Do you speak more than one language?

I studied German for four years in high school. I thought it would be a good idea since my mother's family were Russians who moved to Germany before coming to the U.S., and my grandmother spoke German. I ended up not using it, and forgot most of it (though I still know basic words and can understand certain phrases).

In college, I took six semesters of Spanish and became fairly proficient, at least in reading/writing comprehension and speaking ability. The most difficult thing is employing it in real life, especially with native speakers, as they tend to speak quickly and with rhythms that are unfamiliar unless you've spent a lot of time conversing in the language.

Unlike with German, however, I retained A LOT of Spanish without using it much. I went to graduate school several years after I took my last college-level Spanish course, and had to complete a language requirement for my graduate program. Rather than take a summer Spanish class, I decided to challenge the course by taking a translation test (translating pages of text from English to Spanish), and passed it with flying colors. For whatever reason, Spanish "stuck" much more than the German did.

It's incredibly hard and with Japanese you're saddled with an impossible task if you're not going to live there for any period of time. Try a romance language it will be challenging enough. Then after you've learned the basics go to that country and live there for a year.

Start fucking a Japanese guy. Seriously.

Is this question directed to Americans? If so....you won’t get many responses. Ask Wuropeans most of whom speak 4 or 5

Since when does Zimbabwe speak French?

Most Wuropeans do not speak 4 or 5 languages.

I think I learning Japanese, I really think so!

R6 the educated ones do, with ease.

Amuricans can barely speak English so yes this is baffling to them.

I took Spanish in high school, but didn't need it until I was 35. I began running a business where almost all of the employees only spoke Spanish. I bought a basic Spanish book, decided to learn 4 new words every day, especially those pertinent to the business. When I had memorized the words and started using them, the employees asked if they could help me. I agreed, and soon they were correcting me a lot. After a year of this immersion learning, the advice started tapering off since they had helped me so well.

I speak 2, but I learned the first one as a child.

I speak Spanish, French, German and a little Norwegian ("ikke like slikkepinne")

American here. Speak French and Italian fluently. Here is one side benefit: learning a Romance language (I can not speak to the others) helps immensely with English grammar and structure. Furthermore, a foreign language opens up an entirely new perspective when rereading works in their original language. It's worth it OP. Buy a nice, well made notebook. Take meticulous notes. You will be proud of that notebook in a year.

I learned Japanese and I am fluent in speaking, reading and writing at an advanced level. The best way to learn is to study for the JLPT exams and to use the textbooks Japanese kids use in school to learn Japanese. It's also good to read manga, since they have the furigana next to the hard kanji. Finally, I recommend watching a dorama that appeals to you. Anime is not as helpful because you don't see the mouth moving and it turns out that is really helpful when you're learning a language.

Don't give up, OP!

R2 Several of my favorite novels were originally written in Japanese (Taiko, Battle Royale, 1Q84). I also LOVE Japanese tv shows, manga, and video games.

If I can get good enough to comprehend even 40% of what is being said in these mediums, I'm confident I can immerse myself enough to properly learn the language. But getting good enough to follow along with these things will take a lot of work.

I'm European and I speak 4 languages, and I think that's more than "average". Most non-Brits speak at least 2 (mother tongue plus English) fluently, but if you've gone through the school system and actually learned a foreign language like you're "supposed" to, you've got 3: mother tongue, English & Spanish/French/Italian/German. At least that's the classic combo of most of my peers.

R13 Thanks so much!

You are welcome! I think the movies that star Motoki Masahiro are helpful when you're learning Japanese. (He was the first Japanese to pose nude and show pubic hair!) It's harder to understand men's talking because they grunt and shorten words a lot.

Yep, three -- English, Italian, Spanish

What language do people choose to learn these days? I'm assuming that while French used to be popular in the US, Spanish and Mandarin must be more fashionable nowadays. But I could be wrong.

If you have so much contempt for Americans you drunken sot then fuck off back to Wurope.

R20 typical Murican go back to your country’s redneck trailer trash talk.

No wonder Cheetoh is you’re guy’s President.

Learned French for the whole of high school, where it was the less popular foreign language offered. Loved it and got fairly far by self-studying. I hated the pace of the lessons in school and my classmates' shitty accents. I'm fine reading/writing technical subjects, but literature is hit-or-miss. I gave up on The Songs of Bilitis halfway. Gide's Counterfeiters, which I'm currently reading, has been much less painful.

English, Hebrew something that passes for fluently. Varying degrees of Spanish, Yiddish, French, Italian, German. Read/write Russian. Know words in Russian, Polish, Hindi, Japanese, Portuguese (Brasil), Mandarin, Finnish, Swedish and Danish.

