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St. Jimmy

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My mother language is Italian, and the only foreign language I'm quite good at is English. I can read it well, while I'm not too good at listening it. I'm trying to see movies and series in English to improve it.

 

I have studied German for a couple of years when I was at high school, but had to stop because of lack of time. And I'd love to be able to speak French. I have never studied it but I'm surprisingly good at reading it, probably because it has something in common with both Italian and Genovese, the dialect of my region.

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American English is the only language I speak fluently. My original game plan back in high school was to take 4 years of Latin, but that fell through when the school's only qualified Latin teacher was badly injured in a car accident halfway through my sophomore year and I ended up with two years each of Latin and Spanish. I chose Spanish over German at my mom's suggestion because I used to watch Villa Alegre (sp?) and other bilingual programs on PBS when I was little, and apparently had picked up some vocabulary along with the proper pronunciation back then.

 

And of course, it's been well over 20 years since taking either class. I do remember some bits and pieces of both. And now that I'm working at a fast food place in an area with a large Hispanic population, I've picked up a few more Spanish words and phrases that are useful on the job. Funnily enough, my pronunciation is apparently good enough to make some of the customers think I'm more fluent than I actually am. Most of them seem to appreciate my efforts at better communication. Either that, or they're grinning while trying not to openly laugh at me, but I'd like to think it's the former, anyway. laugh.gif

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I'm fluent in English, but as a child I took French for a few years, but sadly I forgot most of it xd.png. I'd really love to learn French again, as there are quite a few French people who come here to shop and I'd LOVE to understand them better.

 

I'd also love to learn Japanese, Dutch and German as I find them all to be very interesting.

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For me, English is the easiest foreign language to learn. I still have problems with it, but I'm getting better.

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~Topics merged~

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I speak English and Finnish fluently, some Swedish (looking to improve that), some German (that as well). I'd also like to study Japanese and French.

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im gonna be taking Japanese next year that's gonna be a real adventure...

It's not too bad, if you have a knack for languages. At least the pronunciation is pretty straghtforward - it's the grammar that the biggest adventure wink.gif

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Eventually, I would like to be a polyglot. I am starting with Mandarin (It is a tall order for a second language, I know, but I have wanted to learn it since I was very little.). I also want to learn French, Korean, and Irish Gaelic. I probably will throw Japanese in there, too, but that is lower priority for me. Of course, my plans may be thrown off, as I am very open to moving to another country once I get my PhD. I may end up needing to learn a new language due to that!

Yikes! Chinese and English are so different.... Well, actually, the grammar structure has several similarities.

Wow, just wow, so many languages..... Go you!

 

Chinese-English bilingual here, also taking French Lessons, but our teacher unfortunately.... Well, sucks as a teacher.

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My native language is English, and my second language is Esperanto. I am currently also learning Spanish, Dutch, Portuguese, and Turkish.

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Eventually, I would like to be a polyglot. I am starting with Mandarin (It is a tall order for a second language, I know, but I have wanted to learn it since I was very little.). I also want to learn French, Korean, and Irish Gaelic. I probably will throw Japanese in there, too, but that is lower priority for me. Of course, my plans may be thrown off, as I am very open to moving to another country once I get my PhD. I may end up needing to learn a new language due to that!

ohh, good luck!! <33 we share similar aspirations, then--i would love to be a polyglot some day. biggrin.gif

mandarin is a nice language--i wish us both luck! it's really beautiful <333

i can understand and speak chinese, but i'm still working on the reading/writing part, ha : ' D i've found that beginning with the radicals can really help--though admittedly pronunciation is like what even/// even my mom, who is native, admits that the pronunciation is probably the most tricky. grammar is a little less frightening in that regard. xd.png

 

i'm fluent in english, semi in chinese, and taking french and japanese lessons in school. i'm very thankful to be in a really great french class with a teacher who i originally thought didn't care much for us, but somehow two weeks ago she dropped the pin and really started pushing us to the limit--admittedly, grades have dropped somewhat, but we're learning so much it doesn't really matter. <33

my japanese teacher is a little more relaxed, meaning we aren't learning necessarily as much as we could be, but ehh i guess it's all right. i don't want to overwhelm myself with languages : ' D

wtf tho french grammar is so hard

my goal right now is to become fluent in french--i absolutely adore the french language; i think it's just beautiful! the next language on my list would be chinese, since i had an advantage thanks to family, and then japanese since japan is really a lovely place. <33

languages i haven't even started but definitely want to learn in the future are korean, german, spanish, and italian. anything beyond that is probably an impossible dream considering how bad i actually am at languages, but after those i really want to delve a bit into other languages such as afrikaans, russian, and vietnamese.

