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post #121 of 135
6/29/09 at 8:35am
My native tongue is called Tagalog, it's the Filipino national language.

The Philippines is a bi-lingual country, being a colony nation for most of its recorded history, you can see alot of Spanish, English, and American influence in the culture. There are over 1000 dialects in the Philippines and pretty much everybody in the big cities will be able to understand, if not speak English. Interesting fact about the Philippines, We were the people responsible for Magellan's inability to circle the world completely, although he is acredited as the first person to circumvent the globe, he himself never actually made it all the way.

I'm also "capable" of speaking Spanish, and Texan (it's a little different from English Ya'll! lol)
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post #122 of 135
6/29/09 at 9:19am
My first language is Vietnamese. Then i moved to Australia and i had to speak English as my 2nd language.
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post #123 of 135
7/1/09 at 2:18am
Quote:
Originally Posted by BlackCat View Post

Here's my understanding, based on info from my husband, who earned a certificate teaching English as a Second Language:

Most people cannot have native fluency in a language if they don't learn it by 14 years old. However, all "native fluency" means in linguistics is that the person can speak a language fluently in every respect, including without any accent. Around 14, our vocal cord and tongue muscles start to set.

However, for most people's intent and purposes, being fluent in a language with an accent is just fine, and that is attainable at any age. I'm also guessing that a fwe people, depending on their ear for languages and/or vocal ability, can even get rid of an accent post-14.

What you say is true. I am an ESL teacher myself, and I have a couple of other languages: bilingual ability in one, and quite good fluency in another.

I would add one more detail to what you say, however: People who learn more than one language as children often have a "boost" for gaining fluency in additional languages acquired later in life.

Also, there are a small number of people who are very good mimics on the level of phonology. They are often able to fool native speakers of another language for a while by appearing to be fluent and having flawless pronunciation, in spite of not having functional fluency in that language.

Also, passive comprehension skills are also quite good for people who speak related languages. So, for example, if one speaks Spanish and French, Italian and Portuguese become easier to understand... for some people this applies more to reading comprehension than listening, for others, the other way around.

BTW, when I was a young guy, I loved to fool around by speaking Spanish with a French accent, French with a Spanish accent, etc. The French have a *lovely* expression for badly spoken French: They say, "Tu parles français comme une vache espagnole!" (You speak French like a Spanish cow.) For some reason, even though I spoke Spanish before anything else and managed to learn French quite young without an accent, I never liked this expression...
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post #124 of 135
7/1/09 at 5:25am
Quote:
Originally Posted by JaimeB View Post


Also, there are a small number of people who are very good mimics on the level of phonology. They are often able to fool native speakers of another language for a while by appearing to be fluent and having flawless pronunciation, in spite of not having functional fluency in that language.

I used to get that when I was in high school, learning French. French has never been my forte; I read it just fine, but I never gained full fluency speaking it. However, when I went on vacation to France with my family, I'd speak some carefully rehearsed sentences and people would assume I was either native or fully fluent. They generally caught on when they saw my blank face upon their rattling an answer, though.
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post #125 of 135
7/1/09 at 6:07am
I am a native American English speaker, but I grew up in a part of the US that is in a French-Acadian region. So, it was English at home always, and a mixture of French and English everywhere else. I had the regional accent, which is a paysan French-Canadian accent--nothing posh by any means. I lost the accent for the most part (moved away at age 14), but when I speak French (badly now, since I never use it), my mouth goes mostly back to the same accent I had before. When I try other languages, that ends up being my default pronounciation
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post #126 of 135
7/1/09 at 7:22am
Born in USA--spent last 15 years in Japan. Speak English and Japanese.
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post #127 of 135
7/1/09 at 3:35pm
L-O-V-E

Cuz I'm a pimp.
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post #128 of 135
7/2/09 at 4:05am
Quote:
Originally Posted by anak View Post

L-O-V-E

Cuz I'm a pimp.

Dude, we already know you get your ass whipped by little girls.
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post #129 of 135
7/2/09 at 2:42pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Stereotomy View Post

Dude, we already know you get your ass whipped by little girls.

True, Cuz I'm a P-I-M-P ahhhhh ahhhhhhh the pimp takes center stage ahhhhhh ahhhhhhhh .
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post #130 of 135
7/5/09 at 12:14am
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back to to program

In Singapore our National Language is Malay, but I can only understand bits and pieces because I was not educated in Malay.

I speak and write Mandarin and English, and can converse in a Chinese Dialect called Hokkien(most from Taiwan speak it) and can roughly understand another dialect called Cantonese(most from Hong Kong speak it).

Not sure how interesting this is but i once read that our political Ministers are the highest paid in the world, correct me if i'm wrong.
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post #131 of 135
7/7/09 at 2:54pm
You guys are absolutely unbelievable!

I'm a native Polish speaker, English is my second almost on par with German and Spanish. I also speak a bit of Russian (though I'm forgetting it) and Japanese (needs improvement!).
I was made to learn French as a kid but never quite enjoyed it and now I actually regret not having studied it properly.
French and Hebrew are the two languages I still want to learn properly - kind of in honour of my background (my mother's family are Hungarian Jews and my mother's and father's families lived in France until 1960's) but also because there is a great community and culture behind each language that I'd like to explore and experience first-hand.
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post #132 of 135
1/22/13 at 9:15am
I'm part Spanish, part German, and speak English pretty fluently. Then, to a lesser degree, I also speak French, Italian, Norwegian and Swedish, I struggle a bit with Danish, Dutch, Portuguese and Greek, and time and again I try to learn Japanese and Chinese, though I never get too far with those two...
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post #133 of 135
1/22/13 at 9:24am
English. Can also speak Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, French, Russian, Farsi & Swahili
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post #134 of 135
1/23/13 at 3:08am
I am born in New York City of Italian/Hispanic parents. I am also married to a Brazilian woman. So in my home I speak mostly English, which I am most comfortable with. Then Spanish, usually with my Dad. I also speak a combination of both Spanish and Portuguese with my wife.
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post #135 of 135
2/4/13 at 4:35pm
Born in the U.S. so English is my first language but I am fluent in Spanish and love Latin languages as they are very poetic.
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