The Language Mastery Show

Daniel Rusteen is an author, full-time traveler, digital nomad, short-term rental expert, and former Airbnb employee. He is best known for his books Optimize Your BnB and Profitable Properties, but he has also written a book on learning languages: Zilch to Conversational.

In our conversation, Danny shares why he failed to learn a foreign language his first two attempts, the methods he used to finally reach conversational fluency in Spanish, how to choose the right language teacher, why and how to use Anki spaced repetition flashcards, why you should learn the IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet), and why you should go from "sounds to sentences" in your target language.

📝 For show notes, visit ⁠LanguageMastery.com/blog/post/daniel-rusteen. 

📧 Get expert language immersion tips in your inbox each week! 

Join my FREE weekly newsletter to get the tips and tools you need to get fluent anywhere in the world. 

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Ian Fritz is the author of What the Taliban Told Me, a nuanced look at what it was like to undertake intensive language training at The Defense Language Institute (DLI) in not one, but two languages (Dari and Pashto), serve as an "Airborne Cryptologic Linguist" (ACL) in the United States Air Force (USAF), and spy on the Taliban from low-flying gunships.

During his two tours in Afghanistan, he eavesdropped on the Taliban for hundreds of hours, shared intelligence with various Special Forces units on the ground, and—according to official records—totaled 123 "insurgents EKIA" ("enemies killed in action").

But the more conversations he heard below, the more conflicted he became about his job, the war, the killing, and even his desire to continue living. His increasing linguistic fluency and cultural familiarity had humanized the enemy. It created a "moral injury" that Ian feared would never heal...

In the interview, we talk about Ian's experience learning languages at DLI, his experience as an Airborne Cryptologic Linguist, what he would do differently if he started a new language from scratch, and his best tips for beginner and intermediate language learners.

📝 For show notes, visit LanguageMastery.com/blog/post/ian-fritz.

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Join my FREE weekly newsletter to get the tips and tools you need to get fluent anywhere in the world. 

👉🏼 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠LanguageMastery.com/newsletter⁠⁠⁠⁠

Coach Stéphane Angeles is a language coach who helps expats speak better Spanish through expert habit formation strategies, accountability, and one-on-one guidance via Zoom and audio check-ins.

In the interview, we discuss:

To learn more about Steph and her Spanish coaching, check out her Spanish Speaking Academy.

For show notes and links to resources mentioned, visit LanguageMastery.com/blog/post/coach-steph.

📧 Get expert language immersion tips in your inbox each week! 

Join my FREE weekly newsletter to get the tips and tools you need to get fluent anywhere in the world. 

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Gordon Smith and Cynthia Durán are the dynamic duo behind LightSpeed Spanish, where they teach people Spanish through courses, books, and online lessons.

In this conversation, we discuss:

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Elena Mutonono is a business coach, author, and former English teacher who helps overwhelmed online language teachers work lessbut make morewhile better serving students along the way.

In her words:

"I help overwhelmed and exhausted online language teachers change their teaching format so they can work less and make more. As a former ESL teacher myself, I know your struggles, fears and anxieties."

In this conversation, we discuss:

To learn more about Elena's coaching, books, Smart Teacher's Library community, and annual Online Teacher Summit, visit her website at ElenaMutonono.com.

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Despite doing well in other school subjects, Andrew Barr failed French in secondary school. Upon hearing this news, his supportive father assured him:

"The Barrs don't do languages. We do maths and sciences. You will never have to speak of a word of French again!"

It turns out that this prediction was a bit of the mark. Today, Andrew speaks multiple languages and has built a successful business teaching languages at Real Fast Spanish.

In this deep dive into Andrew's language learning journey and philosophy, you will learn:

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Cara Leopold is the founder of Leo Listening, where she helps "intrepid travellers and adventurous expats improve their English listening skills so they can better understand and better connect with fast-talking native speakers through their love of films." In the interview, we talk about how she learned French and the best way to learn languages through TV shows and movies.

📧 Get expert language immersion tips in your inbox each week

Join my FREE weekly newsletter to get the tips and tools you need to get fluent anywhere in the world.

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Steve Kaufmann is a hyperpolyglot who has learned more than 20 languages (!!!) and the co-founder of LingQ, an online language learning platform that helps you acquire languages using content you love. He was my second guest on the Language Mastery Show way back in 2009, and returns 13 years later to offer new insights and encouragement for independent language learners.

For show notes, visit LanguageMastery.com/blog/post/steve-kaufmann

🤿 Master Any Language, Anywhere!

Want to learn a language through at-home immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes?

My detailed "Anywhere Immersion" guides will show you exactly how.

Check out my guides here 👉🏼 LanguageMastery.com/books

Jim and May describe themselves as a "gringo/Mexican international couple" on a mission to connect English speakers to the Spanish-speaking world. Their excellent podcast, YouTube channel, blog, and Spanish immersion retreats in Mexico help learners bridge the gap between learning and actually living in Spanish.  

In the interview, they share what they have each learned in their own language learning journeys, their best tips for learning Spanish, and favorite resources for immersing yourself in Spanish right at home.  

For more about Jim and May and tips for learning Spanish, visit SpanishAndGo.com.  

📝 See show notes here LanguageMastery.com/blog/post/spanish-and-go.

📧 Get expert language immersion tips in your inbox each week!

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Mikkel Thorup is a seasoned world traveler, entrepreneur, consultant, author, and the host of the Expat Money Show. Since he left Canada in his teens, he has circumnavigated the globe over 400 times, visited more than 100 countries, and lived in 9. In our conversation, he shares his best tips for traveling or moving abroad, learning languages, and making the best of the expat life. For more about Mikkel and tips for transitioning abroad, visit ExpatMoneyShow.com.

📝 Get show notes here LanguageMastery.com/blog/post/mikkel-thorup.

📧 Get expert language immersion tips in your inbox each week!

Join my FREE weekly newsletter to get the tips and tools you need to get fluent anywhere in the world.

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Andrew Methven is the creator of Slow Chinese (每周漫闻), a weekly newsletter that helps Mandarin Chinese learners immerse themselves in authentic, colloquial language via interesting stories and news events handpicked from Chinese media, social media, and TV. Instead of learning the stilted and stuffy language of Chinese textbooks, Andrew's excellent newsletter trains you to understand the way people really speak and write the language today. In the interview, Andrew shares how he first fell in love with Chinese, differences between Mandarin between Mainland China and Taiwan, and his top tips for language learners.

📝 See show notes here LanguageMastery.com/blog/post/andrew-methven.

🇨🇳 Learn Chinese Anywhere!  

Want to learn Mandarin Chinese through at-home immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes? My detailed how-to manual and resource guide, ⁠Master Mandarin: How to Learn Mandarin Chinese Anywhere in the World⁠, will show you exactly how.

👉🏼 Learn more at ⁠ChineseMastery.com⁠.

From full-time Mandarin immersion at Peking University and Shanghai's Fudan University to years of independent study online, Daniel Nalesnik has spent the last 13+ years on a mission to figure out the most fun and effective way to learn Mandarin Chinese.  

The result? The creation of Hack Chinese, a powerful spaced repetition tool designed from the ground up just for Mandarin learners, unlike generic SRS apps that struggle to properly handle Chinese characters, tones, etc.  

In our conversation, Daniel shares the lessons he's learned, what he would do differently if he started from scratch, and how new language learners can get started.  

🇨🇳 Learn Chinese Anywhere!  

Want to learn Mandarin Chinese through at-home immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes? My detailed how-to manual and resource guide, Master Mandarin: How to Learn Mandarin Chinese Anywhere in the World, will show you exactly how.