i'm probably forgetting a few other languages i absolutely love, but right now these are my main goals. xd.png

gahh i love talking about languages so much hh <333

 

a question for you guys: do you believe it's possible to be "naturally gifted" at learning languages? i'm a little iffy on that subject since i believe that if you work hard no matter what advantages you have, you'll eventually come to learn the language, but i have friends who seem to instantly just get whatever it is we're learning and that's had me wondering lately. i still stand by my belief that working hard triumphs all, though. ; v ;

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wtf tho french grammar is so hard

my goal right now is to become fluent in french--i absolutely adore the french language; i think it's just beautiful! the next language on my list would be chinese, since i had an advantage thanks to family, and then japanese since japan is really a lovely place. <33

languages i haven't even started but definitely want to learn in the future are korean, german, spanish, and italian. anything beyond that is probably an impossible dream considering how bad i actually am at languages, but after those i really want to delve a bit into other languages such as afrikaans, russian, and vietnamese.

i'm probably forgetting a few other languages i absolutely love, but right now these are my main goals. xd.png

gahh i love talking about languages so much hh <333

 

a question for you guys: do you believe it's possible to be "naturally gifted" at learning languages? i'm a little iffy on that subject since i believe that if you work hard no matter what advantages you have, you'll eventually come to learn the language, but i have friends who seem to instantly just get whatever it is we're learning and that's had me wondering lately. i still stand by my belief that working hard triumphs all, though. ; v ;

 

I definitely want to learn French, too! It is such a beautiful language! I figure I can learn the most difficult one while I am in school, though. That way I will have extra help. smile.gif I know once you learn one foreign language, learning others is easier. Of course, learning one language in a family makes it easier to learn another in the same family. Depending on how broken my brain feels after Mandarin, I may just do Korean next. I don't think I could learn both Korean and Chinese at the same time, though. They are just close enough that I would get things confused. My brain probably can't compartmentalize them into different languages. It's the same with classes for me. I prefer when classes do not overlap at all in the same semester (like two different ecology classes) because I get things mixed up between them and forget which goes with which class. tongue.gif

 

As far as a natural gift for it, yes I think that people can have such a thing. I think it is more of a combination of a good ear and a good memory, though. I am an accent sponge. I pick up accents very easily. Granted, I pick them up in English, but I am hoping the same will apply as I learn other languages so I can get the accent correctly. I am very aware of what motions my mouth and tongue make, so once I make the sound properly a time or two, I really just have to remember to make that motion again. For me, learning to write foreign characters will be more difficult, as I am not very spatially oriented. I even have a hard time picturing my parents' faces. I can verbally tell you descriptors about them, but I can't bring up a clear picture. I am really hoping the characters will not all just be a bunch of squiggles for me. Haha!

 

Yikes! Chinese and English are so different.... Well, actually, the grammar structure has several similarities.

Wow, just wow, so many languages..... Go you!

 

Chinese-English bilingual here, also taking French Lessons, but our teacher unfortunately.... Well, sucks as a teacher.

I found a Skype buddy to practice with. He is trying to learn English, and I am trying to learn Chinese. His English is better than my Chinese. He has been practising for 3 months. We spent two hours tonight helping each other. It was very fun! smile.gif

 

I do not get the four tones at ALL. Supposedly English has five tones, but it's not something that's taught in school. So I really have no basis to compare it to. Haha! I am hoping to have most of the basic phrases already down (at least as far as speaking them) before I even start the class. Then the class can help me further my pronunciation and work on writing. I am in graduate school probably at least another three years before I get my PhD. I figure I can take a class each semester and keep practicing every night with native speakers and with my husband, who wants to learn it with me. smile.gif for every phrase/word we learn, we are going to start only saying it in Chinese when we speak to one another.

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Just English.

I did try to learn French on a lot of occasions (school, Duolingo) but I never succeeded. I'm just not good with languages that aren't my own.

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Just English.

I did try to learn French on a lot of occasions (school, Duolingo) but I never succeeded. I'm just not good with languages that aren't my own.

It might help if you can find someone to converse with. smile.gif I started studying on my own, but having a native speaker talking to me last night REALLY helped a ton! Just using the words back and forth got them stuck in my mind a lot better.