I've lived with a German for almost 40 years, so I can understand television shows and follow most conversations (some of the regional accents baffle me), but because it's always so much easier to let him do the talking, I've never gained any confidence when it comes to speaking it. As soon as I open my mouth in front of a stranger I'm like a deer in the headlights.

,

R24: how vas his German sausage???

I can get by fairly well in French and Spanish, although my reading comprehension is better than my audio comprehension. Like the poster upthread noted, it’s hard to converse with the native speaker of another language due to the rapidity of speech. I’m now working to better my Italian.

I’m proceeding to get my dual Italian (and thus EU) citizenship so that when I retire from my US job in 5 years I can move to the EU and get away from the tRumpian dystopia which I’m convinced will only get worse and not better.

If I may ask what relation are you getting your dual citizenship through?

To get Italian citizenship, you need to prove that one grandparent was born in Italy (a friend got Italian citizenship not only for himself but for his children that way). Or live in Italy for 10 years. Or marry an Italian. Or buy your way in for 2 million Euro.

Well my father was born and raised in Italy and so were all my grand parents. But being that they all became American citizens before I was born thereby nulling their own Italian citizenship there is nothin to pass on to me. It hurt.

I speak French and a lot of people don't know it. I love seeing jaws drop to the floor when I start speaking with someone in French. The French are usually very impressed with my language skills too. I must say, however, I've gotten a little rusty over the past few years.

Yes, I do.

I've learned French and Italian well enough that I can read even 19th century novels though look up the occasional word.

I read The Leopard in the original and saw someone on the subway reading it in English. I thought how in the world could that magnificent book be translated into any other language and get even a quarter of its richness. Since then I've thought why bother reading another foreign work of fiction in English when it is inextricably linked with the language the author wrote it in and you will only be getting a cliffs note version of it. Like the rewriting of Shakespeare into modern English.

I am fluent in GAP.

American here. Speak fluent Mandarin, so well that most people on the phone assume I am Chinese. My husband is Chinese and doesn’t speak much English so that helps.

These days, it is totally possible to learn a foreign language to a highly proficient level without leaving your country, and the one thing that has made it possible is Youtube.

I tried teaching myself French as an adolescent, using nothing more than a Berlitz book full of antiquated vocabulary and phonetic pronunciation guides. Imagine trying to learn French without hearing the actual language! Later, in my twenties (still before the internet existed as it does today), I bought the Foreign Service Institute French course on cassette and did that diligently on my own for about a year. That got me proficient enough to be placed directly in an advanced conversation course at the Alliance Francaise, but I was still far from fluent, and couldn't understand even half of what I heard (when I watched a film for example). I spent 2 years taking one course or another at AF, but a course twice a week 90 minutes at a time didn't do much to improve my French beyond a certain level. I had one French cable channel (TV5) which I watched from time to time, but the shows were boring as hell and always seemed to be about Africa, and I also rented movies occasionally. The thing is, "occasionally" is NOT good enough. My french reached a plateau and stayed there (I'm talking about oral comprehension, my reading comprehension was excellent).

A few years ago, I decided to take advantage of Youtube to master French once and for all, and started watching French videos 2 hours a day. It only took about a month to where my comprehension was almost effortless. It's a lot easier to force yourself to watch things in your target language when you can find things that interest you. I enjoy watching real murder mysteries, so I watch Faites entrer l'accusé, and I like watching documentaries (which tend to be the easiest thing to understand since the journalistic voices are so clear), so I watch Complément d'enquête and Envoyé spécial. I also feel less guilty about indulging my love for trash TV when I do it in French and like watching C'est mon choix, with topics like "My appearance scares people" or "I stole my best friend's man". But my favorite thing is to search for lurid topics like human trafficking and serial killers and watch them in French. At this point Youtube is pretty good at suggesting things in French that might interest me.

Now you may think my French ability is merely passive, since I've mostly just been watching stuff instead of speaking the language. Surprisingly enough, merely watching TV has helped my fluency tremendously. I used to speak a lot more haltingly before, and often had to pause to translate stuff from English in my head before proceeding. I don't have to do that anymore, I can just speak without preparation.

Encouraged by my results in French, I started on the same video watching regimen in Spanish (after establishing a critical mass of vocabulary using resources on the internet). I found Spanish a lot easier to understand than French was at the beginning and I now speak and understand Spanish just as well as French even though I spent a lot less time formally learning it. Just spent a month in Madrid and Andalucia speaking Spanish the entire time.

Now OP, I acquired a lot of my vocabulary through reading, but learning Japanese poses a special problem, since reading Japanese is an undertaking in and of itself. So I'm not sure how you can easily acquire the vocabulary to understanding spoken Japanese. At any rate, I'm interested in learning Japanese and Mandarin myself.

