the Where We Come From series.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	You're listening to shortwave from NPR.
0:06.0	So Maddie, you and I have known each other for a while now, and I think we're ready to
0:10.3	take it to the next level.
0:11.3	Oh my god, are we going way water rafting?
0:13.3	No, are we doing it?
0:14.7	No, not today.
0:17.0	But I have brought you something just as invigorating and just as vulnerable, a Kwong family home
0:23.0	movie.
0:24.0	Oh, yes, I think there's more eggs than you would need more eggs.
0:31.0	So I'm two years old and we're on an Easter egg hunt.
0:34.7	I got my floor all Easter dress, I got my grandparents, play and Edgar Kwong and they are all about
0:40.6	this right now.
0:41.6	Three.
0:42.6	Get chocolate for you.
0:45.6	Oh.
0:46.6	Oh.
0:47.6	Honestly, you still react that way to chocolate.
0:50.6	Let's reveal.
0:51.6	That's true.
0:52.6	That's my uncle, Timothy Kwong.
0:57.0	And you'll notice, Maddie, throughout these home movies and I brought a few today, that
1:00.9	there are two languages being spoken by our family, right?
	...

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