👉🏼 Learn more at ChineseMastery.com.

Scott H. Young is a Canadian writer, programmer, entrepreneur, and metalearning expert. He is the author of the best-seller Ultralearning: Master Hard Skills, Outsmart the Competition, and Accelerate Your Career, and has been featured in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The BBC, Popular Mechanics, Business Insider, and LifeHacker. 

He has applied and refined his principles in a number of accelerated learning challenges, from completing MIT’s 4-year undergraduate computer science curriculum in just 1 year, to spending a year abroad in 4 countries with no English allowed, to a one-month at-home challenge to learn Macedonian, his wife’s native language. 

For more about Scott, visit ScottHYoung.com. 

For show notes, visit LanguageMastery.com/blog/post/scott-young

🇨🇳 Learn Chinese Anywhere!

Want to learn Mandarin Chinese through at-home immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes? Master Mandarin, my detailed how-to manual and resource guide, will show you exactly how. Learn more at ChineseMastery.com.

In today's episode, I share three more tips for building the three foundations of mastery: 

🧠 Master Your Mind: Realize that mastering a language is more about psychology than ability.  ⏱ Master Your Day:Make language learning your primary focus.  📍 Master Your Environment: Decide notto decide by making your target language the default. 

📧 Get expert language immersion tips in your inbox each week!

Join my FREE weekly newsletter to get the tips and tools you need to get fluent anywhere in the world.

👉🏼 ⁠⁠LanguageMastery.com/newsletter⁠

Happy New Year! I hope your 2022 is off to a great start.

In this first episode of the year, I would like to experiment with a new format. I have some exciting interviews lined up in the coming weeks, but I’d like to kick things off with a new segment called The 3 Foundations of Mastery. 

If you already subscribe to my Language Mastery Monday newsletter, you will already be familiar with this framework. If not, what are you waiting for? Head over to LanguageMastery.com/newsletter to get expert tips and tools in your inbox each week.

So what are the three foundations and why do they matter?

Foundation 1 is Mastering Your Mind, which means conquering fears and self-limiting beliefs that are blocking your path to fluency. Foundation 2 is Mastering Your Day, which involves building better habits and learning more efficiently. Foundation 3 is Mastering Your Environment, which means creating your own immersion wherever you happen to live.

One of the biggest lessons I have learned over the last 20 plus years of learning and teaching foreign languages is that you can't master a language unless you also master your mind, your day, and your environment.

Harnessing your psychology, wrangling your schedule, and designing your learning environment can each be extremely difficult, especially in our modern world of distraction and instant gratification.

But master these three foundations you must if you want to have any chance of getting fluent in a foreign tongue.

These factors are what really make learning languages difficult. The languages themselves are learned more or less automatically if you show up and give your brain the input it needs. (And yes, get tons of active practice, too, of course.)

But YOU have to constantly decide to show up and put in the time instead of choosing easier activities that provide a more immediate hit of dopamine and serotonin (Netflix + Cherry Garcia, anyone?).

Language learning can provide these “feel-good” hormones, too, but the rewards live on the other side of much more time and effort.

So to help you win this mental battle, I will be sharing powerful principles and short, actionable tips each week that will help you develop the mindset, habits, and environment you need to learn any language, anywhere.

Ready? Let's get started! Listen to today's episode to hear this week's tips for mastering your mind, day, and environment.

Matt is the creator of the popular Matt vs. Japan YouTube channel and the co-founder of Refold: The Roadmap to True Fluency, where he shares the methods he used to reach near native-like fluency in Japanese in just 5 years. I am a big fan of his immersion-based approach to language learning, his mission to create a more streamlined path to fluency, and his commitment to giving Japanese language learners the tips and tools they need to succeed. 

📝 See show notes here LanguageMastery.com/blog/post/matt-vs-japan.

🇯🇵 Learn Japanese Anywhere! 

Want to learn Japanese through at-home immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes? ⁠Master Japanese: How to Learn Japanese Anywhere in the World⁠, my detailed how-to manual and resource guide, will show you exactly how. 

👉🏼 Learn more at ⁠JapaneseMastery.com⁠⁠.

Note: This interview was originally recorded in 2010 as part of a collection of expert interviews included with my Japanese learning guide Master Japanese. This version includes excerpts from the complete interview, which is available as part of the Master Japanese Digital Package available JapaneseMastery.com. 

Khatzumoto is the man behind the popular Japanese learner blog All Japanese All the Time (or AJATT for short). While attending university in the United States, he figured out a way to immerse himself in Japanese language and culture nearly 24 hours a day. In an extremely short amount of time, he managed to reach an impressive level of fluency despite not living where the language was spoken and even without many of the learning tools and resources now readily available (he began his journey in 2004). 

🇯🇵 Learn Japanese Anywhere! 

Want to learn Japanese through at-home immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes? Master Japanese: How to Learn Japanese Anywhere in the World, my detailed how-to manual and resource guide, will show you exactly how.

👉🏼 Learn more at JapaneseMastery.com⁠.

Lindie Botes is a polyglot, YouTuber, blogger, and UI/UX designer on a mission to master 12+ languages, including Japanese, Korean, Chinese, and more. She is originally from South Africa, but has lived all over the world and now calls Singapore home. Though she loves foreign languages, she sees them not as an end but as a means to break down the barriers that otherwise divide us.

🇯🇵 🇨🇳 Learn Japanese or Mandarin Chinese Anywhere! 

Want to learn Japanese or Mandarin Chinese through at-home immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes? My detailed how-to manuals and resource guides will show you exactly how. Learn more at LanguageMastery.com/books.

Amanda Hsiung-Blodgett (a.k.a. “Miss Panda”) is an intercultural language consultant and trainer, the author of Let’s Learn Mandarin Chinese with Miss Panda!and First Mandarin Sounds: an Awesome Chinese Word Book, and the host of the Playful Chinese podcast. I love her approach to language learning, especially her emphasis on play and having fun. As she puts it eloquently, "Playing is learning. Learning is playing."

🇨🇳 Learn Mandarin Chinese Anywhere!  

Want to learn Mandarin Chinese through at-home immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes? Master Mandarin, my detailed how-to manual and resource guide, will show you exactly how. Learn more at ChineseMastery.com.

Jake Gill (高健) is a Chinese educator, former "Teaching Chinese as a Second Language" graduate student, and the CEO of Skritter, an innovative language learning app that helps Japanese and Chinese learners master characters through active production (i.e. writing on the screen) instead of passive recognition. 

In the interview, we talk about how and why he learned Mandarin Chinese, why traditional language classes won't get you fluent in a language, what he would do differently if he were to start learning Mandarin over again, the limitations of app-based learning and following "the golden path," the importance of following your passion and curiosity in languages, how to learn to learn Chinese characters the "write" way, Jake's current language learning routines and favorite resources, and the importance of daily habits and focusing on process over outcome.

If you'd like to try Skritter, use the code LANGUAGEMASTERY at checkout to get 10% off.

📝 For show notes, visit LanguageMastery.com/blog/post/jake-gill.

🇨🇳 Learn Mandarin Chinese Anywhere!  

Want to learn Mandarin Chinese through at-home immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes? Master Mandarin, my detailed how-to manual and resource guide, will show you exactly how. Learn more at ChineseMastery.com.

Do you live and breath languages? Do you want to make a good living using and refining your language skills every day? Then professional translation might be just the ticket. In today's episode, I chat with my friend Sam, who is a professional Japanese translator and one of the best non-native Japanese speakers I know. We talk about how he learned Japanese, how he broke into the translation industry, and his tips for doing the same.  

🇯🇵 Learn Japanese Anywhere! 

