Linguistic Environment Quotes

Every individual is at once the beneficiary and the victim of the linguistic tradition into which he has been born.

One doesn't live in a country, one lives in a language.

The little child learns to speak, though it has no learned teachers - because it lives with those who know how to speak.

The method (of learning Japanese) recommended by experts is to be born as a Japanese baby and raised by a Japanese family, in Japan. And even then it's not easy.

Part of what our problem as blacks in America is that we don't claim that. Partly, you see, because of the linguistic environment in which we live.

For a lot of people, and I'm one of them, where you are and who you're spending your time with greatly impacts your accent.

We live in an ocean of words, but like a fish in water we are often not aware of it.

Besides, if I wanted to hear people speaking wall-to-wall French, all I had to do was remove my headphones and participate in what is known as ‘real life,’ a concept as uninviting as a shampoo cocktail.

It was probably very difficult to go from Chinese and then suddenly go to kindergarten and start speaking English; it's very hard to transition back and forth when you are in that pivotal age. It's also hard to transition back, but if I was immersed in the country for a given amount of time, you are surrounded by it, everyone is speaking, you are learning new things, you are practicing all the time.

You always speak the language you hear most.

A lot of movies try to set up a world with cool sets, costumes, camera work. In Brick, the world is born from the words.

I certainly like that the Spanish language is spoken around me.