I'm just wondering how many multilingual people are on Southperry.
[b]How many languages can you hold a five minute conversation in with a native speaker?[/b]
[b]Which languages?[/b]
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[b]How did you acquire these languages?[/b]
I'm just wondering how many multilingual people are on Southperry.
[b]How many languages can you hold a five minute conversation in with a native speaker?[/b]
[b]Which languages?[/b]
-
-
[b]How did you acquire these languages?[/b]
I speak 3. English, Malay, and Chinese.
I learnt English and Chinese already at home, Malay is a must because it is my country's main language.
I speak English, of course, and Lao.
Lao from my parents, English from my sister, TV, school (primary education).
I kinda know some French, 4 years of study in high school, and Japanese, a year of study in college, but I've never actively engaged a native speaker in conversation in these languages before (despite spending most of the year in Montreal, though Quebec French and Standard French taught in schools have some differences), so I'm not sure how well I could articulate myself in those languages.
-3
-English, Turkish and Dutch fluently.
I could do some basic German and Arab.
-Turkish is my native language.
I learned Dutch in like 2 weeks. I was very young when we moved to Holland.
Every year I go to Turkey. My parents used to send me to Koran School where we learned Arab. Damn teacher had a pineappleing stick. He would hit you if you didn't do your homework. So me and my little brother studied pretty hard.
I had 5 years of German in High School and English is mostly from internet/movies.
I can certainly hold a conversation with someone... if its via text :P.
I don't even speak much irl anyway, so 3min+ conversations are extremely rare for me to have.
Also, Spanish (Native) and English are the two i can manage. Some bits and pieces of others, but not enough to have a meaningful conversation with anyone
I can speak english and some spanish. Like above, I can get by in Spanish, but I do not have many interactions where I speak it for extended periods, so I do not consider myself bilingual.
How many languages can you hold a five minute conversation in with a native speaker?
3
Which languages?
Dutch
English
German
How did you acquire these languages?
School for Dutch and German (and a bit French)
English part school and mostly games and movies.
Español porque todos aqui en México hablan español.
English because since I was 5 I've been learning it in bilingual schools.
Currently learning Japanese and Chinese.
How many languages can you hold a five minute conversation in with a native speaker?
I can speak two languages that I can hold a five minute or longer conversation with a native speaker in.
Which languages?
-English (Native)
-Japanese (Second Language)
How did you acquire these languages?
English, as stated above, is my native language, so that one is a given. Japanese, however, I learned in high school. Unlike normal people who take Japanese courses in school, my teacher held special after school study sessions which I took part in. I became more than a year more advanced beyond what my classmates would learn each year. After high school was finished with, though, my Japanese studying came to a quick halt. However, I still practice it often by speaking with native speakers over online games, such as MapleStory (JMS), and by chatting over Skype through both text chats and voice chats.
Ironically enough, the internet has been more of help to both my English and Japanese abilities than the majority of courses I took throughout my school years.
How many languages can you hold a five minute conversation in with a native speaker?
2
Which languages?
Hebrew
English
How did you acquire these languages?
Hebrew is my native language.
English I learned when my family spent a year in the USA when I was 8, improved in school and from music and TV, and reached native-speaker fluency when my family spent another two years in the USA when I was 14-16.
How many languages can you hold a five minute conversation in with a native speaker?
2
Which languages?
- Spanish (native).
- English.
How did you acquire these languages?
Spanish: Well, It doesn't have much science about it, I'm from latin-america and almost every country talk spanish.
English: It's a interesting story, It all began with the school, Windows 95-98 and some videogames (Joke).
I started learning english at the school and I never went to some specialized place to only learn english. A surprising fact: I was a better student than a friend/classmate that studied in a institute.
How many languages can you hold a five minute conversation in with a native speaker?
2
Which languages?
-English(natively from U.S)
-French
How did you acquire these languages?
Learned English because I live in 'murica. Younger me knows my parent's native language(Vietnamese) but not using it frequently enough has deleted the lingual part of it in me. I can understand basic Vietnamese but cannot formulate sentences. I learned french as it was my language class in high school for 4 years.
I am disappoint Vietnamese person(then again, Vietnam as a whole still has a lot of problems that i don't want to be related to). There's a reason why the Vietnamese Dong is one of the least valuable currencies in the world(oh the ammount of food you can buy with 1 usd in dong)
How many languages can you hold a five minute conversation in with a native speaker?
2
Which languages?
- English
- Chinese
How did you acquire these languages?
Chinese because I lived w/ my family who spoke primarily Chinese. Nowadays, I have trouble understanding them and have trouble speaking in Chinese, I have no problems saying basic stuff in Chinese but if it gets more complicated, I replace words into English in hopes of them being able to understand what I'm saying.
