This is in response to a question about learning Portuguese if you know Spanish.
In approaching a new language to learn, I usually ask myself which language I am most motivated to learn. A few years ago it was Cantonese, and the reasons were that I had some knowledge of it, that I spoke Mandarin, and that there were lots of Cantonese speakers in Vancouver so there were many opportunities to use it. This sustained an effort of 6 months, where I was able to use my basic knowledge of the vocabulary of Mandarin as a foundation for learning Contonese. I had previously resisted learning Cantonese because I thought the language was ugly and unimportant. I had also convinced myself that the nine tones would be too difficult to learn.
I happened upon a book which explained that 6 tones was enough. Cantonese was demystified. I decided to give it a try. I started doing a lot of listening. Just as the French say "l'appetit vient en mangeant", appetite comes with eating. The more I listened and learned Cantonese, the more I liked it. It no longer seemed ugly to me. This is important since you need to be motivated on various levels in order to learn a language.
After reaching a sufficient level of competence, the next language I attempted was Korean. Here the motivation was at several levels. First I felt that I should leverage my knowledge of Chinese and Japanese. Much of Korean shares Chinese vocabulary, and the structure is similar to Japanese. Once again, the thought that I could pick off some "low hanging fruit" was a motivator. Another motivator was the fact that we had quite a few Korean learners at The Linguist. This was not enough to sustain my interest since the content available from text books and language readers for Korean is simply too boring. I decided to stop studying Korean until we could get Korean going at LingQ, in which case I could access a much wider variety of content.
I then turned my attention to Russian, largely to prove to myself that even starting from scratch, and even in a heavily inflected, grammatically complex language like Russian, my approach to language learning, which places emphasis on enjoyment rather than grammar, would work. Although there are some words common to other languages, most of the vocabulary has to be learned from scratch. The pronunciation is difficult, and the grammar obtuse. The more I got into Russian, the more I enjoyed it. After two years of off and on part time learning on my own, I can read quite comfortably, enjoy but not fully understand movies, and communicate with a little difficulty, and probably a lot of mistakes.
I briefly tried to learn Portuguese a few years ago, since it is so similar to Spanish. I did a lot of listening to content from the Living Language course book, and the Colloquial Language series. It really did not penetrate. I dropped it. Recently, because of the large number of LingQ learners from Brazil, I took it up again. This time I had LingQ working so I took a different approach, more in line with our philosophy at LingQ.
Our feeling at LingQ is that you need a certain amount of beginner learner content, in short doses, in order to get your brain familiar with a new language, so that it is no longer just noise. Then you have to move to interesting authentic content as soon as possible. In other words, language learning is content based, not lesson or instruction based.
If you know a very similar language, with very similar vocabulary, as is the case with attempting Portuguese when you know Spanish, you can essentially skip the introductory stage. You do not need a course book. Living Language or Colloquial Portuguese etc. are unnecessary and boring. You just need to listen and read and save words and phrases from content that you like. You can do short articles at first, but then you should move to lengthier content, including novels. You can listen and read at the same time, and you listen while not reading, and you also read without listening. The main thing is to enjoy it and do a lot of it. If you like, you can even listen in Portuguese while reading in Spanish, using translations of famous books, for which translation and audio books are available. Otherwise you just do a lot of listening and reading, and reviewing new words, word forms, and phrase patterns. I used LingQ to do this. I ordered audio books from Brazil and after a few weeks of listening and working on LingQ my Portuguese improved quite rapidly.
With a lot of listening and reading, and a systematic review of words and phrases that come from this listening and reading, you will be surprised at how naturally the language starts to penetrate your brain, without you having to think of grammar rules or needing to identify the differences between the two languages. It is important not to convince yourself, as Tim Ferriss tries to do, that it is going to be difficult. You also need to be motivated, to like the language and to choose content that you like. I found some really interesting material in audio form, where the text was available. We have also been increasing our Portuguese content at LingQ thanks to our helpful Portuguese speaking members.
Unfortunately ( for my Portuguese) I remain more motivated to learn Russian for now, since I have not yet reached the level I want to get to. When I do, I will get back to Portuguese, unless I go after Korean first (if we have it on LingQ by then).
