Barry M. Farber (1930–2020)
Author of Learn Any Language
About the Author
Barry Morton Farber was a radio host, journalist, and writer. He was born on May 5, 1930 in Baltimore, Maryland and raised in Greensboro, North Carolina. He studied journalism at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He was a gifted at learning languages and spoke over 20. He volunteered show more for the draft in 1952 and was assigned to be a Russian translator. In 1957, he came to New York to find a job in journalism. In 1960, his first talk show, "Barry Farber's Open Mike," aired on WINS in New York. He was later heard on WMCA and WOR in New York and on the ABC Radio Network in various time slots over the years. He interviewed a wide variety of people. His career in broadcasting lasted almost sixty years. In 2014, he was inducted into the Radio Hall of Fame. He wrote two memoirs, Making People Talk: You Can Turn Every Conversation into a Magic Moment (1987) and Cocktails with Molotov: An Odyssey of Unlikely Detours (2012). He wrote articles that appeared in The New York Times, Reader's Digest, The Washington Post, and the Saturday Review. Barry Farber died on May 6, 2020 in Manhattan at the age of 90. (Bowker Author Biography) show less
Image credit: Barry Farber.
Works by Barry M. Farber
Tagged
Common Knowledge
- Legal name
- Farber, Barry Morton
- Birthdate
- 1930-05-05
- Date of death
- 2020-05-06
- Gender
- male
- Education
- University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (BA - Journalism)
- Occupations
- broadcaster
- Organizations
- Republican Party
- Relationships
- Farber, Celia (daughter)
- Cause of death
- complications from surgery
- Nationality
- USA
- Birthplace
- Baltimore, Maryland, USA
- Places of residence
- Greensboro, North Carolina, USA
- Place of death
- New York, New York, USA
- Associated Place (for map)
- USA
Members
Reviews
Here's a very accessible type of book where Barry Farber, amateur polyglot then fluent in twenty-five languages, outlines his methods to learn a foreign language efficiently. All based upon his personal experience, his advices might strike as being unconventional to whose used to a more traditional approach to learning. However, developed through trial and error over more than four decades, his tips are highly valuable and still relevant. In fact, over time this book became an absolute show more classic despite some of its weaknesses.
His approach is actually very easy to sum up. First, he stresses that there is not one single miracle tool to truly master a language, but many. Indeed, as audio and written material, native speakers, and other resources available abound, being fully competent is just a matter of how to use them all in a complementary way. This is what he calls the Multiple-Track Attack; a pompous name for sure, but that perfectly gives the idea of how to tackle a target language: like a besieged city to assault on all fronts, in order to fully conquer it.
'Attempting to master a language through a grammar book alone is too boring; with phrase book alone, too superficial; with cassettes alone, too fruitless (except with Pimsleur!); and with dictionary and newspaper alone, impossible. The multiple-track attack makes your work pay off.'
He insists then on the importance of practicing the language that is, talk, talk, talk, and... talk! The point, made very clear throughout, is that a language is above all a mean to communicate; so learning one will not be enough if the learning is not put to use in communicating. Of course, this does sound like obvious common sense! Yet, how many courses have we all come across where the focus is on increasing the amount of vocabulary and/or improving accuracy through grammar drills, at the expense of actually conversing? Then here we are! This is actually his final blow: a dismissal of all teaching methods first and foremost based on accuracy. Accuracy coming through fluency, his insights on grammar are, about, striking and lethal:
'... you don't have to conquer the grammar to conquer the language. Conquer the language, and you'll possess the grammar!'
Sure, the book has its flaws. Relying mostly on his personal journey and experience, the author might come across as annoyingly self-centred and boastful. There is a whole chapter dedicated to grammar which is so slim and basic that, it could have easily been discarded. It also is one of those books putting emphasis on mnemonics to learn vocabulary, and I personally think mnemonics to be over-rated and having its limits (a point that, to his credit, Barry Farber acknowledges even if shyly). Also, first published in 1991, some of the resources material he recommends are now obviously outdated; although it doesn't undermine his argument in any way (Internet and smart phones have replaced cassettes and tape recorders, but the core principle -using them efficiently alongside each other- remains the same).
