Foreign Languages..

Shaidalyn

Shaidalyn

Artifact Armor
Adventurer
Joined
Dec 13, 2005
Messages
1,127
Linkshell
DestinEnlacere
Now I don't know where else to go so I thought I'd ask here. Since we have some really, really smart people (Rones comes to mind) I thought I'd ask.
I'm currently selling.... a lot of my possessions, and will have a rather large amount of cash left from this. I'm thinking of moving to Europe as I've always loved the culture and such, but I have the firm belief of "You come to our country, you learn our language" (sick of saying "Yo no hablo espanol tu pendejo" to people here who don't get it..) So I will learn the language of the country I move to.. I'm not sure yet between Italy or perhaps just stick to UK... I have a LOT of research but it's something I've always wanted.
Just curious if anyone had knowledge on how to learn a foreign language.. I took french in school but.... I'd die before I lived there. ^^ (no offense.. just not for me) And I've forgotten most.. any help would be appreciated. ^^
 
I am atrocious at learning foreign languages. Two years were required for high school graduation, and I barely passed. I would personally go for the UK because of the language, although what the British speak isn't entirely understandable all the time either. :wink: There would also be less culture shock as they are much like the States in everyday living.

I do have a friend who did a foreign exchange student program in Rome and wrote several school paper articles about it. She really enjoyed it, but stressed how different the culture was. There is no wal-mart or anything like it there. Just grocery shopping is a big time investment as you search many stalls and haggle for what you want. Some people love that style and the culture, but I couldn't do that for a long period of time. On the plus, the people live in a closer community, more personable, and relaxed in puntuality (just don't go near them in a car). Vast generalizations I realize, but the best I can do to describe Italian culture briefly. If there is one thing you took from her articles, it was how close she became to all her neighbors. They took her in almost as family. An act not seen too often here in the states.

Better reason to decide which is what exactly are you wanting from moving their? If you are just after cultural experience, consider a long visit of three to six months. If you are just wanting to get away from your current conidtions, figure out what is inciting you to move. Are you wanting to get away from the big city life or rural back waters? If that is the case, you might want to just try somewhere else here in the states first. While Europe is a nice place to live (beautiful area), the cost of living is higher than here in the states on average. Unless you got employment lined up or feel confident you can find it quickly, you might get over there and find yourself strapped for cash quickly.
 
You should probably master the ELIPSE before you dare start another langauge. THREE periods. Not TWO. Not FOUR. THREE.
 
Practice makes perfect. There's a lot of different factors that can influence how easily learning a new language will be. Your environment, the source from which you're learning (teacher, book, audio, visual etc) and the list goes on. Usually the best forms from what i've heard of are by actually practicing and emersing yourself "in" the atmosphere where the language is being spoken constantly.

Best advice is to find yourself a decent book that has a good audio cd that will teach you pronounciation. After that, try to find someone who is able to speak the language so that you can put it to practice and go from there.

Been speaking french since I was a few years old, so learning languages comes a little easier to me then it would to most. I've picked up Spanish, a bit of mandarin and a little bit of japanese along the way and find that as long as I apply myself, i'm able to comprehend the language quite well. A lot of it is memory though too, gotta have a good memory to know how to conjugate the verbs x_x
 
_Neosquall_ said:
You should probably master the ELIPSE before you dare start another langauge. THREE periods. Not TWO. Not FOUR. THREE.
Click to expand...

speak english or don't speak!
 
[quote="Rones]There would also be less culture shock as they are much like the States in everyday living.[/quote]

Depends on what part of the States you're talking about.


To learn a new language, it is best to be proactive about it, and perhaps the best way to go about it is to be with the actual people who speak it. You can learn on your own using books and/or CDs, but applying it into common-day practice really helps that stuff consolidate into your mind. Formal resources are good to teach you the formal stuff, and get a foothold of the language, then the next step would be to use that as much as you can. Europe is still an English-speaking country, but I'm sure they have their own colloquial languages you will learn with your time there.

I know when I took Japanese in high school, I was doing good. But I haven't practiced that much at all lately, so it's really rusty. Poor vocabulary especially. I do manage to practice some little things with JP players that I party with, which have come to stay with me for a long time now.
 
_Neosquall_ said:
You should probably master the ELIPSE before you dare start another langauge. THREE periods. Not TWO. Not FOUR. THREE.
Click to expand...
That's "ellipsis."

TWO "L"s. Not ONE. An "I," not an "E." Another "S," not NOTHING.

There is another spelling, "ellipses," but both plural and singular do not change in that they both require the "S" at the end.

I'm sorry, I couldn't resist.
 
Thank you to replies.. and whoever moved this.. I meant to cut/paste once I realized which board I was on but I was rushed so fotgot ; ;

And damnit Neo I do it as a pause.. more periods, longer pause. :P I like my gimp speak ; ;
I mostly meant like, CD's, DVD's, online.. Right now I'm strapped for cash but I'll have enough for some things like that soon.. I just know they appreciate people who try over people who just walk in and expect them to speak english.
 
