forgotten Russian - how to restore it?

[Anna Frajlich-Zajac]

I meant "tool" not "toll".Sorry

Sorry,
AF



On Mar 14, 2011, at 10:46 AM, Anna Frajlich-Zajac wrote:

> It is my (not only personal) experience that the language returns,  
> or becomes functional, when the child (a person) realizes
> that it is a real  toll, not an abstract exercise.
>
> AF
> _
>
>
>
>
> On Mar 14, 2011, at 10:22 AM, Helen Halva wrote:
>
>> I have no true research to support this, but anecdotal experiences  
>> support the theory that (as with the boy cited earlier with  
>> "repka") subconscious language "knowledge" is retained and merely  
>> needs to be summoned somehow. I think that immersing the child in  
>> the linguistic medium, for example  in another family situation  
>> where Russian is spoken, via movies, etc. or whatever might be  
>> possible, will aid in that gradual process of recalling "lost"  
>> language capabilities. I doubt that this would work with children  
>> who were removed from the home language before developing active  
>> language skills, say before the age of 3 or so, but for an older  
>> child who left at 7 or older, I think this would be worth the  
>> effort to test.
>> HH
>>
>> On 3/14/2011 10:01 AM, Alina Israeli wrote:
>>> For several years I worked with Russian orphans here in  
>>> Washington DC. at their pre-adoption stage. Those were  
>>> "unadoptable" children, i.e. too old or with health problems  
>>> (many of them had unoperated cleft lip). The youngest were 5-6  
>>> that usually had older siblings. Most were 9-14, a few were 16.
>>>
>>> One summer they would not know a word of English and would need  
>>> me as interpreter, the next summer their English would be  
>>> excellent and they could not remember practically any Russian.  
>>> Some none at all. The only family where a year later Russian was  
>>> still in use was a family that adopted three children from  
>>> Kazakhstan (they already had one of their own), one Russian and  
>>> two Kazakhs.
>>>
>>> Something interesting is going on at the cognitive level and I  
>>> suggested to my colleagues who do language acquisition to study  
>>> such cases (similar cases were observed in Scandinavia). Their  
>>> reply was: who is going to fund a research that studied  
>>> forgetting the language instead of acquiring one?
>>>
>>> But I think studying those mechanisms would be very useful for  
>>> our understanding of language function.
>>>
>>> (One similar testimony I had quite recently from a prospective  
>>> student, she was adopted at age 12 as was her girl-friend from  
>>> the same orphanage; and six month later they were discussing that  
>>> they did not remember any Russian. In high school she took it as  
>>> a foreign language. Her pronunciation is obviously better than  
>>> that of her peers. but that's about all. )
>>>
>>> AI
>>>
>>> Mar 14, 2011, � 2:10 AM, Emily Saunders ������� 
>>> (�):
>>>
>>>> I had an odd experience with a young boy in a summer camp for  
>>>> typical U.S. kids aged 5-10.  He'd been adopted at the age of 2  
>>>> (and was about 5 or 6 at the time of our camp) and had  
>>>> completely forgotten all of his Russian.  We looked for glimmers  
>>>> of understanding with certain basic vocabulary words  
>>>> (����, ����, �����,  
>>>> ������), but nothing until we introduced to the kids  
>>>> a simplified version of the fairy-tale ����� (Repka).   
>>>> While the presenter was telling the story started to interrupt  
>>>> with corrections -- not ������/sobaka but  
>>>> �����/zhuchka, not ����� but  
>>>> ������ and so on.  I'll bet you that she has  
>>>> childhood rhymes and stories kicking around in her memory banks  
>>>> that could be triggered.
>>>>
>>>
>>> Alina Israeli
>>> Associate Professor of Russian
>>> LFS, American University
>>> 4400 Massachusetts Ave.
>>> Washington DC 20016
>>> (202) 885-2387     fax (202) 885-1076
>>> aisrael at american.edu
>>>
>>> -------------------------------------------------------------------- 
>>> -----
>>> Use your web browser to search the archives, control your  
>>> subscription
>>>  options, and more.  Visit and bookmark the SEELANGS Web  
>>> Interface at:
>>>                    http://seelangs.home.comcast.net/
>>> -------------------------------------------------------------------- 
>>> -----
>>>
>>
>> --------------------------------------------------------------------- 
>> ----
>> Use your web browser to search the archives, control your  
>> subscription
>>  options, and more.  Visit and bookmark the SEELANGS Web Interface  
>> at:
>>                    http://seelangs.home.comcast.net/
>> --------------------------------------------------------------------- 
>> ----
>>
>
>
> ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 
> ---
> Use your web browser to search the archives, control your subscription
>  options, and more.  Visit and bookmark the SEELANGS Web Interface at:
>                    http://seelangs.home.comcast.net/
> ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 
> ---
>


-------------------------------------------------------------------------
 Use your web browser to search the archives, control your subscription
  options, and more.  Visit and bookmark the SEELANGS Web Interface at:
                    http://seelangs.home.comcast.net/
-------------------------------------------------------------------------