“为什么要学外语？”有这 4 个理由就够了 ……
去了解一种文化，如果只是透过表面那一层薄纱，我们是无法真正理解的。
one reason to learn them is because they are tickets to being able to participate in the culture of the people who speak them, just by virtue of the fact that it is their code. So that's one reason.
学外语的一个理由就是——它是我们理解和融入一种文化的一张门票，语言就是打开文化的钥匙。所以这是其中一个原因。
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2
双语教学有益健康
“
Second reason: it's been shown that if you speak two languages, dementia is less likely to set in, and that you are probably a better multitasker.
第二个原因：有证据显示如果你说两种语言，更不容易患失智症。
And these are factors that set in early, and sothat ought to give you some sense of when to give junior or juniorette lessons in another language. Bilingualism is healthy.
并且你可能更容易处理同时做多件事情。这些都是目前的研究结论，能够给你一些参考，帮你决定什么时候让孩子们接触新的语言。双语教学有益健康。
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3
语言本身就是有趣的
“
Third reason: languages are just an awful lot of fun.Much more fun than we're often told.
第三点：语言本身非常有趣。比人们一般认为的要有意思的多。
So for example, Arabic:"kataba," he wrote, "yaktubu," he writes, she writes. "Uktub," write, in the imperative.
例如在阿拉伯语中“karaba”表示：“他写了”，“yaktubu”表示“他（她）写”。“Uktub”，是祈使句中“写”的意思。
What do those things have incommon? All those things have in common the consonants sitting in the middle like pillars. They stay still, and the vowels dance around the consonants. Who wouldn't want to roll that around in their mouths?
这些单词有什么共同点呢？这些单词的共同点就是由辅音构成主题，保持不变，元音围绕着辅音变化。谁不想多读几遍呢？
You can get that from Hebrew, you can get that from Ethiopia's main language, Amharic. That's fun.
你可以从希伯来语看到这个样子，你也可以从埃塞俄比亚的主要语言阿姆哈拉语中看到。非常有趣。
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4
这是一个适合自学语言的时代
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And more to the point, we live in an era when it's never been easier to teach yourself another language.
我们现在的时代，要自学一门语言比过去容易的多。
It used to be that you had to go to a classroom, and there would be some diligent teacher --some genius teacher in there -- but that person was only in there at certain times and you had to go then, and then was not most times. You had to go to class.
过去你要学外语，就需要去上课。或许会遇到勤勉的老师，以及一些睿智的老师，但是那个人只在特定的时间出现，你需要去按时上课，除此之外就没有机会了。你只能去课堂。
If you didn't have that, you had something called a record. I cut my teeth on those. There was only so much data on a record, or a cassette, or even that antique object known as a CD. Other than that you had books that didn't work, that's just the way it was.
如果你没法听课，你能拿到录音带。我小时候就是这么学的。录音带只有这么点信息，或者在磁带上，或者是那个叫 CD 的老古董上。除了那些，还有用处不大的书，过去就是这样。
”
看完 John McWhorter的演讲，大空翼想说：
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