One of the most important things I think, in learning a foreign language, is to understand your OWN language. To know the ins-and-outs of your native tounge will help you to understand how to form sentences in other languages. I've learned more about English in my Japanese class to be honest, but my teacher also teaches English as a second language.

A lot of other languages have words for expressions, sounds, or actions that we don't have in English. Or a lot of words will have the same meaning, but not the same effect.

I do believe that if you're determined, and enjoy what you're doing, you'll be successful. Try to find some friends in a country you're interested in, and find out more. I think you'll do just fine. ^^
 
You know most people over here in europe speak English anyway, English is becoming the dominating language over here, except obviously in proper remote areas of countries. Whichever country you move to you would only have to learn basic language before you moved and then you would pick the rest up easy enough throughout your first year or so.

One way most of us brits talk to foreigners is: ask them first, if they dont understand, ask them again but louder, then they always seem to understand
 
You have to practice with people who speak both English and the language you want to learn, at first, so they can fix your mistakes and make it easier to understand the grammar structure.

(And by the way, I found France a lot more friendly than Italy)
 
Honestly, in my experience the best way to learn a language is to just jump in headfirst, total immersion. I went to Italy with my family about seven years ago, and came away after 2 weeks speaking better Italian than after 2 years of studies in high school. I know that's not always possible though, heh.

If you're in a city with any sort of tourist traffic, then 75% of the people you encounter will know english. I've found that if you make an attempt to speak to them in their own language, even poorly, they are a bit friendlier than if you just yell english at them, lol. I haven't been to other countries in Europe, but we recieved nothing but friendliness in Italy. (Mind you, traveling outside of normal tourist season and having the last name Damiani may factor into that).

Many of the larger cities have amenities similar to the US. Supermarkets are becoming more commonplace, so you don't have to spend 2 hours each day going from vendor to vendor if you don't feel like it. (Though of course they still have that too). Cost of living is incredibly high though. The reason so many Italians in the cities ride vespas is because they can't afford to fuel an actual car- when travelling 7 years ago we paid an average of 3000 lira per litre, which converted to about 6 dollars per gallon. I'm sure prices have gone up since then.
 
The robots are coming.

Binary is the language of the future.

100100101010101010001101011011010110100101111
010101010101010101010101001001010010101011110
10101011001010101010010101010100102....
WTFerror!

Fortunately for us, the robots will be running on Windows.
 
well...I'm a spanish/english major (have yet to graduate mind you) and I find that if you learn any foreign language, it becomes easier and easier to pick it up multiple languages.

the main basis for most languages, if not all languages out there is latin. So therefore there are words that are similar due to the latin roots.

Example: to sleep

Italian Spanish
(dormire) (dormir)

So if you say that you know french, then I'm sure you could pick up any language. It might take some work...and an oxford translation dictionary ^.^
 
But people that speak Spanish are infected with parasites!

Sometimes their heads explode then the parasite comes out and they start swinging around a sharp tentacle and try to cut your head off!
 
Areya said:
the main basis for most languages, if not all languages out there is latin. So therefore there are words that are similar due to the latin roots.
Click to expand...

;|...
 
I like to consider myself a reasonably intelligent person. I am TERRIBALE at foriegn languages. Then again I never had a real "Need" to learn it other then spanish class. I have heard alot of stories of people picking up a language real fast when forced to speak it. Which is part of the reason I get annoyed when people can not speak english here.

And to respond to the person that said all languages are based on Latin. French, Spanish, Portugeuse, Italian, and Romanian are the latin based languages. There MIGHT be 1-2 more I forgot. English is derived from Germanic. So if you know say French, learning spanish is relatively easy. English is a whole nother story. Its one of the harder languages to learn, other then some of those oriental ones.
 
Last edited:
arabic is hard ...

English is much more easy
 
_Neosquall_ said:
You should probably master the ELIPSE before you dare start another langauge. THREE periods. Not TWO. Not FOUR. THREE.
Click to expand...


lol when I read this I can't help but think back to my sociology class. According to the number of dots you put in a sentence like that or the number of exclamation points you use after one depends on your personality/thought pattern.

I don't remember exactly but it was something along the lines of three means you are "normal"/typical behavior, four you are obsessed with sex, five or more you are over weight.

I doubt this has a lot of truth but it gives you a good laugh when reading posts sometimes. :2cents:
 
You could always move to the Arctic. No need to learn a new language there....



...Okay seriously now. In my brief stint in Europe, it seemed no matter where I went, in every shop, pub, taxi, someone understood enough english so I could communicate with them. From the UK, to Portugal, to Scandanavia, to the Ukraine, to Germany, to Italy, and back to the UK, it was the same. The only problem I had in communications with english was when I was in eastern Europe, (Karlovy-Vary) and the guy at the ticket counter for the train had no clue what I wanted. (I wanted a bloody ticket to Hamburg!) Fortunately, he spoke a bit of French, so I was good.

Synopsis: Even if you have no proficiency in another language besides English, you will more than likely be able to communicate with people anyway.

But as a first time traveler, one thing I recommend as a must, buy your own map. They also have translator books specificly made for travelers, geared toward words and phrases you will most likely use. Buy one of those too. I had one in my hockey bag the whole time I was there!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top