Having said that, clear and entertaining here's definitely a classic on foreign language learning. Published more than two decades ago, it might be getting old, with tips and advices that have been outlined again an again on more recent publications, but it still is a useful and valuable tool to have at hand. Just check it out! show less
His approach is actually very easy to sum up. First, he stresses that there is not one single miracle tool to truly master a language, but many. Indeed, as audio and written material, native speakers, and other resources available abound, being fully competent is just a matter of how to use them all in a complementary way. This is what he calls the Multiple-Track Attack; a pompous name for sure, but that perfectly gives the idea of how to tackle a target language: like a besieged city to assault on all fronts, in order to fully conquer it.
'Attempting to master a language through a grammar book alone is too boring; with phrase book alone, too superficial; with cassettes alone, too fruitless (except with Pimsleur!); and with dictionary and newspaper alone, impossible. The multiple-track attack makes your work pay off.'
He insists then on the importance of practicing the language that is, talk, talk, talk, and... talk! The point, made very clear throughout, is that a language is above all a mean to communicate; so learning one will not be enough if the learning is not put to use in communicating. Of course, this does sound like obvious common sense! Yet, how many courses have we all come across where the focus is on increasing the amount of vocabulary and/or improving accuracy through grammar drills, at the expense of actually conversing? Then here we are! This is actually his final blow: a dismissal of all teaching methods first and foremost based on accuracy. Accuracy coming through fluency, his insights on grammar are, about, striking and lethal:
'... you don't have to conquer the grammar to conquer the language. Conquer the language, and you'll possess the grammar!'
Sure, the book has its flaws. Relying mostly on his personal journey and experience, the author might come across as annoyingly self-centred and boastful. There is a whole chapter dedicated to grammar which is so slim and basic that, it could have easily been discarded. It also is one of those books putting emphasis on mnemonics to learn vocabulary, and I personally think mnemonics to be over-rated and having its limits (a point that, to his credit, Barry Farber acknowledges even if shyly). Also, first published in 1991, some of the resources material he recommends are now obviously outdated; although it doesn't undermine his argument in any way (Internet and smart phones have replaced cassettes and tape recorders, but the core principle -using them efficiently alongside each other- remains the same).
Having said that, clear and entertaining here's definitely a classic on foreign language learning. Published more than two decades ago, it might be getting old, with tips and advices that have been outlined again an again on more recent publications, but it still is a useful and valuable tool to have at hand. Just check it out! show less
For anybody looking for resources, you may find it useful to take a look at my blog on learning French. Whether or not I succeed in doing that, what I am managing is a large collection of super-useful resources for learning and practising. A lot of them are quite obscure, so you might find stuff there that you really like but won't see mentioned on your average '10 places to learn French before you die' list, all such lists being pretty much generic.
https://frenchalone.wordpress.com/
And yes, show more this is six years after first writing about this book.
------------------------------------
I must confess that I started this book at chapter eight, magical memory aid, only to discover it was about making up stories to remember words. Instantly my back is up as I recall a childhood of people trying to make you remember things by having to remember other things. This book gives the bizarre example of setting about a method to recall the letters of the music staff. Like it doesn’t go in alphabetical order? Honestly. I’m shaking my head. Aren’t words pictures and patterns? I still don’t in the least understand why they aren’t sufficient.
On the other hand, walking back from coffee today, I asked the person I was with if he’d ever used this practice and he said he’d been raised on it by teachers. And he gave me an example, which I’m ashamed to say has stuck in my head every since and that’s been 7 hours.
Roy G Biv
Don’t tell me. I’m the only person in the world who doesn’t know who this is. Or didn’t until earlier today. And now after many hours of this and that, I still know who he is. And I’m pretty sure that if I were to have sex tonight, which I mention purely in a theoretical kind of way, it’s Roy who would be occupying my thought during it. He’s probably there for life. I’ll end my days with dementia and everybody around me will wonder about me and Roy G Biv.
Can I make myself use this technique? I just don’t know.
There are other things that bother me. He wants you to fill up all those empty times in your day, wasted now, with language learning. Standing in a queue, taking the escalator. But don’t we all already use that time?
