Languages and Linguistics

[Thatsjustpeachy]

Very interested in these topics, would like to comment on a few things.

Since my goal is to become a professional translator and maybe even an interpreter one day, I'm also keen to learn a couple more languages in a foreseeable future.
In my honest personal opinion, successful intercultural communication is the beating heart of our world that seemingly becomes more and more globalized on a daily base. There's hence no room for potential misinterpretations.

In the right setting a profession based around an understanding of multiple languages can be very rewarding. However, a typical translator is a very burnout job and I speak with some minor experience. Most of the times you will not be able to translate something you have a direct interest in and the pay is very weak. For the more lucrative positions such as government positions, you need to have a mastery of the language and bring additional skills outside of just knowing the necessary languages. Maybe you are already aware of this because it is a career goal to you. Just offering my two cents since I have seen friends struggle when languages were their main pursuit, and sometimes their only pursuit.

I agree with Chinese arguably having the world's easiest, most logical grammar-- but it's only possible because of all the insanity around tones. What a nightmare for a non-native to learn!

I would be careful with that statement because I believe having refined Chinese grammar is much more than what meets the eye. Having a "loose" grammar structure can invite disorder and it is very easy to notice imperfections in other people's Chinese writing. Reminds me of this graph http://imgur.com/TTDAW69. The more you learn the harder Chinese grammar gets as opposed to a more structured grammar scheme like Japanese.

I feel like I have brought this up before somewhere, apologies if this is repetitive.

 

[Chou Toshio]

Very interested in these topics, would like to comment on a few things.



In the right setting a profession based around an understanding of multiple languages can be very rewarding. However, a typical translator is a very burnout job and I speak with some minor experience. Most of the times you will not be able to translate something you have a direct interest in and the pay is very weak. For the more lucrative positions such as government positions, you need to have a mastery of the language and bring additional skills outside of just knowing the necessary languages. Maybe you are already aware of this because it is a career goal to you. Just offering my two cents since I have seen friends struggle when languages were their main pursuit, and sometimes their only pursuit.



I would be careful with that statement because I believe having refined Chinese grammar is much more than what meets the eye. Having a "loose" grammar structure can invite disorder and it is very easy to notice imperfections in other people's Chinese writing. Reminds me of this graph http://imgur.com/TTDAW69. The more you learn the harder Chinese grammar gets as opposed to a more structured grammar scheme like Japanese.

I feel like I have brought this up before somewhere, apologies if this is repetitive.

I'd agree with your graph too actually! Chinese grammar never seems difficult until you suddenly have to figure out where "ba" goes. Then gets progressively gets harder.

Overall though, the graph speaks to the level of difficulty in Japanese grammar. I think just the fact that Chinese grammar requires zero conjugation makes its grammar infinitely more accessible to a foreign learner than English or Japanese.

 

[Max. Optimizer]

In the right setting a profession based around an understanding of multiple languages can be very rewarding. However, a typical translator is a very burnout job and I speak with some minor experience. Most of the times you will not be able to translate something you have a direct interest in and the pay is very weak. For the more lucrative positions such as government positions, you need to have a mastery of the language and bring additional skills outside of just knowing the necessary languages. Maybe you are already aware of this because it is a career goal to you. Just offering my two cents since I have seen friends struggle when languages were their main pursuit, and sometimes their only pursuit.

Thank you very much for your valuable advice, it's highly appreciated. As a matter of fact I was already aware of this since I'm currently partaking in University courses about "Exploring Languages and Cultures", which means I learn about diplomacy, professionalism, successful intercultural encounters and intercultural competencies in one course and study a language, such as Spanish for example, simultaneously in a different course. It's in my opinion a healthy mélange between theory and practice. Again, thank you again for your concern, I genuinely appreciated your reply. In case you ever have any other ideas or suggestions, never hesitate to reply here.

 

[spies]

I took a weekly quechua class for almost two years and can barely understand a real speaker :( I "know" the basic grammar, can read and say some sentences, but it is completely different from european languages, basically immersion is the only way to learn it

 

[apt-get]

I live in Morocco. My native languages are Arabic, Moroccan, and French, although I'm only fluent in Moroccan, French, and English.