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Hey, this might be unrelated, but I thought I saw Doom Kitty from Ruby Gloom as your avatar? I loved that show as a kid. I just recently started binge watching it again. smile.gif

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I do not get the four tones at ALL. Supposedly English has five tones, but it's not something that's taught in school. So I really have no basis to compare it to.

Really? I never heard anything of the sort with English.... But I'm not the observant kind, so YMMV.

 

The four tones.... Well, I grew up with Chinese, so I'll probably be really biased in saying that they're easy. There's a flat sound, a up-inflation, an... I call it a valley inflation in English, and the down inflation.

 

Hmm. I think the easiest way to get better at them is to just get the raw sounds and sounding them out in all four inflations repeatedly, then go to pronouncing pinyin.

 

Funnily enough, after getting the basic sound of it down, it's easy to inflate the sound so that you get across a proper tone for something, like a rise for a question, while retaining correct pronunciation.

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Really? I never heard anything of the sort with English.... But I'm not the observant kind, so YMMV.

 

The four tones.... Well, I grew up with Chinese, so I'll probably be really biased in saying that they're easy. There's a flat sound, a up-inflation, an... I call it a valley inflation in English, and the down inflation.

 

Hmm. I think the easiest way to get better at them is to just get the raw sounds and sounding them out in all four inflations repeatedly, then go to pronouncing pinyin.

 

Funnily enough, after getting the basic sound of it down, it's easy to inflate the sound so that you get across a proper tone for something, like a rise for a question, while retaining correct pronunciation.

The guy I have been chatting over Skype with was trying to say each tone. Two I can hear distinctly on their own but have trouble when they are in a word. The other two sound alike to me... I can't hear the difference. I'm not sure if it is due to the microphone rather than being true to life, or if my ear is just not used to picking it up.

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I definitely want to learn French, too! It is such a beautiful language! I figure I can learn the most difficult one while I am in school, though. That way I will have extra help. smile.gif I know once you learn one foreign language, learning others is easier. Of course, learning one language in a family makes it easier to learn another in the same family. Depending on how broken my brain feels after Mandarin, I may just do Korean next. I don't think I could learn both Korean and Chinese at the same time, though. They are just close enough that I would get things confused. My brain probably can't compartmentalize them into different languages. It's the same with classes for me. I prefer when classes do not overlap at all in the same semester (like two different ecology classes) because I get things mixed up between them and forget which goes with which class. tongue.gif

 

As far as a natural gift for it, yes I think that people can have such a thing. I think it is more of a combination of a good ear and a good memory, though. I am an accent sponge. I pick up accents very easily. Granted, I pick them up in English, but I am hoping the same will apply as I learn other languages so I can get the accent correctly. I am very aware of what motions my mouth and tongue make, so once I make the sound properly a time or two, I really just have to remember to make that motion again. For me, learning to write foreign characters will be more difficult, as I am not very spatially oriented. I even have a hard time picturing my parents' faces. I can verbally tell you descriptors about them, but I can't bring up a clear picture. I am really hoping the characters will not all just be a bunch of squiggles for me. Haha!

french is amazing, yes!! <33

ahh yeah the only reason i can learn french and japanese at the same time is that they're so different, and even then i confuse them sometimes--such as when counting, my brain just supplies whatever language i think of first so i'll say stuff like une, deux, san, yon, cinq, and people will look at me like what are you doing

i'm okay with learning chinese with both since i have help at home and it's quite similar to japanese, in a good way ; v ;

 

ahh yea definitely--having a good memory is amazing for languages! i think a major part of learning a language really is studying hard, though, and reviewing often--there's so much to learn that it's important to keep going everyday for a long time. ^^

ahaha yeah the characters do take a while! have you learnt the radicals? they do wonders for helping understand a character and remember what it means.

i'm okay both with listening and writing; it's easy for me to remember things both spoken and written. i could do a little more work on the 'studying everyday' factor, though : ' D

 

the four tones are strange, even for me--i always miss the second one that slants upwards, for some reason. it just doesn't click for me and it frustrates me to no end bc speaking chinese comes naturally to me due to family but when i actually try to think and break it down then i get all confused bc it's like "i've been doing this all along but why actually"

something that helps me with the tones is to, rather than trying to memorize all four, pick random characters and say them and try to figure out the tone. maybe it's just me, but through that i get a better sense of how they're used and what they have in common with each other.