Want to learn Japanese through at-home immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes? ⁠Master Japanese: How to Learn Japanese Anywhere in the World⁠, my detailed how-to manual and resource guide, will show you exactly how.

👉🏼 Learn more at ⁠JapaneseMastery.com⁠⁠.

If you have a burning desire to learn Mandarin Chinese but feel overwhelmed at the very thought, then today’s podcast is a must-listen episode for you. Yes, to the uninitiated, Chinese characters look like a random pile of squiggly lines. True, the wrong tones could lead to you inadvertently calling someone's mother a horse! But don't let this scare you away, because today’s guests, Phil Crimmins and Luke Neale, have created an innovative language course called the Mandarin Blueprint designed to take these worries away. 

🇨🇳 Learn Chinese Anywhere!  

Want to learn Mandarin Chinese through at-home immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes? My detailed how-to manual and resource guide, ⁠Master Mandarin: How to Learn Mandarin Chinese Anywhere in the World⁠, will show you exactly how.

👉🏼 Learn more at ⁠ChineseMastery.com⁠.

Stuart Jay Raj is an Australian polyglot, applied linguist, author, musician, and cross-cultural business consultant based in Thailand. He has presented at two TEDx events (once in English and once in Mandarin), and is the author of Cracking Thai Fundamentals: A Thai Operating System for the Mind.  

In addition to teaching and writing extensively on effective language acquisition, he has alsoapplied his impressive language skills as a multilingual facilitator in various specialized industries (including aerospace, oil and gas, hospitality, and cyber security) and as the co-host of a Thai travel show called Neua Chan Phan Plaek (เหนือชั้น 1000 แปลก) that explosured fascinating people, places, and things around the world via local languages. Stuart holds a degree in Cognitive and Applied Linguistics from Griffith University, and speaks over 15 languages, including Thai, Lao, Mandarin Chinese, Cantonese, Indonesian / Malay, Spanish, Italian, Danish, Hindi, Vietnamese, Burmese, and various other Asian languages and dialects.  

📧 Get expert language immersion tips in your inbox each week!

Join my FREE weekly newsletter to get the tips and tools you need to get fluent anywhere in the world.

👉🏼 ⁠⁠LanguageMastery.com/newsletter⁠

Nick Godwin is a British polyglot, English language coach, and course creator living in Tokyo, Japan. He specializes in helping advanced English learners break through plateaus and helping beginning Japanese learners to communicate through by focusing on practical skills that matter. In addition to running the English language learning site ByLingua, he also helped develop the popular story-based course Japanese Uncovered, and recently launched a blog that blends his love of language, learning, and intentional living called Minimalinguist. 

🇯🇵 Learn Japanese Anywhere! 

Want to learn Japanese through at-home immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes? ⁠Master Japanese: How to Learn Japanese Anywhere in the World⁠, my detailed how-to manual and resource guide, will show you exactly how.

👉🏼 Learn more at ⁠JapaneseMastery.com⁠⁠.

Richard Simcott is a "hyperpolyglot" (named one of Britain's most multilingual people by HarperCollins) and the co-founder of the Polyglot Conference, an annual event that brings together language lovers from all over the world. He returns to the Language Mastery Show six years after our first conversation to talk about how he juggles so many languages, the "minimum effective dose" required to move a language project forward, and how he chooses which languages to pursue. Richard is a fountain of language learning wisdom and I hope you enjoy our conversation as much as I did!

For show notes, visit LanguageMastery.com/blog/post/richard-simcott-returns.

📧 Get expert language immersion tips in your inbox each week!

Join my FREE weekly newsletter to get the tips and tools you need to get fluent anywhere in the world.

👉🏼 ⁠⁠LanguageMastery.com/newsletter⁠

Anthony Metivier is the founder of the Magnetic Memory Method, the host of the Magnetic Memory Method Podcast, and the creator of the Magnetic Memory Masterclass. 

He has refined his memory techniques learning a number of languages, including Biblical Hebrew, German, Mandarin Chinese, and Sanskrit, and has gone on to teach thousands of learners how to maximize their memories and create unforgettable associations. I like that his approach combines proven ancient principles with modern brain research, while focusing on practical application (e.g. remembering foreign language vocabulary) instead of impressive but ultimately useless memory feats (e.g. memorizing decks of cards or long strings of numbers).  

Anthony is a truly fascinating man with a wide range of interests and insights, and I think you will get a lot out of our conversation. 

📧 Get expert language immersion tips in your inbox each week!

Join my FREE weekly newsletter to get the tips and tools you need to get fluent anywhere in the world.

👉🏼 Learn more at ⁠⁠LanguageMastery.com/newsletter⁠

🇨🇳 Learn Chinese Anywhere!  

Want to learn Mandarin Chinese through at-home immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes? My detailed how-to manual and resource guide, ⁠Master Mandarin: How to Learn Mandarin Chinese Anywhere in the World⁠, will show you exactly how.

👉🏼 Learn more at ⁠ChineseMastery.com⁠

Nick Velasquez is the author of the new book Learn, Improve, Master: How to Develop Any Skill and Excel at It. In the interview, we discuss the core principles, strategies, and tools you can use to master any anything, may it be reaching conversational fluency in Japanese or remembering more of what you read.  

🇯🇵 Learn Japanese Anywhere! 

Want to learn Japanese through at-home immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes? ⁠Master Japanese: How to Learn Japanese Anywhere in the World⁠, my detailed how-to manual and resource guide, will show you exactly how.

👉🏼 Learn more at ⁠JapaneseMastery.com⁠⁠

Chris Vasselli is a programmer, passionate Japanese learner, and the creator of the Nihongo iOS app, my go-to Japanese dictionary and reading tool for authentic Japanese content. In the interview, we discuss, 1) his language learning journey, 2) how to acquire Japanese the fun, natural, immersive way, and 3) why you shouldn't fear the Japanese writing system. 

🇯🇵 Learn Japanese Anywhere! 

Want to learn Japanese through at-home immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes? ⁠Master Japanese: How to Learn Japanese Anywhere in the World⁠, my detailed how-to manual and resource guide, will show you exactly how.

👉🏼 Learn more at ⁠JapaneseMastery.com⁠⁠.

I first started The Language Mastery Show in 2009 as a short-term experiment. My initial goals were: 

① To test drive the new medium of podcasting. 

② To serve and empower independent language learners. 

③ To have a good excuse to meet some of my linguistic heroes. 

Now eleven years later, I am happy to say that the podcast has exceeded all initial expectations. I've reached hundreds of thousands of people, interviewed 50 of the world's best language learners, and befriended many in real life. 

Before kicking off Season 3 of The Language Mastery Show next week, I wanted to go back and highlight some of my favorite lessons from the amazing guests that have shared their time and wisdom with us over the years, including polyglots, hyperpolyglots, linguistics, professors, teachers, and passionate enthusiasts. I've learned countless lessons on how to make my ownlanguage learning more fun and effective along the way, and I hope you have gleaned some useful strategies, methods, and resources, too. 

📧 Get expert language immersion tips in your inbox each week!

Join my FREE weekly newsletter to get the tips and tools you need to get fluent anywhere in the world.

👉🏼 ⁠⁠LanguageMastery.com/newsletter⁠

Nelson Dellis is a memory athlete, 4-time U.S. Memory Champion, a Grandmaster of Memory, a high-altitude mountaineer, author, speaker, and all-around cool dude. He is now on a mission to reach conversational fluency in Dutch in just one year, applying all the memory techniques, mnemonics, and visualization strategies he used to train for memory championships. 

📧 Get expert language immersion tips in your inbox each week!