I honestly don't know where I "learned" English from. It could be from school or my brother and sister (2 and 4 years older than me, respectively) who were beginning to speak in English.
Side note: I'm also in the progress in learning Spanish but I'm not very good at it. The teacher just sits at her disk while giving us book work. She has only taught/lectured the class about 10 times during the entire school year. I'm also hoping to learn Korean so I can understand games better.
How many languages can you hold a five minute conversation in with a native speaker?
2
Which languages?
Malay, English,
How did you acquire these languages?
Malay is obviously my native language because my country, Malaysia use this language to communicate among others. I learned it from my parents.
I learned English when I start to enter primary school, practiced a lot because I speak English with Chinese classmates. Also after secondary school, I start to join forums, play online games, virtual community and surprisingly, they helped me a lot to be more familiarized with English until at one point, I can consider that Malay and English proficiency almost at the same level.
Overall proficiency:
Malay : 50%
English : 47%
Japanese: 2% (due to I still sucks when learning Kanji)
Arabic: 1% (I can't even recall what I had learned when I was in secondary school, just basic words)
Spekaing proficiency:
Malay: 90%
English: 75% (sometimes I have to use Malay because I have trouble to express my thoughts in English
Japanese: I'm still learning lol. 2nd year Elementary level, aiming to pass JLPT N5
Arabic: I learning it because I wanted to study more on Holy Quran, which is encouraged for Muslims.
Last edited by Kusanagi Haru; 2013-05-22 at 05:55 AM.
How many languages can you hold a five minute conversation in with a native speaker?
2
Which languages?
English and Chinese, Cantonese to be specific.
How did you acquire these languages?
English came about from school, TV and my siblings. Cantonese comes from both my parents being native Cantonese speakers, and being forced into taking Chinese School lessons (both Mandarin and Cantonese, but my Mandarin has deteriorated beyond repair).
How many languages can you hold a five minute conversation in with a native speaker?
3
Which languages?
-Spanish
-English
-French
-Looking for more in the near future
How did you acquire these languages?
-Native Spanish speaker. I just wish I was better with accents, my writing feels awful because I was never able to learn them.
-I learned English at school, starting from a very early age and having most classes in English helped me understand the basics. Later on, it was Maple and here that I got to practice on a daily basis. At the moment, I feel more comfortable writing, reading and listening stuff that's in English than Spanish. I don't feel uncomfortable while talking but I need to improve my pronunciation. I want to get a mic so I can talk with others while playing Dota, or just stream stuff so that I get to talk and practice more. I'm studying to become a languages teacher, mainly English because I really like it.
-I dropped high school when I was 17. I had to wait for a year to present an official exam that would get me secondary school graduate title. During that year I started with French classes at french embassy's place for that. It was really great, I enjoyed myself greatly because learning languages is really fun, also because teachers and students there were awesome. Of course it was only a year or so, and despite getting high level classes it wasn't enough to feel fully competent at it. Nowadays I try to practice with my mom (who is also multilingual, she can speak same languages as me plus German) but there's not enough time or motivation to try and practice more often. I might be able to hold a 5mins+ conversation about very basic topics but right now I feel like I'd do it poorly.
Oddly enough, back then when I was considering university degrees I never though of languages and actually went for psychology despite loving languages so much.
-Soon I'll start a second degree at school. I want to study Philosophy too and it's a requirement to learn Latin and Greek. I'm really excited about it and would love to start already.
How many languages can you hold a five minute conversation in with a native speaker?
Two. Although I can also talk in Spanish only if it's very very basic.
Which languages?
- English
- Korean
How did you acquire these languages?
I grew up speaking Korean in my family.
I also attended an after-school learning center to learn to read and write. I had to recite passages to my mother every night for 5 years before bedtime. I also visit Korea every some odd years. Lastly, watching Korean dramas with English subtitles also helped a lot.
English I learned from school over the years, although I had a very hard time transitioning from Korean to English. I practiced by speaking to my brother in only English.
Last edited by Mandalay; 2013-05-21 at 11:37 PM.
How many languages can you hold a five minute conversation in with a native speaker?
Two.
Which languages?
- English
- German
How did you acquire these languages?
Raised with English; mother was born in Germany so she taught me a little but the bulk was learned through school and a three week trip in Deutschland.
I can't grammar in German, though.
English & Spanish.
I'm dominican.
How many languages can you hold a five minute conversation in with a native speaker?
Two.
Which languages?
- Spanish
- English
How did you acquire these languages?
Spanish is my native language.
I attended English school when I was little (didn't learn as much as I wanted back then because I was too shy and barely spoke). As I grew up, I joined a few more English courses. Years later I got a job which required me to speak English so I managed to get an English scholarship in a government program. My English improved a lot and my maple life was nicer ever since.
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