it's definitely good to have a native speaker, though!! i need to find someone who speaks french or japanese . . . i'd love to have a conversation! / v \

one thing i really dislike is how--it doesn't happen often, but i can think of a few--sometimes people look down on you for speaking in a language that you don't know too well. i have a teacher that absolutely despises the korean transfer students because their english isn't that good and i'm like 'wtf it's like their second or third language try to understand a bit won't you'

 

having languages is super fun--though it's hard to stick to one sometimes xd.png when i speak/write, i use the first word to come to mind so it'll come out originally as a mess of all four until i can find one language to stick with. xd.png

 

psst if you'd like to have a convo sometime i'd love that!!

Edited by Lady_Lunevis

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Day two of conversation with my new Chinese Skype pal!

 

My pronunciation is getting a little better. He is able to understand some of what I am saying without me typing it out and having him correct every little thing I say. I am starting to remember a few of the phrases without looking them up. I made an Excel document with the English word or phrase, the pinyin spelling, my own pronunciation guide, and the characters. I am not really ready to learn the characters yet, but I figure seeing them won't hurt me. So far I can recognize the characters for zia jian, and nothing else. I call zia "house with a crooked leg" and jian is "little person dancing in a room". I know that sounds stupid, but it helps me pick them out from other characters. (~ - _ - )~

 

Having someone to converse with makes it so much easier and more fun! We have very slow conversations (as he stops to tell me what a word or phrase is, and I help correct his pronunciation), but it is still so much nicer than trying to learn from a book. I look forward to it rather than thinking of it as studying. I see it as making a friend and learning his language so we can be better friends. biggrin.gif Today I learned how to say different colours, different types of tea, that I like to drink tea, that I like to read books, to ask how much something costs, and how to be rude and tell someone to shut up. *Giggles* I also learned how to say I hate someone, just in case I ever get really angry (sheng qi) at someone. tongue.gif We had a lot of fun just talking and learning whatever came up, then practising it and using it again in conversation. I think for every language I learn, I am going to try to find someone to practice with like this!

Edited by harlequinraven

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Oooh yey, that sounds lovely! I'm not that social, so I wonder if I could find a person to help me with french like that...

 

Uh, what's zia jian supposed to mean? Zai jian/再见?

 

Haha, that's a great way to memorize Chinese characters, mainly because it has some sort of logic to its appearance like that. Wu/舞/dance, for instance, is supposed to be a person in costume dancing... Well, the top part of it is probably a "it is pronounced like this ((無)) word", but the bottom half makes the character look like it's dancing. v(happy.gif)v

 

Apparently west/xi/西 is supposed to be a bird settling into its nest, but I can't tell by a glance. I guess it would be easier with oracle bone script?

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Eventually, I would like to be a polyglot. I am starting with Mandarin (It is a tall order for a second language, I know, but I have wanted to learn it since I was very little.). I also want to learn French, Korean, and Irish Gaelic. I probably will throw Japanese in there, too, but that is lower priority for me. Of course, my plans may be thrown off, as I am very open to moving to another country once I get my PhD. I may end up needing to learn a new language due to that!

Being a ployglot would be amazing!

 

I'm only fluent in American English but I'm trying to learn German in Duolingo. It's not too bad so far. I never realized German and English were so similar.

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Eventually, I would like to be a polyglot. I am starting with Mandarin (It is a tall order for a second language, I know, but I have wanted to learn it since I was very little.). I also want to learn French, Korean, and Irish Gaelic. I probably will throw Japanese in there, too, but that is lower priority for me. Of course, my plans may be thrown off, as I am very open to moving to another country once I get my PhD. I may end up needing to learn a new language due to that!

Nice! Out of curiosity, are you also learning how to write in traditional or simplified?

 

I'm learning Mandarin right now \o I used to go to a Cantonese school, but I understand more Cantonese than what I can speak (if that makes sense ;u;).

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Well,first language is Romanian.Then I speak English,but I sometimes have random bursts of mistakes,though I know how to say something I want (yet I doubt myself). These two are my best.

 

As languages I want to learn and I know a bit of there are:

German (lovely accent,I love powerful sounding languages.Also,German people are lovely ^^ )

Flamande

Greek

French (used to speak it well,but I almost forgot it now and I want to start again)

Norwegian

Italian

Spanish

 

The list goes on and isn't in a certain order

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