Join my FREE weekly newsletter to get the tips and tools you need to get fluent anywhere in the world.

👉🏼 ⁠⁠LanguageMastery.com/newsletter⁠

Last week, I shared part one of my most recent chat with the inimitable Olly Richards, who first appeared on The Language Mastery Show back in in April 2014. Since that time, he's gone on to build I Will Teach You a Language (now called StoryLearning) into one of the top language blogs, launch a slew of excellent language courses, and publish a series of great short story books through Teach Yourself. 

In part two of our wide-ranging conversation, we get into his language learning routines and habits, how he tackles reading (especially in Japanese), the importance of getting a wide range of high-quality exposure to your target language, the power of following your interest and curiosity, and Olly's top tips for launching a successful online language learning empire or just a profitable side hustle to help pay the bills. 

📧 Get expert language immersion tips in your inbox each week!

Join my FREE weekly newsletter to get the tips and tools you need to get fluent anywhere in the world.

👉🏼 ⁠⁠LanguageMastery.com/newsletter⁠

Author, polyglot, and "langpreneur" Olly Richards from I Will Teach You a Language (now called StoryLearning) returns to the podcast six years after our first chat to share what new lessons he's learned and how a high-altitude near death experience led him to the power of stories in language learning. Olly has been quite the busy bee since we last spoke, going on to build one of the most popular language blogs on the planet, launching a series of in-depth language courses, and publishing 16 short story books with Teach Yourself (with more coming soon, including a Japanese edition)! 

📧 Get expert language immersion tips in your inbox each week!

Join my FREE weekly newsletter to get the tips and tools you need to get fluent anywhere in the world.

👉🏼 ⁠⁠LanguageMastery.com/newsletter⁠

Jan van der Aa is a Brussels-based polyglot and entrepreneur from the Netherlands, the co-founder of the language learning site LanguageBoost, and the co-founder of Langpreneur (now called Creator Smarts), an event series and podcast dedicated to helping language lovers, teachers, influencers, podcasters, YouTubers, etc. turn their passion for languages into profitable, scalable online businesses. Note: This interview contains some adult language. 

📧 Get expert language immersion tips in your inbox each week!

Join my FREE weekly newsletter to get the tips and tools you need to get fluent anywhere in the world.

👉🏼 ⁠⁠LanguageMastery.com/newsletter⁠

Arieh Smith, a.k.a. Xiaomanyc (Xiǎomǎ, 小马), is a popular YouTuber who loves practicing Mandarin Chinese on the streets of New York and surprising unsuspecting native speakers. From 24-hour crash courses in new languages like Korean, to learning additional Chinese dialects like Cantonese and Fuzhounese (which are really mutually unintelligible languages), his viral linguistic exploits have entertained and inspired millions of learners around the world. In our conversation, he shares why and how he learned Mandarin Chinese, tips for mastering Chinese characters and tones, and strategies for going from zero to basic conversations in a matter of days no matter where in the world you live. 

🇨🇳 Learn Chinese Anywhere!  

Want to learn Mandarin Chinese through at-home immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes? My detailed how-to manual and resource guide, ⁠Master Mandarin: How to Learn Mandarin Chinese Anywhere in the World⁠, will show you exactly how.

👉🏼 Learn more at ⁠ChineseMastery.com⁠.

Jonty Yamisha is a language activist, an "accidental polyglot" in his own words, a "third-generation Circassian refugee," and the founder of OptiLingo, an audio-based language app that uses "guided immersion" to help people reach fluency in foreign languages more quickly. We discuss the Circassian language and cultural history, how he's raising his children bilingually, and how he "steals back" time for language learning amid his busy professional and family life. 

📧 Get expert language immersion tips in your inbox each week!

Join my FREE weekly newsletter to get the tips and tools you need to get fluent anywhere in the world.

👉🏼 ⁠⁠LanguageMastery.com/newsletter⁠

Michael and Ellen Robins first met in 2004 while they were studying Spanish in Mexico. Though Ellen had intended notto spend time with any other native English speakers while abroad, Michael's charm and sufficient command of the Spanish language were enough to overcome her initial objections. They are now married, have two children, have visited 23 countries, and have lived abroad nine times. In the interview, they share key lessons they've learned while acquiring Spanish, living abroad, and raising children bilingually. 

📧 Get expert language immersion tips in your inbox each week!

Join my FREE weekly newsletter to get the tips and tools you need to get fluent anywhere in the world.

👉🏼 ⁠⁠LanguageMastery.com/newsletter⁠

In 2015, the Danish podcaster Kris Broholm joined me on the Language Mastery Show to talk about how discovering the polyglot community helped pull him out of depression and give his life direction. His podcast, Actual Fluency, is now one of the most popular language podcasts on the planet, with 166 guests to date! Though Kris speaks multiple languages, he sees himself not as a language expert himself, but as a "language learning journalist" who highlights the expertise of the world's best language learners. 

In this special two-part two-way interview (which is also being shared on his podcast), we each talk about lessons we've learned in the last four years, patterns we've observed after talking to so many polyglots, and how our respective blogs, podcasts, and language businesses have evolved. 

📧 Get expert language immersion tips in your inbox each week!

Join my FREE weekly newsletter to get the tips and tools you need to get fluent anywhere in the world.

👉🏼 ⁠⁠LanguageMastery.com/newsletter⁠

In 2015, the Danish podcaster Kris Broholm joined me on the Language Mastery Show to talk about how discovering the polyglot community helped pull him out of depression and give his life direction. 

His podcast, Actual Fluency, is now one of the most popular language podcasts on the planet, with 166 guests to date! Though Kris speaks multiple languages, he sees himself not as a language expert himself, but as a "language learning journalist" who highlights the expertise of the world's best language learners. 

In this special two-part two-way interview (which is also being shared on his podcast), we each talk about lessons we've learned in the last four years, patterns we've observed after talking to so many polyglots, and how our respective blogs, podcasts, and language businesses have evolved.

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👉🏼 ⁠⁠LanguageMastery.com/newsletter⁠

Ruben Adery is a pronunciation and dialect coach who helps language learners, actors, singers, etc. develop native-like foreign accents in English, Spanish, Portuguese, Hebrew, and Italian. I first met him at the 2019 Polyglot Gathering in Bratislava where he gave a talk titled The Sincerest Form of Flattery: Imitating Foreign Accents to Help Master Any Language. The content of the talk itself was great, but the really impressive part was that he had the audience fooled for the first five minutes that he was from Israel when he is in fact a native English speaker from Los Angeles! As Ruben likes to say: "Accents speak louder than words!" 

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👉🏼 ⁠⁠LanguageMastery.com/newsletter⁠

I am pleased to welcome back my first repeat guest on the podcast: the author, teacher, and grammar guru Ellen Jovin. A lot has happened since our first chat over five years ago, including travels all over the United States discussing the inner workings of English grammar with passing strangers at her "Grammar Table," and a new book for English learners called English At Work: Find and Fix Your Mistakes in Business English as a Foreign Language. 

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👉🏼 ⁠⁠LanguageMastery.com/newsletter⁠

Katie Harris is the founder of Joy of Languages, a site dedicated to helping make language learning a joy instead of a chore. She was bored to tears with languages in school, but eventually figured out a more fun, effective approach to language learning that is focused on communicating with people and enjoying authentic listening and reading content. With a Masters in Linguistics from Cambridge University and an MRes in Speech, Language and Cognition from University College London, Katie does a great job peppering in just enough linguistics, psychology, and neuroscience to help language learners, but always keeping the focus on fun and efficacy. We first met at the 2019 Polyglot Gathering in Bratislava where I attended her talk How to Learn a Language by Watching TV and Film. Her philosophy was right in line with my "Anywhere Immersion" approach and I was eager to get her on the podcast. 

