Other Languages You've Studied

[MasterYeats]

I learned to speak English, French and Russian in that order, but when I'm sloshed I jabber on and on in Russian apparently. I always find myself thinking in two or three different languages.

What language do you all dream in? Mine are normally English or Russian. Once German but I was trippin'.

Is it true that Americans only know half a language?

[bavardage]

English - mother tongue.
French - learning for 5 years, though that will stop now (A-level timetable didn't permit continuation)
German - learning for 4 years, and am taking for A-level.

Oh and I know enough latin to say the dog is in the street, the slave is in the garden working and you are an idiot. I am planning to buy the aforementioned latin for dummies - currently have a very boring latin textbook.

Basic written spanish and italian are decipherable from my knowledge of french.

[sunkistbabe1]

I was in french immersion in school. Started in kindergarten, finished in grade 12. It's been a few years since I've practiced it regularly but I can still understand it and I still maintain my proper 'r' accent

[Rippy]

I've been taught French and English from infancy (don't know how my parents managed without me confusing the two), and until this coming school year I've gone to a French language school.

I think it has to do with learning two languages so early, but accents come super easily to me. I can speak in basically any accent I've heard a bit. I also tend to take on the accent of whoever's around me. Like, if I moved to England, I'd probably have a full English accent in about a week. Just having conversations with people of different accents, and I start to think with that accent. Scary stuff.

I also speak with a Quebecer accent all the time just because it sounds so much cooler than plain Ontarian French

[Alpha Omicron]

I speak English, and am (slowly) learning Klingon. As a result of mandatory French education, I can read French but I wouldn't embarrass myself trying to hold a conversation in it.

[pollywog]

Kemetic: Many years of leafing through the book of the dead and memorizing passages when the mood struck me. Nothing terribly useful, but it's not like there are ancient egyptians around to speak it to, anyway.

We obviously attend different parties.

I need an invite to yours. Ancient Egyptian parties were the *best* parties.

I heard they were a bit... "catty".

Fixed for those people who don't get the pun, even after 2 minutes of staring at the screen thinking "Wtf does he mean?".

[Briareos]

I learned to speak English, French and Russian in that order, but when I'm sloshed I jabber on and on in Russian apparently. I always find myself thinking in two or three different languages.

What language do you all dream in? Mine are normally English or Russian. Once German but I was trippin'.

Is it true that Americans only know half a language?

I'm American, so it's probably not true of all Americans, no. And I jabber on and on in Mandarin when plastered. My friends tell me they can't get me to shut up. Mind you, this is at parties in the U.S., where no-one knows what I'm saying at all.

[fjafjan]

Kemetic: Many years of leafing through the book of the dead and memorizing passages when the mood struck me. Nothing terribly useful, but it's not like there are ancient egyptians around to speak it to, anyway.

We obviously attend different parties.

I need an invite to yours. Ancient Egyptian parties were the *best* parties.

I heard they were a bit... "catty".

Fixed for those people who don't get the pun, even after 2 minutes of staring at the screen thinking "Wtf does he mean?".

Clearly you are an inferior specimen.

[Dibley]

Kemetic: Many years of leafing through the book of the dead and memorizing passages when the mood struck me. Nothing terribly useful, but it's not like there are ancient egyptians around to speak it to, anyway.

We obviously attend different parties.

I need an invite to yours. Ancient Egyptian parties were the *best* parties.

I heard they were a bit... "catty".

Fixed for those people who don't get the pun, even after 2 minutes of staring at the screen thinking "Wtf does he mean?".

Clearly you are an inferior specimen.

Clearly. Anyone worth associating with should get that joke.

[pollywog]

Quote pyramid, see above.

Clearly. Anyone worth associating with should get that joke.

Give me a break, I wasn't thinking in English and Maori isn't a particularly "Punny" language.[/quote]

[parkaboy]

i've had 3 years of german and forgotten most of it. i've had two jears of japanese and forgotten most of it.

i do not have a head for languages, but they still fascinate me and i'll be studying ASL soon. *shrugs*

[Dibley]

Quote pyramid, see above.

Clearly. Anyone worth associating with should get that joke.

Give me a break, I wasn't thinking in English and Maori isn't a particularly "Punny" language.

But why should we give you a break? As a 13 year old girl from Kentucky, you have absolutely no excuse to be thinking in Maori. Also, when you are trying to get jokes in English, it is helpful to think of them in English.

[pollywog]

You screwed up the quote tags. Your point, while logical, is unfortunately invalid.

[Dibley]

OBJECTION! You have no proof! All is repaired.

[pollywog]

Every time I get into an argument like this, I end up looking more stupid. Can we please stop?

[Dibley]

Sure. And I was lying about the spelling and grammar. My spelling and grammar are always (usually) impeccable.

Back ontopic! Languages, anyone?

[Gadren]

Native English speaker, did some German in elementary school (my gifted teacher was German and taught us a lot), took some Spanish in middle school (very reluctantly, because it was either that or French, and I find both languages to be some of the ugliest languages ever), but found my favorite language to be Latin (4 years in high school, and I think of myself very much as a Roman guy). I also took a 12-week course in Arabic last year, and am considering pursuing that in university.

