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What additional languages can you speak and/or read?

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T

Tabris

Member
What additional languages can you speak and/or read?

I can speak and read just a tad of German. I know a couple handfuls of sentences in Japanese but cannot read anything. And whatever I subconsciously remember from sleeping during mandatory French classes in middle school.

I'm going to Asia to live abroad for a year, and while I can get by learning just a couple Thai phrases and brushing up on some of my Japanese phrases - I want to learn Mandarin for trip to Shanghai and Beijing.

What have been great ways you've been able to learn another language outside taking an actual course(s)? Any great apps lately that teach you through it and can recognize your speech back to let you know how your pronunciation is coming?
 
N

Numb

Member
Speak and read swedish,swahili and somali. Read arabic but can't understand much anymore
School mostly outside of the mother tongue
 
M

m3r4

Dufter Typ taking lurking to the next level
German, English, Japanese fluently.

Some French, currently learning Spanish.
 
B

bluethree

Member
Japanese - fluent/almost professional level
Korean - (rusty since I haven't used it in a while) conversational

I started learning Chinese a couple years back but got distracted, really want to get back into it.
 
P

Princess Viola

Member
I've been studying Spanish for over a year now because I'm Puerto Rican and I know some Japanese phrases and sentences, but can't read it.
 
A

AtomskEater

Member
Japanese. Just a little. I know enough to work through children's book with a dictionary and a little elbow grease and some videogames with a dictionary and a lot of elbow grease. Need to get back to studying it, I wanted to pass the JLPT N3 last year but fell off track halfway through the year.
 
M

Matsukaze

Member
I'm decent at reading French but I sound like a clod speaking it.

I also know a tiny bit of Irish thanks to my mom.

I've been interested in learning the basics of German in my spare time, but I haven't really begun any research.
 
C

Currygan

at last, for christ's sake
I sorta understand French, but only when spoken VERY slowly. Same as Italian due to a friend who teached us for fun and we grasped a lot of it. I can read both languages with sufficient ease. Obviously nobody would ever understand what I'm saying due to a superheavy cockney
 
R

Renekton

Member
- Fluent in Mandarin and English.
- Passable in Malay (national language which has zero practical use).

I wonder if I should try to brush up on my written Mandarin or learn Japanese.
 
M

m3r4

Dufter Typ taking lurking to the next level
Tabris said:
How are you learning it?
Click to expand...

I use DuoLingo for the most part, since it's the most motivating (because game-like) option to me. I also asked Spanish-speaking friends to try and not use English when we talk so I can get used to conversational patterns.

The occasional conversation between my "Spanish self" and my "French self" is probably not too effective, but it helps to keep the languages present in my mind.
 
E

Einchy

semen stains the mountaintops
Spanish since I was born in Mexico but I have a really hard time reading it and I pretty much can't write it.
 
S

Samus4145

Member
I am very slowly learning Filipino. Understanding it is much easier than pronouncing words, as some of the syllables needed don't exist in English.
 
N

Nathan_Drake

Member
Native English.
Was taught Farsi and then Urdu in the military. So I can understand Dari as well and some Punjabi and other regional languages. Hindi is almost the same as Urdu except I can't read it but use to enjoy bollywood films. I can read any Arabic script but not know what it means exactly but since they have 3 letter root systems I usually can pick up on the base meanings.
 
F

Fou-Lu

Member
I have a very small amount of both French and Japanese. The French is from being Canadian, the Japanese from college courses. Not fluent in either.
 
N

NinjaCoachZ

Member
Lately I've been trying to study more French again (since being in Ontario, we learn it in school but never use it elsewhere). I can read and translate written sentences without too much difficulty and can form some basic sentences myself but I have to work on my speaking/grammatical and listening abilities. I have a Harrap's dictionary which is SUPER helpful. Hopefully I can be fully fluent in a bit, that's a goal of mine.

Studying Spanish in university too. Was thinking of starting to finally bite the bullet on Japanese this fall, I wonder if I can pull that off (I've got hiragana on lock and am working on katakana - doing both in my spare time for fun).
 
I

ItIsOkBro

Member
m3r4 said:
I use DuoLingo for the most part, since it's the most motivating (because game-like) option to me. I also asked Spanish-speaking friends to try and not use English when we talk so I can get used to conversational patterns.

The occasional conversation between my "Spanish self" and my "French self" is probably not too effective, but it helps to keep the languages present in my mind.
Click to expand...

Hmm that site seems pretty cool thanks for sharing.
 
M

Matt Attack

Member
I've been studying Japanese for almost two years now (university courses), so I can read and speak a bit of it. I've also retained a decent amount of Spanish from middle and high school courses. I'd like to end up attaining fluency in both languages eventually.
 
T

Tabris

Member
m3r4 said:
I use DuoLingo for the most part, since it's the most motivating (because game-like) option to me. I also asked Spanish-speaking friends to try and not use English when we talk so I can get used to conversational patterns.

The occasional conversation between my "Spanish self" and my "French self" is probably not too effective, but it helps to keep the languages present in my mind.
Click to expand...

I wonder if there's an equivalent for asian languages?
 
H

hazukash

Member
Native French speaker. I took Spanish for 5 years in high school, but I never really enjoyed it. Still, I'd say I'm at an intermediate level - my best friends are Spanish speakers so it helps. I'm actively learning Japanese (studying for the JLPT 2) as well as Swedish to talk with my in-laws. Duolingo and online flash card sites are very helpful. I also know some random German. I might learn Dutch and Mandarin eventually too.
 
M

m3r4

Dufter Typ taking lurking to the next level
Tabris said:
I wonder if there's an equivalent for asian languages?
Click to expand...

Before I started studying Japanese at Uni, I tought myself Hiragana, Katakana and thirty or so Kanji via TheJapanesePage. It gave me a nice buffer in the first couple of weeks.

As somewhat of a logical next step, I also tried to learn some Korean after becoming moderately fluent in Japanese. Talk to me in Korean has lessons as audio files accompanied by pdfs and they were always quite entertaining. Unfortunately, I never really got anywhere beyond self introduction and one-liners, but the site itself is highly recommendable imo.

... Chinese I gave up after a week, the four intonations were doing my head in.

Both services aren't as interactive as DuoLingo, but well-structured and diverse in what they have to offer.
 
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Hypron

Member
French is my mother tongue but I don't speak any other additional language. I did a couple of years of German in school but I don't remember much of it sadly :mad:
 
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Naughty_Doge

Member
Spanish. It's my mother tongue so...yeah.

English. I can read, understand and speak it with no trouble.

Italian. I can read and understand it for the most part. I can speak it well enough but the problem is my lack of vocabulary.

German. I can read German without much trouble, but I have a hard time understanding any text or conversation above basic level since I'm a beginner.

Once I'm done with German (not anytime soon) I want to learn Mandarin.
 
T

Tabris

Member
Hazaku said:
iTalki is getting popular for it.
Click to expand...

That's basically just a service that connects per hour cost language teachers to you for Skype sessions. Seems like average cost is $20 an hour.

I rather have a DuoLingo like option with game-like bite-sized lessons.
 
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