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👉🏼 ⁠⁠LanguageMastery.com/newsletter⁠

Gabriel Gelman is the founder of Sprachheld, a popular language learning website for Germans learning foreign languages (and―as an added bonus―non-Germans learning German as a foreign language). On the site, Gabriel shares useful language learning tips and tools, inspirational interviews with polyglots and linguists, and a dialogue-based Spanish course (with other languages slated for production in the future). I've followed his work for some time and was delighted to finally meet him in person at the 2019 Polyglot Gathering in Bratislava.  

📧 Get expert language immersion tips in your inbox each week!

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👉🏼 ⁠⁠LanguageMastery.com/newsletter⁠

Elisa Polese is an Italian polyglot known for teaching multiple languages at once (up to ten languages at a time!), including Arabic, Catalan, Dutch, Italian, English, Esperanto, French, German, Greek, Hindi, Portuguese, Russian, and Spanish. In addition to her focus on multilingual learning, Elisa is also a big proponent of speaking from day one and getting over the fear of making mistakes. I had the privilege of witnessing her impressive multilingual teaching skills firsthand at the 2019 Polyglot Gathering in Bratislava, and it was exhilarating to see so many languages flying around in the room at once! 

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👉🏼 ⁠⁠LanguageMastery.com/newsletter⁠

Dr. Gareth Popkins is a lawyer, historian, and former English and Welsh teacher who is fluent in German, Russian, and Welsh, advanced in French, conversational in Hungarian, Finnish, Italian, Portuguese, and Basque, and now hard at work on Japanese. We first met in June 2019 at the Polyglot Gathering in Bratislava and I knew right away that I wanted to have him on the podcast to share his language learning story and tips. As he puts it: "I’ve got fluent because I really wanted to and I kept going, despite myself. It’s sometimes said that an expert is someone who’s made all the mistakes in the book. If so, I’m that expert. I’m still experimenting. I’m still learning…. and still making those mistakes, of course."  

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👉🏼 ⁠⁠LanguageMastery.com/newsletter⁠

Inés Ruiz is an award-winning entrepreneur, a former Spanish teacher at Cambridge University, and now the founder and CEO of Medita Spanish, the world's first language and meditation app. By integrating mediation and mindfulness practices, she hopes to make language learning more fun and less stressful.  

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👉🏼 ⁠⁠LanguageMastery.com/newsletter⁠

Gretchen McCulloch is an internet linguist, the "Resident Linguist" at WIRED Magazine (Best. Title. Ever!), the co-host of the Lingthusiasm podcast, and the author of the new book Because Internet: Understanding the New Rules of Language, a smart, loving, pun-filled look at the evolution of language in the internet age.  

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👉🏼 ⁠⁠LanguageMastery.com/newsletter⁠

Benny Lewis is a fun-loving blogger, YouTuber, author, language hacker, and technomad from Ireland (hence his nickname "Irish Polyglot"). He is the creator of the most popular language learning site in the world as of writing, Fluentin3Months.com, and has authored five books. He has demonstrated again and again that it's possible to reach conversational fluency in a matter of months, not years as most believe. Benny's philosophy on language learning is right in line with my Anywhere Immersion approach, as exemplified in the following quote from his book Fluent in 3 Months: How Anyone at Any Age Can Learn to Speak Any Language from Anywhere in the World: 

“...where you are isn’t what decides whether or not you’ll be successful. Attitude beats latitude (and longitude) every time. It’s more about creating an immersion environment, exposing yourself to native speakers, and doing everything you can in that language.”  

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👉🏼 ⁠⁠LanguageMastery.com/newsletter⁠

Shannon Kennedy is a language lover, traveler, musician, and writer. She has written extensively for Fluent in 3 Months and Drops, and is also the Language Encourager and Community Manager for the Add1Challenge. In 2018, she co-hosted the inaugural Women in Language event, an online conference to champion, celebrate, and amplify the voices of women in languages. In the interview, we discuss ① why majoring in music led Shannon to start learning German, Italian, and Spanish, ② how her self-study methods differ from how she had learned languages in school, ③ why learning is short, frequent chunks of time is more effective than longer study sessions, ④ her daily habits and how she fits in language learning around work and motherhood, ⑤ why kids don’t learn languages better than adults, and ⑥ why discipline is more important than motivation when learning any skill.  

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👉🏼 ⁠⁠LanguageMastery.com/newsletter⁠

Lindsay McMahon is the co-founder of All Ears English, a podcast and site dedicated to helping people learn natural English in a fun, relaxed way by focusing on "connection, not perfection." The show is ranked in the Top 20 Most Downloaded podcasts in Japan, Korea, China, and Brazil, and has been downloaded more than 50 million times! In the interview, we discuss her experience living and working abroad, the most common mistakes English learners make, and the importance of remembering that purpose of learning languages is to communicate and connect.

"When you pick up a book or a podcast, remember why you're learning. You are not learning English to learn English. You are learning to connect." —Lindsay McMahon.

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👉🏼 ⁠⁠LanguageMastery.com/newsletter⁠

Lýdia Machová, PhD is a polyglot, language mentor, interpreter, TED speaker, the former head organizer of the Polyglot Gathering in Bratislava, and the founder of Language Mentoring, a site that shows people how to learn any language by themselves. Her 2018 TED Talk, The Secrets of Learning a New Language, has been watched nearly 9 million times, and has brought the language learning secrets of polyglots to a much wider audience than ever before. 

See show notes here: LanguageMastery.com/blog/post/lydia-machova.

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👉🏼 ⁠⁠LanguageMastery.com/newsletter⁠

Tamara Marie is a language coach and the founder of Spanish Con Salsa, a site and podcast that help you learn Spanish through through music, travel, and cultural immersion. 

📝 For show notes, visit LanguageMastery.com/show.  

🇯🇵 Learn Japanese Anywhere! 

Want to learn Japanese through at-home immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes? MASTER JAPANESE, my detailed how-to manual and resource guide, will show you exactly how. Learn more at https://bit.ly/masterjapaneselms.  

❓Ask Me a Question!  

Got a question about language learning you'd like me to answer on the show? Leave me a voice recording and you might here my response on the next episode! Record your message here: https://anchor.fm/john-fotheringham/message

John Dinkel is the CEO and founder of Manga Sensei, an online education company that teaches Japanese through fun, effective, modern mediums, including a weekly comic series, a daily 5-minute podcast (the #1 Japanese language podcast on Spotify), and a free 30-day course on the basics of Japanese. John began his Japanese journey as an LDS missionary in Nagoya, Japan, an experience that changed the trajectory of his life, showed him the necessity of making mistakes, and lead him to start his business and share the lessons he learned.

📝 For show notes, visit LanguageMastery.com/show.  

🇯🇵 Learn Japanese Anywhere! 

Want to learn Japanese through at-home immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes? MASTER JAPANESE, my detailed how-to manual and resource guide, will show you exactly how. Learn more at https://bit.ly/masterjapaneselms.  

❓Ask Me a Question!  

Got a question about language learning you'd like me to answer on the show? Leave me a voice recording and you might here my response on the next episode! Record your message here: https://anchor.fm/john-fotheringham/message

Sara Maria Hasbun, a.k.a. Miss Linguistic, is a polyglot, translator, linguist, and the Managing Director of Meridian Linguistics. She speaks Spanish, French, Mandarin, Korean, American Sign Language, Nicaraguan Sign Language, and Indonesian, and has also dabbled in Thai, Cantonese, and Malay.