I speak English and Italian fluently and advanced French.

R34 Do you use Mandarin at work? I am trying to assess how useful it mught be.

Because I live in Metro Detroit, I can speak some Arabic and Albanian. I took French and Spanish in school. I can understand my native Italian neighbor because of this, but can't say much back.

I love answering in a speaker's native language when they don't expect it though.

I yelled at some kids to stop playing football in my yard. Their mother knocked on the door and accused me of being prejudiced against Arabs (in English). When I answered her in Arabic she turned red and walked away.

I don't hate anyone except bratty tween boys.

I found as well the documentaries on 5 are invariably about Africa which become tiresome when they are dealing always with the same topics of hunger, poverty and disease. French colonial guilt?

Because the French speak so rapidly and use so much slang I love when there are literal word for word subtitles in French for the hearing impaired and I as well find junk tv incredibly helpful the kind of stuff I would never watch on American TV. You have to avoid the English subtitles because not only will they not help you learn but they will be sometimes a general idea of what is being said.

[quote]I as well find junk tv incredibly helpful the kind of stuff I would never watch on American TV.

Watching Hogan's Héros dubbed into German every afternoon in Frankfurt was worth more to me than a semester of college German.

[quote] Well my father was born and raised in Italy and so were all my grand parents. But being that they all became American citizens before I was born thereby nulling their own Italian citizenship there is nothin to pass on to me. It hurt.

Eh. If you're gay, you're really not missing out on all that much. Trust me.

English - 5 (native); Russian, Swedish - 4 (Superior). Spanish - 3 (Superior). A bunch of others 2 (Advanced).

Movie Quotes - Off the charts.

R40 I've spent enough time in Italy to know the homophobia is perhaps the worst in Europe. It's through the roof. Despite many of their greatest artists of whom they are very proud being gay.

if I speak in tongues, does that make me a cunning linguist?

R42, I don't know if I would say it's worse than some of those Eastern European countries, but of all the non-Iron Curtain European nations, it definitely is, unfortunately.

Watashi no nihongo wa kanari hidoi desu.

You have chosen a difficult language to learn. You have to work hard to memorize hiragana, katakana, and kanji.

I wish you luck!

Six, actually.

Thanks r35...good post.

I would like to learn Italian, but I have no one to speak with. Two firends of Italian heritage are from New York and use Southern Italian slang.

I really envy thos who are really fluent in several different languages.

My native language is German. As a child I had to learn Russian, but I still hate the language (sorry, Russians!) and am barely able to even read Russian anymore. Later then I've learned English, and it is the only language I'm fluent in (it's OK, but I wish I would be better....). Then I've also learned Latin (made my Latinum), but have forgotten nearly everything. But I still have a sense for latin grammar. And the last one is French: had started to learn French but gave up after 7 or so lessons because I couldn't pronounce anything- it was too difficult for me. Nevertheless I'm quite good with guessing what a written French sentences means; at least sometimes....

For those of you learning patiently and diligently another language: here is something to look forward to:

For people saying they want to find someone to coverse with more often. This website and others like it was recommended to me.

You can pay a freelance native speaker to practice conversational speaking with you for $10-$25 an hour. Many languages are available.

I've been working on learning Spanish for awhile now, but I'm afraid it just isn't coming naturally to me. My reading comprehension is improving much faster than my verbal skills. If I can see a written sentence, I can figure it out a bit, but to converse with someone, I don't think I'll ever get there. I can't 1) listen to what is being said; 2) figure out what the hell they just said; 3) figure out what I want to say in response; 4) translate it into Spanish, and then 5) verbally respond. If you aren't exposed to learning other languages while young, it can be very frustrating.

I speak Spanish fairly well, and can get by in French and Italian. I took some German and Latin in college. But languages that don't use "our" alphabet are challenging. I'm a visual learner and need to see things to grasp and understand them.

Yes, several. Two slavic, German and a couple of romance languages with varying degrees of fluency. I'm American, not "wuropean". Thanks for that one!

Why bother folks?

American/non-Wuropean here, and I speak 4 languages including English. My advice would be to try a language app like Duolingo to help you build a foundation of the basics in your target language. Duolingo allows you to set your own pace and customize the app to your learning style, and is sort of set up like a game where you score "points" to help keep you motivated. It's actually very effective, and includes audio files from native speakers to help with verbal comprehension. It's best to do it for a few minutes every day, and when you feel you've reached a certain point of profiency, you can continue to build upon your newfound knowledge with other supplements and materials.

Dating a native-speaker is probably the best, fastest, and cheapest way to learn a language, especially listening and speaking. More helpful if you guys quarrel a lot.

