In praise of passive vocabulary

I have heard people say that they can only learn a word if they use it. I do not agree. I know far more words passively in my foreign languages, than I use actively. There is nothing wrong with that. I enjoy my listening and reading and feel that understanding what I hear and read is essential. I do not mind struggling to find words when I speak. I find that the more I listen and read, and review my words and phrases, the greater my passive vocabulary, and therefore the greater my potential active vocabulary. When I have more opportunity to speak, I find these passive words gradually migrating over into the active category. Here is the podcastDownload Passive vocabulary

Comments

[Tom]

I do not understand the discrepancy between active and passive vocabulary. It seems to me that if you understand a word (passive), than you can use it (active); if you use a word, you can obviously understand it.

Why do some learners seem to get hung-up on transitioning passive vocabulary to active vocabulary? Obviously you may forget some words or not use some words very often, but I don't think either of these categories would be considered passive. Conversely, I do not think you can fully understand a word or phrase and not be able to use it.

[lyzazel]

Tom: I think it might have more to do with how you learn the word: do you learn it by just hearing it or do you learn it by saying it yourself. Although I agree with your opinion that the limit between passive and active is a bit artificial.

I do not agree, however, with "I do not think you can fully understand a word or phrase and not be able to use it". We can very often understand a word from the context but that doesn't mean we know how to use and apply it. At least not in other contexts.

[Chris S]

Well the amount of words I know when I'm reading, because I've re-noticed them is far higher than the amount of words I know when I try to speak freely.

[skyblueteapot]

Well, I'm currently reading "Dracula" in Russian, so my passive vocabulary now includes phrases such as "Hellspawn", "feeding on the blood of the living" and "On the stroke of midnight the Forces of Darkness will rule over the earth".

I couldn't produce any of these phrases in a casual conversation (and, let's face it, am unlikely to ever need to), but if I see them written down I recognise them and remember what they mean.

[Chris S]

well I could see how you might need 'feeding' blood' and 'living' though...

Why have you decided to read a translation of something btw when Russian has such a great history of literature on its own?

[Ana]

I'm happy for having a big passive vocabulary either. I've read two entire books in English last month, one of them with more the 500 pages. I haven't used a dictionary once!
Of course, there were a couple of words that I didn't know, but I could easily ignore them without loosing the text meaning.
I can produce reasonably good English, but unfortunately, not at that level which I found in those books... but I'm sure that my newly acquired ability to read such big texts will enhance my ability to produce more sophisticated forms of English, in the same way I achieved that in my own language: by having a lot of fun while reading!
So, for me, the great advantage of a big passive vocabulary is that it makes it possible to you to digest greater amounts of content. It is that content digesting that is going to improve your language skills...

[Rod Hinn]

I think there is a big difference with passive and active vocabulary in any language, even in our mother tongue. Of course, the active vocabulary that you use is in a sense a part of (or was a part of) your passive vocabulary at one point. But of course, you do not use every word you know. That is how people find their voice in language. They use certain words that they are comfortable and familiar with and do not use all their vocabulary. So there seems to be a huge difference. Even in one's native language one can get tongue tied and not be able to find an expression or a way of expressing what they might want to say, or they might say it a certain way than someone else does because of which phrases are in their active vocabulary or expressions.

I think knowing this difference allows us as multilinguists to really think how we want to talk and express ourselves and to find our own voice in a language , and this process of finding our own voice is how we convert passive vocabulary into active vocabulary. We might start with a limited amount of vocabulary because everyone starts off that way (when we were little babies for our native languages, and when we are beginning language learners) but as we have a larger passive vocabulary and learn and are comfortable with new expressions, we convert them into our active vocabulary when finding our voice and how we speak.

[Jeff Lindqvist]

Chris S wrote:
"Why have you decided to read a translation of something btw when Russian has such a great history of literature on its own?"

I surely takes much longer to read "real" Russian literature than something you have read in your native language, and many people choose to read "familiar" content, as simple as that.

Antonio Garceffo once wrote:
"Reading “Dances With Wolves,” instead of a “real” German novel made sense to me. I knew the story, the context, the history, it was all tangible for me. Only the language was new. And that was what I sought to learn. It made perfect sense to me."

http://brooklynmonk.wordpress.com/2008/10/18/learning-languages-in-your-pajamas-eating-captain-crunch/

[Chris S]

Jeff Lindqvist: great article, guess it makes sense. I also guess I'm just a bit consumed with reading a languages literature in the original... :)

[Steve Kaufmann]

I believe we learn best from content that interests us, whatever that content might be.

[skyblueteapot]

I'm only intermediate 1 in Russian so it's hard work to read a novel unless I've already read it a couple of times in English.

I'll tackle Russian classics (most of which I haven't read yet in English) when I've got to intermediate 2/advanced 1.