📝 For show notes, visit LanguageMastery.com/show.  

🇨🇳 Learn Mandarin Chinese Anywhere!  

Want to learn Mandarin Chinese through at-home immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes? Master Mandarin, my detailed how-to manual and resource guide, will show you exactly how. Learn more at: https://bit.ly/mastermandarinlms.  

❓Ask Me a Question!  

Got a question about language learning you'd like me to answer on the show? Leave me a voice recording and you might here my response on the next episode! Record your message here: https://anchor.fm/john-fotheringham/message

Idahosa Ness is an accomplished polyglot, world traveler, musician, and the founder The Mimic Method, which helps language learners adopt more native-like pronunciation through the power of listening, phonetics, and mimicry. 

📝 For show notes, visit LanguageMastery.com/show.  

🇯🇵 Learn Japanese Anywhere! 

Want to learn Japanese through at-home immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes? MASTER JAPANESE, my detailed how-to manual and resource guide, will show you exactly how. Learn more at https://bit.ly/masterjapaneselms.  

❓Ask Me a Question!  

Got a question about language learning you'd like me to answer on the show? Leave me a voice recording and you might here my response on the next episode! Record your message here: https://anchor.fm/john-fotheringham/message

Claude Cartaginese is one of the kindest guys you will meet in the language learning blogosphere, and I really appreciate all he has done to encourage language learners, gather advice from the world's best learners, and share his infectious enthusiasm for language learning. In 2010, he released a monumental e-book called the The Polyglot Project, a free PDF which brought together tips and advice from 43 polyglots, hyper-polyglots, linguists, YouTubers, and language lovers, including Mike Campbell, Steve Kaufmann, Benny Lewis, Moses McCormick, Stuart Jay Raj, Anthony Lauder, and many more. 

📝 For show notes, visit LanguageMastery.com/show.  

🇯🇵 Learn Japanese Anywhere! 

Want to learn Japanese through at-home immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes? MASTER JAPANESE, my detailed how-to manual and resource guide, will show you exactly how. Learn more at https://bit.ly/masterjapaneselms.  

❓Ask Me a Question!  

Got a question about language learning you'd like me to answer on the show? Leave me a voice recording and you might here my response on the next episode! Record your message here: https://anchor.fm/john-fotheringham/message

Gabriel Wyner is a polyglot, former opera singer, the author of the book Fluent Forever: How to Learn Any Language Fast and Never Forget It, and the creator of the Fluent Forever app, the most funded app in crowdfunding history. I highly recommend his book and app, especially to anyone who struggles with foreign language pronunciation or making new words stick. 

📝 For show notes, visit LanguageMastery.com/show.  

🇯🇵 Learn Japanese Anywhere! 

Want to learn Japanese through at-home immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes? MASTER JAPANESE, my detailed how-to manual and resource guide, will show you exactly how. Learn more at https://bit.ly/masterjapaneselms.  

❓Ask Me a Question!  

Got a question about language learning you'd like me to answer on the show? Leave me a voice recording and you might here my response on the next episode! Record your message here: https://anchor.fm/john-fotheringham/message

In this episode of the Language Mastery Show, I catch up with my old friend Mike Campbell, the founder of Glossika. A lot has changed in the seven years since we last spoke at a Starbucks in Taipei, Taiwan, and it was fun to learn more about the innovations he's made at Glossika, his work to save endangered languages, and how his views on applied linguistics and language acquisition have evolved. 

📝 For show notes, visit LanguageMastery.com/blog/post/mike-campbell.  

🇨🇳 Learn Mandarin Chinese Anywhere!  

Want to learn Mandarin Chinese through anywhere immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes? Master Mandarin: How to Learn Mandarin Chinese Anywhere in the World, my detailed how-to manual and resource guide, will show you exactly how. Learn more at: ChineseMastery.com.

Lindsay Williams has been hooked on languages ever since childhood when she got a taste of French—and the free croissants that accompanied the class! Since then, she's gone on to learn Spanish, Italian, Mandarin Chinese, German, Dutch, Portuguese, Japanese, Esperanto, Indonesian, Korean, Guarani, and more. Along the way, she developed a passion for teaching languages, too, and has taught learners in Costa Rica, refugees in the U.K., countless learners online, and even employees at a garlic bread factory! She now dedicates time to inspiring independent language learners and online teachers, sharing a wealth of useful tips and tools on her popular site Lindsay Does Language. She has also created one of my favorite new podcasts, Language Stories, a documentary series that highlights various languages around the globe and the people who speak them. 

📝 For show notes, visit LanguageMastery.com/show.  

🇯🇵 Learn Japanese Anywhere! 

Want to learn Japanese through at-home immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes? MASTER JAPANESE, my detailed how-to manual and resource guide, will show you exactly how. Learn more at https://bit.ly/masterjapaneselms.  

❓Ask Me a Question!  

Got a question about language learning you'd like me to answer on the show? Leave me a voice recording and you might here my response on the next episode! Record your message here: https://anchor.fm/john-fotheringham/message

In his own words, Dr. Orlando Kelm is "a lucky guy" professionally. Not only does he get to spend his time with two languages (Spanish and Portuguese), but he is also the Associate Director of Business Language Education for the UT Center for International Business Education and Research (CIBER), a part of the McCombs School of Business. He is also the co-author of a new book on intercultural relations called When we are the foreigners: What Chinese think about working with Americans. 

📝 For show notes, visit LanguageMastery.com/show.  

🇨🇳 Learn Mandarin Chinese Anywhere!  

Want to learn Mandarin Chinese through at-home immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes? Master Mandarin, my detailed how-to manual and resource guide, will show you exactly how. Learn more at: https://bit.ly/mastermandarinlms.  

❓Ask Me a Question!  

Got a question about language learning you'd like me to answer on the show? Leave me a voice recording and you might here my response on the next episode! Record your message here: https://anchor.fm/john-fotheringham/message

With 11 languages under his belt (Update: now 20 as of 2021), Steve Kaufmann is an extremely accomplished language learner. His extensive language learning wisdom in shared in his book titled The Way of the Linguist: A Language Learning Odyssey and his online language learning system called LingQ. 

📝 For show notes, visit LanguageMastery.com/show.  

🇯🇵 Learn Japanese Anywhere! 

Want to learn Japanese through at-home immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes? MASTER JAPANESE, my detailed how-to manual and resource guide, will show you exactly how. Learn more at https://bit.ly/masterjapaneselms.  

❓Ask Me a Question!  

Got a question about language learning you'd like me to answer on the show? Leave me a voice recording and you might here my response on the next episode! Record your message here: https://anchor.fm/john-fotheringham/message

Author, linguist, and fighter Antonio Graceffo “pulls no punches” (pun intended) when sharing his views on how to learn a foreign language effectively. His language learning wisdom stems from formal training as an interpreter and translator at Germany’s prestigious University of Mainz, coupled with over a decade of living, learning, and working in South and East Asia. Antonio speaks numerous languages (French, German, Italian, Khmer, Mandarin Chinese, Spanish, Thai and Vietnamese), and has used his language skills to good ends. On top of a stunning trail of articles and books, Antonio continues to fight the human rights atrocities in Burma. 

📝 For show notes, visit LanguageMastery.com/show.  

🇨🇳 Learn Mandarin Chinese Anywhere!  

Want to learn Mandarin Chinese through at-home immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes? Master Mandarin, my detailed how-to manual and resource guide, will show you exactly how. Learn more at: https://bit.ly/mastermandarinlms.  

❓Ask Me a Question!  