Oh, and I've done some conlanging:
http://www.omniglot.com/writing/cilthic.htm

[Unforgiven]

I speak Dutch (fluent, native), English (fluent), and Japanese (not nearly as good as I'd like).

In high school I had to learn French, German, Latin and Ancient Greek. And I remember nearly nothing.

/me sucks at languages.

[Briareos]

I forgot to mention what languages I want to learn: EVERYTHING. Here's a short list in order of interest level:

Classical Chinese, Japanese, Latin, Ancient Greek, Arabic, Farsi, Portuguese, Korean, Russian, Hebrew, German.

[Kawa]

I want to learn Classical Chinese so, so badly, even if the practical side of me finds it rather useless. T_T Classical Chinese literature is so utterly beautiful and precious and you can't translate it even into modern Mandarin. (I totally would have been an Asian Languages/Studies major if I had gone to a liberal arts school.)

[Briareos]

I would have double majored into East Asian Languages/Civilization if I'd had time. Classical Chinese is pretty much awesome.

[Arancaytar]

Native German, and I took a year or two of French (I can read road signs and brochures, to a degree). I know a few words of Esperanto and always wanted to learn more (I saw Project Gutenberg has Esperanto texts, so I'll practice by reading those).

And a bit of conlang, but languages don't really count if you're the only one who speaks them.

[robinberghuys]

I'm Dutch and my stepmom is American, so I speak Dutch and American. I studied French for 7 years, but the level was pretty low. So even though I only studied German for 5 years, my German is much better. It probably has to do with the fact that German is kind of like Dutch (or the other way around). I also studied Latin for two years, but I forgot a lot of it and I studied classical Greek for 5 years. I failed, though, because I hated the way in which it was taught.

Anyway, since no-one will care about that, here's a funny thing. Since I'm Dutch, I can read Danish and Swedish instruction manuals. Without ever having been taught either language. I don't know if the Danes and the Swedes can read the Dutch instruction manuals, but they might. Most of my friends share this ability, so I'll extrapolate and say that Dutch people can read Danish and Swedish instruction manuals. Although I'm not really sure if it's those languages, maybe it's Norwegian as well. Or some other combination of the three.

Also, I want to learn those languages, since I think that might be very easy. And of course Spanish would be a very useful language to learn. But right now I have other priorities.

By the way: I'm surprised no-one has said anything like C, C++, fortran, html, php or perl.

[RealGrouchy]

Native German, and I took a year or two of French (I can read road signs and brochures, to a degree). I know a few words of Esperanto and always wanted to learn more (I saw Project Gutenberg has Esperanto texts, so I'll practice by reading those).

So then who do get to translate your posts here into English?

- RG>

[Invisible_Insane]

I speak English considerably better than most people, though on these fora it's not really something to be proud of. I've been studying French since about seventh grade, and I may be spending my junior year of university in Paris. I'd really like to learn Arabic, and maybe spend some time in Dubai. Or Cornell has a school in Qatar... hmm. It's just a matter of time, really.

[wraith]

Well my native language is Bulgarian and (to your surprise) I speak it.
I also speak (and occasionally write) English and Russian. I can manage with German and Spanish, and I can catch a few expressions or words in Swedish and Japanese.

As I figured Mandarin is very popular here. Maybe I should give it a shot...

[Cuton]

Native Francophone and English (depending on the language I use at the start of a conversation, people assume my main language is either... I also am able to think in both), comprehension of spanish/italian to a certain degree. Took a year of german (on top of pre german training in vocal music class... for pronunciation)

I don't particularly like the Quebecer accent, it makes me irate. However, since I don't have an accent at all while speaking english, I sometimes force myself to adopt the Quebecer speaking english accent. It gets me recognized rather quickly... I only do it because in my first year of University, no one knew I was francophone until I told them... It's a tad akward to have people insulting your culture with you in the room and them not knowing you belong to that group. (It's happened more than a few times, the even fewer times I've pointed it out, admitedly while everyone was drunk, resulted in near fights.) Oddly enough, I randomly met my cousin by speaking with a quebecer accent at a party... we'd met a long time before when we were both kids, but we lived far from each other and stuff... then we somehow ended up in the same school and at the same party. Good times.

Cuton

[robinberghuys]

Thinking in two languages is weird. I sometimes don't remember if something I read or something I was told was in English or Dutch. And sometimes I accidentally almost use words from the one language in the other, which is strange as well.

[Kawa]

German in terms of vocal music = for the win. German and French are my favorite languages to sing in. I'm aware much of what's out there is in Latin and I do sing it, and sing it well - but I will always love German. Mahler's Symphony for a Thousand, Second Movement = yes! It will always remind me of my first voice teacher, who was the Jewish grandmother I should've had, and is the reason I can actually eat oatmeal raisin cookies (she made me like them, seriously.)

I miss voice classes, now. And Mandarin classes too. I will find independent ways of pursuing them in my small tech school, I swear!

[RealGrouchy]

I speak English considerably better than most people, though on these fora it's not really something to be proud of.

