MH FEATURED POLL #22: What languages do you speak?

[whitegrey 115]

1st: German (Bonus: Austrian dialect )

2nd: English

[ghost 2687]

English and Korean yo!

My English is stronger though.

 

In college I've studied enough Japanese to read, write, and speak, but have since lost much of my skills due to not using it. 

 

한국 말 합니다. 짜짠. (I speak Korean. Tada.).

[Spectralion 394]

My native, Javanese, Indonesian, and not-so-good-English for online stuff.

Yeah, We Indonesian people have many languages in our country.

Basically in my hometown, if you use Indonesian languages, you'll be considered as "city boy".

[JukaForever 758]

English mainly but I can do conversational Tagalog (Filipino dialect). I say conversational because my vocab is quite limited to 5th grade level and many longer words confounds me.

[Duwang 676]

I'm American so I'm an English native.

 

I majored in Japanese graduated from my university with a degree in it almost 2 weeks ago.
I haven't taken the actual JLPT but based on practice tests I'd say that my reading level is about N2 level and my speaking is N3. 
I'm looking to live and work in Japan so I'm hoping to achieve fluency one day.

 

I studied Mandarin Chinese for 3 years in high school. My teacher was Taiwanese so I learned traditional characters

I took a placement test in college and managed to place into intermediate level courses but I haven't done anything since then so I'm extremely rusty, but I'd really love to get back into it. At my prime I was able to interpret for a friend when she had to go to the DMV.

[fitear1590 2414]

English is my mother tongue, but I'm also fluent in German after studying (also abroad) in college. I even teach beginner-level German right now!

I took Spanish for five semesters in high school and, despite not being able to speak it very well anymore, I have retained a surprising amount of vocabulary over the years! I also took three semesters of Japanese in college, but my speaking skills have diminished quite a bit since then. I still know my kana (I don't think I'll ever forget this) and a fair amount of the kanji I learned.

[eiheartx 1310]

 

I'm totally astonished by the majority of you who took french lessons at school, I didn't know that it was so "popular" to be an option.

 

[zombiesatemycereal 64]

Native English, studying Spanish and Korean. Grew up with half of my family speaking Spanish which has helped a lot I feel like I can understand 50% of what's being said, but still have a long way to go. Need to find a better way to balance studying both. 

[PsychoΔelica 648]

 

I'm totally astonished by the majority of you who took french lessons at school, I didn't know that it was so "popular" to be an option.

 

 

[AmberKid 0]

German is my mother tongue, but since I grew up bi-lingual, my English is fluent...funny enough I adapt to my conversational partners, I switch between accents, which can be rather confusing for listeners.

 

I had four years of Latin in school, I don't count it as an "active" language, though.

 

I had two years of French in school too, but I hardly speak it.

 

I studied Japanese for three years, but I forgot much of it. Time to get back to learning. And I still have Korean on my "Want to learn"-List.

[anakuro 847]

English is my mother tongue

 

However, I studied Japanese for two (..and a half) years a school and then it was self study now I've lived here so long. Some days are of course better than others lol 

 

Fun fact about my Japanese: I speak in a very uncommon dialect. But, I'm told it's cute that I speak in a rural dialect...

[The Piass 3472]

French is my first language. Afterwards, I speak English fluently and a little bit of Spanish and Japanese...

[indigo 389]

Finnish, English. I didn't vote for Swedish because I wanted Finnish to beat them, but that failed.

[DogManX 179]

My native language is DEUTSCHLAND! then I'm fluent in english and also pretty good at french. Half of my family is from Switzerland, but I can't really speak it anymore since late childhood.

 

Used to study italian but I sucked so bad at it there was nothing to come from it...

 

Ey also schpeak austrinn pritti wehl. And some dutch, jonge.

[Kawaii_Minpha 194]

Edit: Message deleted

[MaikoMizu 167]

I sprechen einige Deutsche. I thank my mom for having connections with foreign friends. 
 

I can have a basic conversations in Japanese but not much else. That makes, English, German and Japanese, I guess.

[violetchain 912]

English is my native language and the only one I consider myself fluent in.

 

I studied French from kindergarten to the end of high school, but I'm super rusty and I doubt I could hold a conversation in it even when it was still fresh in my mind.

 

I studied Japanese in university as an elective, and since I come into contact with it every day in one form or another I think I'm getting better at understanding it and my vocabulary is improving a lot, but I haven't practiced writing or speaking it in ages, so I'm probably even worse at those aspects now than I was when I graduated.

[Igyou_Hime 80]

Swedish (native), english and japanese. I used to study french but I've forgotten most of it so I didn't add that ^^'''

[Shir0 1303]

German, English (from school) and I do understand a bit of my parents native language (when I'm being insulted lol) and also can say a few things, ofc swearing

 

 

German its a easy language in my opinion

 

I was born and raised here and this thought never crossed my mind lol probably because of german grammer >_> but nice to see you like it (:

[Visutox 188]

Spanish and Maghrebi Arabic (which is a dialect of Arabic spoken in Maghreb, the one I speak is from Morocco) are my native languages, I learned English and French some years later. I speak these languages fluently (except that I need to improve my English). I also plan to learn two or three more languages (I have Arabic, Catalan and Greek in mind). That's all for me.

[Igyou_Hime 80]

Spanish and Maghrebi Arabic (which is a dialect of Arabic spoken in Maghreb, the one I speak is from Morocco) are my native languages, I learned English and French some years later. I speak these languages fluently (except that I need to improve my English). I also plan to learn two or three more languages (I have Arabic, Catalan and Greek in mind). That's all for me.

I can't understand how people can keep several languages active in their head, it's really impressive to me! I have a hard time keeping the 3 I "know" updated XD

[PsychoΔelica 648]

I speak now 4 languages, and the recently language is german.

 

German its a easy language in my opinion

How much is German similar to English? I know that some words in English are borrowed from German.

[sentarou 112]

Currently Swedish, English and Japanese. Would love to learn Finnish someday.

[Visutox 188]

I can't understand how people can keep several languages active in their head, it's really impressive to me! I have a hard time keeping the 3 I "know" updated XD

You absolutely need to practice 'em if you want to keep 'em "active in your head", otherwise you're gonna struggle the moment you'll try to speak 'em again. Happened to me with Spanish some years ago since I started speaking only in French once I came to live in Belgium. I had a hard time struggling whenever I met spanish speakers (be it my old friends or random people). Music, movies, social networks and stuff are what helped me to keep using Spanish and English and speak 'em fluently (I use the two others every day so yeah). 

 

Forgot to say that I studied Dutch for 10 years but I never managed to make a proper sentence. Would happen the same with German if I tried (even if I dislike it less than Dutch). 

[Champ213 1858]

How much is German similar to English? I know that some words in English are borrowed from German.

 

 

English is basically an offshoot of an early medieval German dialect (the Angles and Saxons came from northern Germany after all), but later they got screwed over by french-speaking Normans, which is why there are a lot of words from medieval French as well. Also, at some point the English decided that all those declinations are just not cool and dropped most of them. And while they were at it, they also shifted half their vowels... but I digress.

 

 

In a nutshell: they are related (both are germanic languages) and are somewhat similar, but have developed quite differently since over 1500 years. I'd say they are similar enough to make it easier to learn one language if you speak the other, but it also can be confusing, because some words may sound similar and even have the same origin, but have developed into very different meanings now.