The author of this book is certainly a wanker, but it might be that this is just because he needs to fill up the book with something. It could be a list which was a few pages long. But there is padding like you wouldn’t believe. A blow by blow account of every language he’s ever learned. He even gives a detailed account of when he decided not to learn languages. And yet, fairly early on he says something which is just SO true that I have to put that in italics as well. SO true.
He is discussing at which point you might say you have learned a language:
p.40
This strikes me as exactly correct. It is the point where you are no longer conscious of the language you are speaking.
I guess I like to think that in a sense even people like me who are linguistically bereft nonetheless in a certain sense have learnt a bunch of languages in their lives. For me I’d include the language of conventional economics, that of Marxist economics, music, knitting, bridge….the wonderful language of cooking. When you first cook there are all these expressions, merely words which one has used a million times before which suddenly seem completely mysterious and a source of great consternation. ‘A splash’, ‘a handful’ ‘turn up’ ‘turn down’ ‘put some’ Then at some point you find that you think in these words without realising that you are. The language and therefore the concepts are now yours.
Then again just along a bit and he comes out with another profound concept:
p. 43-4
How often have I given the same advice to bridge students. Do it as an act of faith, trust me, and eventually you will understand. This really works. After a while, instead of doing the things I’ve set down as rules ‘just because’, it becomes clear why. But why couldn’t possibly come first. Maybe this is because language rules, like good bridge plays, aren’t necessarily demonstrable as true. I’m not sure that one needs to follow chess advice in the same blind way, though I rather think if I’d done more of that as a kid I would be a better player.
If ever there was a person whose role in life is to test this book it’s me. I have a talent for not speaking languages which might be envied if there was in fact any point to the knack. There are a couple of aspects to the whole business that don’t scare me the way they scare other people. This thing about getting too old to learn a language. I was always a slow learner, so I shan’t even notice that I’m lagging. And I don’t know a thing about grammar so it isn’t going to upset me that it’s done differently in another language. I’ll be blissfully unaware of the offending practices.
It’s going to be French. This is what a bad person I am. A few years ago I taught myself to speak English with a French accent because the thing I especially like about French is the sound and I realised that all you have to do to sound French while speaking English is to put the stress on the opposite syllable from the one we do in English. A generalisation, no doubt, but pretty much true. For a while I thought the easiest way to do this was to use only two syllable words as long words can get a bit confusing, but I didn’t persevere with this theory. Suddenly I’m full of enthusiasm for the idea that I might as well learn the darn language and be done with it…though I must admit I still have an idea it will be easier to speak English with a French accent than French with a French accent.
I’d say give me a day to finish the book first, but that is against the spirit of the thing which is to get on with it. Tomorrow. I’ll get on with it tomorrow. And report back.
------------------
Update a couple of years later: I'm starting to wonder if the whole language thing is overrated. I'm in a French-speaking country without a word of French to my name and it doesn't seem to matter that much. I find the Swiss are pretty much like the French. They may hate Englishmen. They may hate that thing where Englishmen think if they speak English slowly and loudly nobody in the world won't understand them.
And even if you ask them sweetly 'do you speak English?' they reply back 'non' which, to be honest, I find just a little suspicious as an answer...
But if you say 'Bonjour' in a particular way, and now I'm referring to how I say it, they will absolutely insist that you speak not another word of their language, the English will flow from their lips and honestly. Why on earth was I ever thinking of learning French?
Oh yes. Hmmm. I forgot. To read fabulous French writers in the original. Hmmm. Yes. Excusez-moi. show less
https://frenchalone.wordpress.com/
And yes, show more this is six years after first writing about this book.
------------------------------------
I must confess that I started this book at chapter eight, magical memory aid, only to discover it was about making up stories to remember words. Instantly my back is up as I recall a childhood of people trying to make you remember things by having to remember other things. This book gives the bizarre example of setting about a method to recall the letters of the music staff. Like it doesn’t go in alphabetical order? Honestly. I’m shaking my head. Aren’t words pictures and patterns? I still don’t in the least understand why they aren’t sufficient.