Got a question about language learning you'd like me to answer on the show? Leave me a voice recording and you might here my response on the next episode! Record your message here: https://anchor.fm/john-fotheringham/message

Mattias Ribbing is a Swedish author, lecturer, and Grandmaster of Memory. I had the pleasure of meeting him at the 2016 Bulletproof Conference and was blown away by his highly effective methods and positive attitude. Contrary to what most people would assume, Mattias isn't a savant and wasn’t born with extraordinary cognitive skills. He had average grades at school and struggled to remember what he had studied like almost everyone else. It wasn’t until he was 29 that he developed his impressive ability to remember. The secret, he discovered, was thinking in images. Listen to the conversation to find out more about how to make new words stick through the power of mental images. 

📝 For show notes, visit LanguageMastery.com/show.  

🇯🇵 Learn Japanese Anywhere! 

Want to learn Japanese through at-home immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes? MASTER JAPANESE, my detailed how-to manual and resource guide, will show you exactly how. Learn more at https://bit.ly/masterjapaneselms.  

❓Ask Me a Question!  

Got a question about language learning you'd like me to answer on the show? Leave me a voice recording and you might here my response on the next episode! Record your message here: https://anchor.fm/john-fotheringham/message

Kerstin Cable (formerly Hammes) is the creator of the Fluent Language blog, author of Fluency Made Achievable: The Fluent Guide to Core Language Skills, and co-host of the The Fluent Show. She is a native German speaker, but has reached a native level of fluency in English, and abilities in a number of additional languages, including French, Italian, Latin, Spanish, and Russian. She is a great language teacher with an infectious passion for languages and charming sense of humor. 

📝 For show notes, visit LanguageMastery.com/show.  

🇯🇵 Learn Japanese Anywhere! 

Want to learn Japanese through at-home immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes? MASTER JAPANESE, my detailed how-to manual and resource guide, will show you exactly how. Learn more at https://bit.ly/masterjapaneselms.  

❓Ask Me a Question!  

Got a question about language learning you'd like me to answer on the show? Leave me a voice recording and you might here my response on the next episode! Record your message here: https://anchor.fm/john-fotheringham/message

In today's show, I talk with Kris Broholm of Actual Fluency, an excellent podcast and blog boasting an impressive number of interviews with brilliant language experts, zany polyglots, etc. (over 50 episodes as of writing), including many of my heroes and a few guests who have been on the Language Mastery Show. In his own words, Kris is not an expert on languages, linguistics, or learning, is not a great student, and is not gifted at language learning. While I think he is certainly being humble, I love how he shows that anyone can learn a language regardless of one's level of introversion, aptitude for learning, location, age, etc. Unlike many who come to language learning as just a hobby, languages helped pull Kris out of severe depression and transform his life. 

📝 For show notes, visit LanguageMastery.com/show.  

🇯🇵 Learn Japanese Anywhere! 

Want to learn Japanese through at-home immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes? MASTER JAPANESE, my detailed how-to manual and resource guide, will show you exactly how. Learn more at https://bit.ly/masterjapaneselms.  

❓Ask Me a Question!  

Got a question about language learning you'd like me to answer on the show? Leave me a voice recording and you might here my response on the next episode! Record your message here: https://anchor.fm/john-fotheringham/message

In today's show, I chat with the man, the legend, the one and only, Italian polyglot Luca Lampariello. Over the past 20 years, Luca has reached a very high level in 9 foreign languages: English, French, German, Spanish, Swedish, Russian, Dutch, Portuguese, and Mandarin Chinese. Luca is full useful tips and strategies, which he shares in depth at his excellent site: LucaLampariello.com. 

📝 For show notes, visit LanguageMastery.com/show.  

🇯🇵 Learn Japanese Anywhere! 

Want to learn Japanese through at-home immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes? MASTER JAPANESE, my detailed how-to manual and resource guide, will show you exactly how. Learn more at https://bit.ly/masterjapaneselms.  

❓Ask Me a Question!  

Got a question about language learning you'd like me to answer on the show? Leave me a voice recording and you might here my response on the next episode! Record your message here: https://anchor.fm/john-fotheringham/message

Aaron Myers is the man behind The Everyday Language Learner, a wonderful blog that aims to help the average Joe (and John, and Rosemary, and...okay, you get the idea) learn a foreign language in fun, effective, efficient way. Above all else, Aaron strives to empower learners by showing people HOW to learn, not just WHAT. 

📝 For show notes, visit LanguageMastery.com/show.  

🇯🇵 Learn Japanese Anywhere! 

Want to learn Japanese through at-home immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes? MASTER JAPANESE, my detailed how-to manual and resource guide, will show you exactly how. Learn more at https://bit.ly/masterjapaneselms.  

❓Ask Me a Question!  

Got a question about language learning you'd like me to answer on the show? Leave me a voice recording and you might here my response on the next episode! Record your message here: https://anchor.fm/john-fotheringham/message

Donovan Nagel is an Applied Linguistics graduate hailing from rural Queensland, Australia (the amazing soundscape you hear in the background of our interview) and the man behind the language learning site and community, The Mezzofanti Guild, and the Arabic learning site, Talk in Arabic. Donovan named the site after one of his heroes, Cardinal Giuseppe Gasparo Mezzofanti (1774 – 1849), a hyperpolyglot who Donovan felt a strong connection to given their mutual background in theology, Greek, Hebrew, and Arabic, and the fact that they both focus on learning via contact with real people. 

📝 For show notes, visit LanguageMastery.com/show.  

🇯🇵 Learn Japanese Anywhere! 

Want to learn Japanese through at-home immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes? MASTER JAPANESE, my detailed how-to manual and resource guide, will show you exactly how. Learn more at https://bit.ly/masterjapaneselms.  

❓Ask Me a Question!  

Got a question about language learning you'd like me to answer on the show? Leave me a voice recording and you might here my response on the next episode! Record your message here: https://anchor.fm/john-fotheringham/message

Kevin Morehouse is the man behind Language Hero, a site dedicated to helping language learners start their journey, find allies, and stay the course. Kevin is a certified Italian teacher and soon to be certified in Spanish as well. 

📝 For show notes, visit LanguageMastery.com/show.  

🇯🇵 Learn Japanese Anywhere! 

Want to learn Japanese through at-home immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes? MASTER JAPANESE, my detailed how-to manual and resource guide, will show you exactly how. Learn more at https://bit.ly/masterjapaneselms.  

❓Ask Me a Question!  

Got a question about language learning you'd like me to answer on the show? Leave me a voice recording and you might here my response on the next episode! Record your message here: https://anchor.fm/john-fotheringham/message

Richard Simcott is an accomplished British hyperpolyglot based in Skopje, North Macedonia. He has actively studied more than 50 languages to date, and works in 14 of them on a regular basis! His impressive linguistic feats have led HarperCollins to call him “one of the most multilingual people from The United Kingdom.” In our conversation, he shares how he got into languages, how he learns and maintains so many, and what you can do to learn one (or many!) foreign languages yourself. 

📝 For show notes, visit LanguageMastery.com/show.  

🇯🇵 Learn Japanese Anywhere! 

Want to learn Japanese through at-home immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes? MASTER JAPANESE, my detailed how-to manual and resource guide, will show you exactly how. Learn more at https://bit.ly/masterjapaneselms.  

❓Ask Me a Question!  

Got a question about language learning you'd like me to answer on the show? Leave me a voice recording and you might here my response on the next episode! Record your message here: https://anchor.fm/john-fotheringham/message

Benny Lewis is a fun-loving blogger, YouTuber, author, language hacker, and technomad from Ireland (hence his nickname "Irish Polyglot"). He is the creator of the most popular language learning site in the world as of writing, Fluentin3Months.com and the author of Fluent in 3 Months: How Anyone at Any Age Can Learn to Speak Any Language from Anywhere in the World. He has demonstrated again and again that it's possible to reach conversational fluency in a matter of months, not years as most believe. 