Good grammar is always something to be proud of, but I think in your case, "good choice of words" would be something to be proud of--if you had it! (ooh, burn! &c.)

I think what you mean to say is "though on these fora it is not particularly exceptional" or "though on these fora it is fairly common".

@robin: in a bilingual setting, borrowing words from the other language is not uncommon at all.

- RG>

[robinberghuys]

@robin: in a bilingual setting, borrowing words from the other language is not uncommon at all.

- RG>

I know it's not uncommon I still think it is weird. Feels weird anyway.

[Eschatokyrios]

Native English speaker.

I've had Spanish lessons since I was in first grade, but many of my teachers were incompetent. So I'm proficient in Spanish, and I could probably translate most texts with a good dictionary, but I'm not fluent. Mexican Spanish, that is. We never learned Castellano. I don't even know the verb conjugation endings for vosotros.

I took German I just for kicks my Junior year of High School. I thought it was very basic and easy. I managed to get a high A without trying very hard. Even so, ich kann nicht Deutsch gut sprechen.

I'm teaching myself Latin out of Wheelock's Latin, 6th edition. I just got to the chapter about the subjunctive. I'm also teaching myself Georgian out of Georgian: A Reading Grammar. The going is slow, both because I don't think it's a particularly good learner's text and because Georgian is just awesome in its complexity and foreignness to speakers of Indo-European languages.

I would like to someday learn Russian and Okinawan.

[Cuton]

Re: using words from other languages as you speak... franglais. Enough said. (to those who know what I'm talking about, a tip of my mug to you!)

EDIT! Also, anal vocal teachers are the best. My prof (who happened to be my uncle... though he's actually really good and I didn't go to him because he's my uncle but rather because he's widely respected) had a reputation for details. He aparently wrote a dissertation during his Masters (in choral direction) about how the "s" sound at the end of plurual words should be sung. It must have been a work of genius.

Cuton

[RealGrouchy]

EDIT! Also, anal vocal teachers are the best.

Cuton

Yes, there a bunch of them in political studies and management programs. They teach you how to talk out of your ass.

- RG>

[Dibley]

Mexican Spanish, that is. We never learned Castellano. I don't even know the verb conjugation endings for vosotros.

Though my Spanish teacher was less than competent, and didn't ever cover vosotros, it was in the textbook so I learned it. Have since forgotten some of it, though.

[Arancaytar]

Native German, and I took a year or two of French (I can read road signs and brochures, to a degree). I know a few words of Esperanto and always wanted to learn more (I saw Project Gutenberg has Esperanto texts, so I'll practice by reading those).

So then who do get to translate your posts here into English?

- RG>

I kind of assumed that we don't need to mention English.

[Freyja]

I'm always up for learning new languages. I've grown up speaking English, but I've been exposed to a fair amount of other languages. I picked up German and Polish as a kid (thanks to our neighbors), but I ended up going back and studying German in college. I also learned Spanish, Portuguese, and a bit of Greek while my family lived in Spain and on Crete. I can understand Italian, even if I really only know enough to order from a menu. And I know just enough Japanese that if I were ever to be in Japan, everyone would know I'm a tourist (if the blonde hair and blue eyes don't give it away).

At the moment, I'm really focusing on maintaining fluency in Spanish and German, and I'm trying to learn some middle-eastern languages (it's hard to fit into my schedule, but that's not going to stop me from going for it). Spanish is pretty easy for me to keep up with because we have some family friends from Spain. The German is a little more difficult because I don't have much of a chance to speak it. Luckily, however, there are a lot of German texts that pop up when I'm doing research for my archaeology classes, so at least I get some translation exercise there.

It seems like I'm one of the few who doesn't know French, Latin, and/or Mandarin. I wouldn't mind learning those, but they're not on my immediate list. I guess Mandarin is just too far down on my list and I figure that I don't need French or Latin right away because I'm not in the process of obtaining a classical education.

[Emmaskillz]

I study French at school (this is my 4th year) and I studied Japanese for 2 years but I found it fairly difficult and the teacher sucked so hard.

I really want to learn german and I want to get back into Japanese. I love languages. I spent three weeks in France earlier this year but I've lost it a bit. I think I'm just trying too hard or something. It comes fairly naturally but I'm perfectionate

[Clerria]

I study a variety of languages but I find that unless I use them frequently, they will have walked out of my brain within a few short years. That's not entirely true... I tend to keep the grammar and lose the vocabulary.

My best is Japanese,

Others at various degrees of awesomeness or lack thereof (including past fluencies/current nostalgic memories):

Spanish
French
Persian
Arabic
Chinese
Hebrew
German

I have a couple library style bookshelves, half of which is covered in language teaching books, books in other languages, or books about language. It's something I'm simultaneously embarassed and proud of.

I think next on my list is probably Korean or Thai, or Russian... so many choices. so little time... (Seriously, who has time for this kind of hobby when there's so many other things in life that take up all of my time. I need extra hours in my day.)

[Materiality]

I speak Finnish (native) and English fluently, and know quite a bit of Japanese (I can write about 1200 kanji). I should know Swedish, as it is the second official language of Finland...

I studied French for 5 years, but I've mostly forgotten it.