On the other hand, walking back from coffee today, I asked the person I was with if he’d ever used this practice and he said he’d been raised on it by teachers. And he gave me an example, which I’m ashamed to say has stuck in my head every since and that’s been 7 hours.
Roy G Biv
Don’t tell me. I’m the only person in the world who doesn’t know who this is. Or didn’t until earlier today. And now after many hours of this and that, I still know who he is. And I’m pretty sure that if I were to have sex tonight, which I mention purely in a theoretical kind of way, it’s Roy who would be occupying my thought during it. He’s probably there for life. I’ll end my days with dementia and everybody around me will wonder about me and Roy G Biv.
Can I make myself use this technique? I just don’t know.
There are other things that bother me. He wants you to fill up all those empty times in your day, wasted now, with language learning. Standing in a queue, taking the escalator. But don’t we all already use that time?
The author of this book is certainly a wanker, but it might be that this is just because he needs to fill up the book with something. It could be a list which was a few pages long. But there is padding like you wouldn’t believe. A blow by blow account of every language he’s ever learned. He even gives a detailed account of when he decided not to learn languages. And yet, fairly early on he says something which is just SO true that I have to put that in italics as well. SO true.
He is discussing at which point you might say you have learned a language:
p.40
My standards are less exacting. I’ll confess to ‘speaking a language’ if, after engaging in deep conversation a charming woman from a country whose language I’m studying, I have difficulty the next morning recalling which language it was we were speaking.
This strikes me as exactly correct. It is the point where you are no longer conscious of the language you are speaking.
I guess I like to think that in a sense even people like me who are linguistically bereft nonetheless in a certain sense have learnt a bunch of languages in their lives. For me I’d include the language of conventional economics, that of Marxist economics, music, knitting, bridge….the wonderful language of cooking. When you first cook there are all these expressions, merely words which one has used a million times before which suddenly seem completely mysterious and a source of great consternation. ‘A splash’, ‘a handful’ ‘turn up’ ‘turn down’ ‘put some’ Then at some point you find that you think in these words without realising that you are. The language and therefore the concepts are now yours.
Then again just along a bit and he comes out with another profound concept:
p. 43-4
You don’t have to know grammar to obey grammar. If you obey grammar from the outset, when you turn around later and learn why you should say things the way you’re already saying them, each grammatical rule will then become not an instrument of abstract torture disconnected from anything you’ve experienced but rather an old friend who now wants you to have his home address and private phone number.
When the grammatical rule comes first, followed by its pitiful two or three examples in the textbook, it seems to the student like an artificially confected bit of perversity rolled down upon his head like a boulder.
When the grammatical rule comes after you’ve got some of the language in you, it becomes a gift flashlight that makes you smile and say, ‘Now I understood why they say it that way!’
So, you are right now and forevermore warned not to bridle or to question, ‘Why is the word for ‘go’ in this French sentence vais and in the very next sentence aller?’ Simply embrace the faith that both sentences are correct and learn them….
The more shaken you become by grammatical storms, the more tightly you must hug the faith. I vow it will all become clear.
How often have I given the same advice to bridge students. Do it as an act of faith, trust me, and eventually you will understand. This really works. After a while, instead of doing the things I’ve set down as rules ‘just because’, it becomes clear why. But why couldn’t possibly come first. Maybe this is because language rules, like good bridge plays, aren’t necessarily demonstrable as true. I’m not sure that one needs to follow chess advice in the same blind way, though I rather think if I’d done more of that as a kid I would be a better player.
If ever there was a person whose role in life is to test this book it’s me. I have a talent for not speaking languages which might be envied if there was in fact any point to the knack. There are a couple of aspects to the whole business that don’t scare me the way they scare other people. This thing about getting too old to learn a language. I was always a slow learner, so I shan’t even notice that I’m lagging. And I don’t know a thing about grammar so it isn’t going to upset me that it’s done differently in another language. I’ll be blissfully unaware of the offending practices.