📝 For show notes, visit LanguageMastery.com/show.  

🇨🇳 Learn Mandarin Chinese Anywhere!  

Want to learn Mandarin Chinese through at-home immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes? Master Mandarin, my detailed how-to manual and resource guide, will show you exactly how. Learn more at: https://bit.ly/mastermandarinlms.  

❓Ask Me a Question!  

Got a question about language learning you'd like me to answer on the show? Leave me a voice recording and you might here my response on the next episode! Record your message here: https://anchor.fm/john-fotheringham/message

Ellen Jovin is variously described as a "linguaphile," a "language-crazed writer," a "grammar freak," a "former freelance writer," and a professional trainer specializing in communication skills. On the first of July in 2009, Ellen began an impressive language and culture project called "Words & Worlds of New York" with the goal exploring the myriad languages spoken in The Big Apple. 

📝 For show notes, visit LanguageMastery.com/show.  

🇨🇳 Learn Mandarin Chinese Anywhere!  

Want to learn Mandarin Chinese through at-home immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes? Master Mandarin, my detailed how-to manual and resource guide, will show you exactly how. Learn more at: https://bit.ly/mastermandarinlms.  

❓Ask Me a Question!  

Got a question about language learning you'd like me to answer on the show? Leave me a voice recording and you might here my response on the next episode! Record your message here: https://anchor.fm/john-fotheringham/message

With seven languages under his linguistic belt and an academic background in Applied Linguistics, Olly Richards of I Will Teach You a Language has proven that he can both talk the talk and walk the walk. His infectious passion for all things language is a breath of fresh air in the increasingly cynical language learning blogosphere. 

📝 For show notes, visit LanguageMastery.com/show.  

🇯🇵 Learn Japanese Anywhere! 

Want to learn Japanese through at-home immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes? MASTER JAPANESE, my detailed how-to manual and resource guide, will show you exactly how. Learn more at https://bit.ly/masterjapaneselms.  

❓Ask Me a Question!  

Got a question about language learning you'd like me to answer on the show? Leave me a voice recording and you might here my response on the next episode! Record your message here: https://anchor.fm/john-fotheringham/message

Keith Brooks is the man behind Pardon My Norwegian, a site dedicated to "everything cool from Norway from the eyes of a Kentuckian." Prior to "marrying" the Norwegian language, Keith sampled a number of a potential languages in a project called 37 Languages. His "speed dating" or "taste testing" approach to choosing just the right "significant linguistic other" got picked up by PRI's The World in 2009 ("Blogging the Love of Language"), and Keith was asked back again in 2010 to report on which language he finally chose to settle down with ("A Language Speed-Dater Gets Serious"). 

📝 For show notes, visit LanguageMastery.com/show.  

🇯🇵 Learn Japanese Anywhere! 

Want to learn Japanese through at-home immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes? MASTER JAPANESE, my detailed how-to manual and resource guide, will show you exactly how. Learn more at https://bit.ly/masterjapaneselms.  

❓Ask Me a Question!  

Got a question about language learning you'd like me to answer on the show? Leave me a voice recording and you might here my response on the next episode! Record your message here: https://anchor.fm/john-fotheringham/message

Susanna Zaraysky is a self-proclaimed "language geek," a speaker of 7 languages, and the author of Language is Music: Over 100 Fun & Easy Tips to Learn Foreign Languages. She has been featured on CBS, BBC Radio, CNN, NBC, and Univision, and now thanks to me, the world's most famous podcast! (Wink, wink.) In our interview, we discuss the weaknesses of traditional language education, the power of music in language acquisition, the importance of developing a resonance for one's target language and culture, and the fact that you can learn any language, anywhere. 

📝 For show notes, visit LanguageMastery.com/show.  

🇯🇵 Learn Japanese Anywhere! 

Want to learn Japanese through at-home immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes? MASTER JAPANESE, my detailed how-to manual and resource guide, will show you exactly how. Learn more at https://bit.ly/masterjapaneselms.  

❓Ask Me a Question!  

Got a question about language learning you'd like me to answer on the show? Leave me a voice recording and you might here my response on the next episode! Record your message here: https://anchor.fm/john-fotheringham/message

Paulino Brener is an educator, performer, social media manager, and one of the few people I know who has managed to successfully blend ALL of his passions—foreign languages, teaching, crafts, social media, and performance arts—into one. All while getting paid to do so! In our interview, he discusses creative ways to harness one's passions in foreign language learning, whether as a teacher or a learner. 

📝 For show notes, visit LanguageMastery.com/show.  

🇯🇵 Learn Japanese Anywhere! 

Want to learn Japanese through at-home immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes? MASTER JAPANESE, my detailed how-to manual and resource guide, will show you exactly how. Learn more at https://bit.ly/masterjapaneselms.  

❓Ask Me a Question!  

Got a question about language learning you'd like me to answer on the show? Leave me a voice recording and you might here my response on the next episode! Record your message here: https://anchor.fm/john-fotheringham/message

In my interview with Jason West, the creator of English Out There, we discuss the weaknesses of traditional English schools, methodologies, and materials, and how his approach aims to overcome them. I especially enjoyed his effective, no-nonsense approach to language learning, his efforts to bridge the gap between traditional classroom-based learning and independent study, and his willingness to share before-and-after speech samples of his students. 

📝 For show notes, visit LanguageMastery.com/show.  

🇯🇵 Learn Japanese Anywhere! 

Want to learn Japanese through at-home immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes? MASTER JAPANESE, my detailed how-to manual and resource guide, will show you exactly how. Learn more at https://bit.ly/masterjapaneselms.  

❓Ask Me a Question!  

Got a question about language learning you'd like me to answer on the show? Leave me a voice recording and you might here my response on the next episode! Record your message here: https://anchor.fm/john-fotheringham/message

Arkady Zilberman is the creator of Language Bridge and a former simultaneous interpreter in Russia. He focuses on overcoming what is perhaps the greatest impediment to adult foreign language learning success: cross-translation to and from one's native language. 

📝 For show notes, visit LanguageMastery.com/show.  

🇯🇵 Learn Japanese Anywhere! 

Want to learn Japanese through at-home immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes? MASTER JAPANESE, my detailed how-to manual and resource guide, will show you exactly how. Learn more at https://bit.ly/masterjapaneselms.  

❓Ask Me a Question!  

Got a question about language learning you'd like me to answer on the show? Leave me a voice recording and you might here my response on the next episode! Record your message here: https://anchor.fm/john-fotheringham/message

Randy Hunt is on a mission to learn a new language fluently every year. His current project is Italian, with Lithuanian as a side-project saved for weekend fun. Randy has his language-learning head screwed on tightly, and I firmly agree with his contention that learners can reach “conversational fluency” (the ability to talk with native speakers on a variety of topics) in a year if you spend enough time doing the right things. As we both have observed, most learners neither spend enough time nor do the right things. 

📝 For show notes, visit LanguageMastery.com/show.  

🇯🇵 Learn Japanese Anywhere! 

Want to learn Japanese through at-home immersion instead of boring textbooks or expensive classes? MASTER JAPANESE, my detailed how-to manual and resource guide, will show you exactly how. Learn more at https://bit.ly/masterjapaneselms.  

❓Ask Me a Question!  

Got a question about language learning you'd like me to answer on the show? Leave me a voice recording and you might here my response on the next episode! Record your message here: https://anchor.fm/john-fotheringham/message