On NPR, they have a link to listen to news stories in "slow" French, Italian etc. I havnt used it in awhile but it was good

R54 why bother to learn a musical instrument?

R54 Machine translation is probably serviceable dealing with Romance languages, but it doesn't really work between languages that are so different, such as English and Chinese.

English of course, advance level Spanish, and even I'd say intermediate Italian. You can tell Spanish was impacted by Muslims, while Italian skews closer to Vulgar Latin. Even know a few words in Russian.

Now computer languages - PHP, Python, C++, JavaScript, VBA.

R54 A command of languages broadens your mind, your intellect and your ability to communicate. Americans have a terrible habit of isolationism, which American English (a terrible, butchered and dumbed down version of English) promotes. You don't get a view of the world other than your own shopping mall understanding of events.

You are unable to understand anything that's happening more than 50 miles from you. Like most Americans, you are paranoid about everything, friendly countries, unfriendly countries. You can't distinguish one from the other. You've lumped the entire world into "enemies".

Well, the consequences of ignorance as unfolding. The world is moving on without America. Soon, unless you do speak several other languages you'll find there are poor job choices unless you want to be one of the Amazon robot pickers in a mammoth warehouse somewhere.

Portuguese as a native language, English as a second language, have a fairly good knowledge of Spanish and can understand some French. Want to learn Hebrew and improve my french now

German. I can read Ancient Greek and Latin (and speak it aloud when reading it), but I don't know that I could actually converse in it, as it really isn't taught that way in the US.

I speak three languages, Hungarian (native), English and German (both fluent). I took 4 years Italian and 1 year Latin at school/college but I don't count those because my level is basic.

My parents were Irish and French but we lived in Switzerland so I went to a German-speaking school. Then we moved to London. So I spoke Irish and French at home but German then English elsewhere. As I never actually learned Irish formally I can't read or write it. Though we also had relatives who lived in Sweden and we used to spend all our holidays there so I became fluent in Swedish (which is a relatively easy language to learn for English/German speakers). At school in London I didn't need to attend French or German lessons so did Swedish instead so I'm one of very few people with a Swedish GCSE.

R64 And, really. Who would your practice your Latin on? Trump is deporting all of them.

R66 Wait, he even deports the poor old Romans?

I can speak German moderately well. I'm trying to learn to read a little Middle High German, mostly so I can read the Minnesang poets (such as Walther von der Vogelweide, pictured below) in the original.

I have a passable reading knowledge of Italian and Chinese. Trying to learn some Latin.

Would love to learn to read Greek someday.

R67 I hear a wind, whispering ROME If you WANT TO!

(Just not here. Over there). ROME AROUND THE WORLD. (Just not here. Over there) ROME AROUND THE WORLD

Yes, but I was raised in two languages, so I have never had to start from scratch by taking classes.

Gaeilge (Irish) is my native language, having grown up in a Gaeltacht. I speak English and my sister and I had our own language when we were very young.

R35 I use the same method. I generally only watch tv and movies in French, including trashy shows and movies I would not usually consume in English. My bf is perfectly bilingual in both English and French, so he is also a good resource for vocab and idioms. He doesn’t like speaking to me in French or watching any French content, though (despite it being his native language!)

Do you think it's because he doesn't want to hear your French? Salaud!

R27, there are a couple of different routes to obtain Italian citizenship “by blood”. I think there are 4 or 5 different scenarios. The one I qualify under is: grandfather born in Italy, mother born in the US, neither grandfather nor mother ever renounced Italian citizenship and I was born after Jan. 1, 1948.

It’s a real labyrinth of paperwork. I’ve been working on it for about a year getting various documents from Italy and from states where parents, grandparents and myself have lived and getting them all authenticated. I’m almost at the end of the road in the document acquisition. Then all the US generated documents have to be translated into Italian. I have an appointment at the Italian consulate for my formal interview but not until July 2020. The consulate in San Francisco, which covers the west coast, is booking appointments 2 years out.

It’s a hellish amount of work but knowing that when it’s done I’ll have that Italian/EU passport and will be able to live anywhere in the EU makes it all worthwhile.

^^^you won't be able to live in my country. Not by the time you're done 🤘

English, French and Spanish

Es yay, I ay ooh day. Ank thay ou yay or fay asking ay.

R73 Hah, possibly! He probably finds it a bit of a chore to speak with me. I don't use French slang when I speak like his friends do, so my manner of speaking probably seems overly formal. In general, he just seems to prefer English, despite having done all his schooling in French. I try to suggest watching shows or movies in French, but he's not interested.

r35 Thank you for these suggestions! I've just subscribed to these channels on youtube to help my own French..