It’s going to be French. This is what a bad person I am. A few years ago I taught myself to speak English with a French accent because the thing I especially like about French is the sound and I realised that all you have to do to sound French while speaking English is to put the stress on the opposite syllable from the one we do in English. A generalisation, no doubt, but pretty much true. For a while I thought the easiest way to do this was to use only two syllable words as long words can get a bit confusing, but I didn’t persevere with this theory. Suddenly I’m full of enthusiasm for the idea that I might as well learn the darn language and be done with it…though I must admit I still have an idea it will be easier to speak English with a French accent than French with a French accent.
I’d say give me a day to finish the book first, but that is against the spirit of the thing which is to get on with it. Tomorrow. I’ll get on with it tomorrow. And report back.
------------------
Update a couple of years later: I'm starting to wonder if the whole language thing is overrated. I'm in a French-speaking country without a word of French to my name and it doesn't seem to matter that much. I find the Swiss are pretty much like the French. They may hate Englishmen. They may hate that thing where Englishmen think if they speak English slowly and loudly nobody in the world won't understand them.
And even if you ask them sweetly 'do you speak English?' they reply back 'non' which, to be honest, I find just a little suspicious as an answer...
But if you say 'Bonjour' in a particular way, and now I'm referring to how I say it, they will absolutely insist that you speak not another word of their language, the English will flow from their lips and honestly. Why on earth was I ever thinking of learning French?
Oh yes. Hmmm. I forgot. To read fabulous French writers in the original. Hmmm. Yes. Excusez-moi. show less
I'm surprised I hadn't listed this book in my library, as I bought it a couple of months ago,I think.
Anyway, this review will be short and simple. I just finished reading the entire book in...... about 5-6 hours. And I took a few short breaks doing it.
If you like learning languages, this is a good book to read. I got it on recommendation from a site as I was exploring ways to learn Japanese (already started that, really, but anyway).
This book is not going to give you instructions on learning show more any particular language. You're not going to be able to start learning any language just from this one book - you're going to need the tools for that language. The author has mastered many, and this book is a general guide, sort of an approach and attitude for learning a language on your own. (And motivations as well for doing so.) It's a good book to read at the beginning of your journey into any language, to help you get started and figure out how to approach it.
The book itself is pretty engaging. I learned a few words in various languages (very few of which I have actually spent time studying or will in the near future), and compared the methods in the book to what I'm already doing to study Japanese. Some of what I'm doing already follows this approach, and I'll be adding a few more tricks to my language learning skills. It's also filled with anecdotes that keep you entertained as you read, including a short autobiography of the author's language learning journey. I didn't even mind the "Back to Basics" chapter, basically reintroducing you to the English grammar you may not have paid attention to in school (For me, that was anything that ended in "ive"), and was a decent refresher of terms you might come across in foreign grammar. show less
Anyway, this review will be short and simple. I just finished reading the entire book in...... about 5-6 hours. And I took a few short breaks doing it.
If you like learning languages, this is a good book to read. I got it on recommendation from a site as I was exploring ways to learn Japanese (already started that, really, but anyway).
This book is not going to give you instructions on learning show more any particular language. You're not going to be able to start learning any language just from this one book - you're going to need the tools for that language. The author has mastered many, and this book is a general guide, sort of an approach and attitude for learning a language on your own. (And motivations as well for doing so.) It's a good book to read at the beginning of your journey into any language, to help you get started and figure out how to approach it.
The book itself is pretty engaging. I learned a few words in various languages (very few of which I have actually spent time studying or will in the near future), and compared the methods in the book to what I'm already doing to study Japanese. Some of what I'm doing already follows this approach, and I'll be adding a few more tricks to my language learning skills. It's also filled with anecdotes that keep you entertained as you read, including a short autobiography of the author's language learning journey. I didn't even mind the "Back to Basics" chapter, basically reintroducing you to the English grammar you may not have paid attention to in school (For me, that was anything that ended in "ive"), and was a decent refresher of terms you might come across in foreign grammar. show less
This was just the encouragement I needed to start really digging into a new language. If you have been frustrated by tradtional language courses please don't quit before you read this. It could use a more modern rewriting for our advanced technology but surely you would be smart enough to jump in on your own to find internet resources after reading what he has to say about using multiple resources. This is a great quick encouraging read... just try it!
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