Current Events > I do not understand people that can speak multiple languages.

(+) Yeah! (+)

Motherfuckers out there know how to speak 4 languages. Meanwhile, I don't have the extra brain capacity to even learn a second one. Foreign language classes were always my weakness and after all those years, it's clearly not paying off...
I'm perfectly content being an ignorant, monolingual American.

just try harder, i speak 3 fluently and im stoopid

I doubt very many people truly learn a second language from taking foreign language courses in school. The best way to learn is to be immersed in it, which is one of the reasons why the places that tend to be multilingual tend to be relatively small countries directly next to countries that speak completely different language. Large and isolated countries tend to be monolingual simply because there's no need.

I speak 3 languages, but that's mainly due to living in a bilingual country along with growing up on English media

If you learn Spanish then Portuguese, Italian and French aren't too hard to learn.

KhlavicLanguage posted...

just try harder, i speak 3 fluently and im stoopid

Did you learn them as a child or grownup? If its grownup, can you give any tips to people who want to learn a new language as an adult that isnt practice and repetition?

You have to learn the languages before you can understand them

s0nicfan posted...

I doubt very many people truly learn a second language from taking foreign language courses in school. The best way to learn is to be immersed in it, which is one of the reasons why the places that tend to be multilingual tend to be relatively small countries directly next to countries that speak completely different language. Large and isolated countries tend to be monolingual simply because there's no need.

I'm going to Ecuador in a couple of days and for the past 4-5 or so months, I've been trying to brush up on my Spanish. I took A LOT of notes, but I don't completely understand a lot of this stuff.

Another 3 language guy here. It helps if there's some kind of love interest. It did for me at least.

Kitt posted...

I'm going to Ecuador in a couple of days and for the past 4-5 or so months, I've been trying to brush up on my Spanish. I took A LOT of notes, but I don't completely understand a lot of this stuff.

Watch Spanish TV. Talk back to the TV. You want to get as close to total immersion as you can.

[LFAQs-redacted-quote]

Ive been dating your wife for months and Im not any better at Spanish

Kitt posted...

I do not understand people that can speak multiple languages.

That's probably because of them speaking in several languages.

s0nicfan posted...

I doubt very many people truly learn a second language from taking foreign language courses in school. The best way to learn is to be immersed in it, which is one of the reasons why the places that tend to be multilingual tend to be relatively small countries directly next to countries that speak completely different language. Large and isolated countries tend to be monolingual simply because there's no need.

This. I'm bilingual, and I learned both languages primarily from being around it all the time. You just start copying words and expressions you hear, and you're practicing it in a daily basis. I took French as a third language for 3 years, and I'm no where close to fluency.

DrizztLink posted...

That's probably because of them speaking in several languages.

That was partly the joke I was making with that, yeah.

I tried to learn Japanese but kanji fucked me up lol

5 languages here

I speak 5, and I a dumb American. Well technically I was born in Tel Aviv so I'm dual, but I'd defo choose America if I had too.

Also it helps when you learn them as a kid. I learned French/Italian as an adult. Was pretty hard.

Spoke Hebrew, Spanish and English in the house as a kid so it's kinda like I've always known them.

LordYeezus posted...

I tried to learn Japanese but kanji fucked me up lol

@MachineJaipur does this mean lesbian?

Probably my greatest academic weakness. Great with everything else, but I've always been painfully slow with learning a second language. My Spanish is just good enough for small talk.

Kitt posted...

I'm going to Ecuador in a couple of days and for the past 4-5 or so months, I've been trying to brush up on my Spanish. I took A LOT of notes, but I don't completely understand a lot of this stuff.

When I went to Ecuador, I was dependent on my mom and grandmother. They weren't able to teach me Spanish as a child because of my dad (he's not Spanish). No one speaks English there so you might need to depend on a translator. I went there to visit family in Quito, traveled to the beach in Manta, and spent a night in Guayaquil.

Guide posted...

Probably my greatest academic weakness. Great with everything else, but I've always been painfully slow with learning a second language. My Spanish is just good enough for small talk.

That's pretty much how its been for me in terms of academics. Except, I don't even think I can trust myself with small talk.

I can speak 4 fluently and 2 others broken.

MICHALECOLE posted...

Did you learn them as a child or grownup?

2 as a child, 1 as an adult. all three are from pretty different language families so i didn't have some sort of massive vocabulary "discount" on any of them (i.e. spanish speaker learning italian)

MICHALECOLE posted...

If its grownup, can you give any tips to people who want to learn a new language as an adult that isnt practice and repetition?

try to dedicate some sort of bare-minimum time to spend on it daily, even just 15 minutes. it'll keep you accountable and likely create a desire to spend more time on it. most importantly it keeps you from falling off the wagon entirely.

another thing is you probably don't have to spend more than $100 in total to learn any major language to a high-intermediate level. there's a crapton of free/cheap materials, podcasts, MOOCs, etc out there. don't drop hundreds on a course, and don't get private coaching until you're already fairly proficient and just want to push higher.

and don't listen to people expounding about immersion, you can reach B2 (https://tracktest.eu/english-levels-cefr/) in your bedroom in any language. immersion is for ironing out the small niche kinks that keep you sounding foreign, not for learning to communicate.

The reason I know how to speak Vietnamese and Spanish because I was exposed to both of those languages when I was younger. It's easier to learn them young than it is when you're older.

Ive slowly been learning Russian over the past few years. Learned a lot by listening to Russian bands and watching Russian TV shows.

What always throws me is the different alphabet but I can have basic conversations albeit in Russglish.

electricbugs2 posted...

Ive slowly been learning Russian over the past few years. Learned a lot by listening to Russian bands and watching Russian TV shows.

What always throws me is the different alphabet but I can have basic conversations albeit in Russglish.

!!

I just know some Spanish and German words.

But if I try to put them in a coherent sentence or response then I'd sound like a idiot.

But to be fair many doesn't know what I mean when I say Nein or Ja.

Damn_Underscore posted...

You have to learn the languages before you can understand them

I was expecting the first post to be a joke somewhat of this nature too

trs desol

MICHALECOLE posted...

@MachineJaipur does this mean lesbian?

Kanji is the alphabet I believe or a word for the entire writing system

I don't understand people that can speak multiple languages either.

Except when they speak English.

MachineJaipur posted...

Kanji is the alphabet I believe or a word for the entire writing system

They mostly use hiragana though

MachineJaipur posted...

Kanji is the alphabet I believe or a word for the entire writing system

kanji is the japanese word for chinese characters that they use for 50% of their words. Japanese names are almost always written in kanji, for example. Common nouns: mountain, dog, river, rain, cherry blossom, tree, etc. are going to be kanji.

hiragana was developed as a phonetic system. most particles, parts of speech, "helping words," grammatical conventions, etc. are going to be in hiragana. Kids learn to do everything in hirigana and things like video games used hiragana for speech because it's easier to put an alphabet on an NES cart than 3000 chinese characters, plus kanji looked bad in 8-bit. In terms of accessability, the government requires that important documents (i.e. taxes, voting, stuff, products, safety text) need to have the hiragana pronunciation written over the kanji. this helps less-literate japanese speakers.

katakana is another phonetic alphabet. foreign words (like computer, hamburger) and western names are going to be written in katakana "Super Mario Bros." is written in katakana, for example. Because katakana is the "cleanest" of the systems it's often used in advertising and brands because it looks cool and is less squiggly.

finally they also consider the latin alphabet as "romanji" (i.e. Roman or Latin) and consider it japanese's 4th writing system. you can write any japanese sentence in the latin alphabet, for example, and this can let a japanese person write in japanese on a western typewriter/keyboard.