I started learning English in primary school, although what mainly helped me become fluent was probably the internet.

I mainly gotta work on my vocabulary when it comes to Arabic, since I don't really have any problems with the language itself.

I've studied Spanish for 3 years in high school, and I've got good enough reading comprehension to be able to read most of the things I've encountered that were written in Spanish (the language's proximity to french makes it easier). I can't really write anything in Spanish, though. Gotta work on it more...

I'm currently learning Japanese, and I hope I'll be fluent in it one day. My objective right now is to pass the JLPT N4 in December.

In the future, I'd like to learn Russian too (I already know cyrillic, but that doesn't really mean anything). I'm also interested in Esperanto.

 

[Martin]

初めまして。俺はエバンス・マーチンです。英語とメキシコ語を話します。よろしく。
I sincerely hope I didn't mess that up :s

In hindsight the「俺」probably wasn't that appropriate for this context as I was using a very formal introduction (tbh I only really used it 'cause I've not actually got around to using it yet), and similarly I should have probably used「よろしくお願いします」as opposed to a simple「よろしく」to match the formal tone of an introduction with「です。」That said, from what I've been told by my Japanese teacher, you would say "Nice to meet you" (technically speaking it's kinda along the lines of "please be nice to me") if you were making a formal introduction such as when you're introducing yourself to your new colleagues/boss at work or when exchanging business cards.

Actually having reread some of my textbook yesterday I am not sure on something which relates to the two bits quoted above. In this case, would the subject of the sentence have been clear enough to omit it in this case? So would I say「初めまして。私/僕/俺はエバンス・マーチンです。」or would I simply say「初めまして。エバンス・マーチンです。」? I genuinely don't know what contexts I would say「私、俺、僕」etc. and when I would omit it.

 

[Cresselia~~]

Actually having reread some of my textbook yesterday I am not sure on something which relates to the two bits quoted above. In this case, would the subject of the sentence have been clear enough to omit it in this case? So would I say「初めまして。私/僕/俺はエバンス・マーチンです。」or would I simply say「初めまして。エバンス・マーチンです。」? I genuinely don't know what contexts I would say「私、俺、僕」etc. and when I would omit it.

私 is a formal, entry level type of "me". But some guys might think it's a bit girly/ gay.
俺 is a bit informal, and sometimes a bit rude.
僕 is used by most guys. In terms of politeness, it's between 私 and 俺 . Girls must not use this.

 

[Martin]

私 is a formal, entry level type of "me". But some guys might think it's a bit girly/ gay.
俺 is a bit informal, and sometimes a bit rude.
僕 is used by most guys. In terms of politeness, it's between 私 and 俺 . Girls must not use this.

Oh no I know which each is applicable for, but I didn't know whether it is ok to omit the pronoun altogether due to the subject being obvious or whether it is necessary when introducing yourself.

 

[Cresselia~~]

Oh no I know which each is applicable for, but I didn't know whether it is ok to omit the pronoun altogether due to the subject being obvious or whether it is necessary when introducing yourself.

Actually you can. Grammatically it is still correct.
Sometimes, I think it's even better to omit it.

 

[Typhlito]

Cool thread. So for me it's hard to say what my first language. That's because I live in the US and was around people speaking English but I have a Spanish speaking family so I was learning both at the same time . I guess Ill say that I learned English first since even to this day I haven't completely mastered Spanish since all the Spanish I know is mostly from speaking with family so my Spanish reading/writing is not the greatest. I also struggle sometimes when I listen to someone I don't know speak spanish if they don't speak clearly but more times than not I'm fine. It's definitely good enough to go visit Spanish speaking countries though.

Currently I started teaching myself Japanese (during work) and I honestly don't find it to be that difficult (yet at least). It's just very different from English and Spanish and requires a completely different mindset to learn. Decided to learn to read and write before trying to speak so could get that good foundation I lacked with Spanish. Just finished learning hiragana although I still need a bit more practice before I start on katakana. I do have most of it memorized though and whenever I see it on a label or something I try to sound it out (and feel proud of myself when I get it right!). Funny thing though is that I notice myself putting a Spanish accent with my "r"rolls and such when I don't do that with English. Kinda like it lol.

Edit: So I realized that the Spanish accent I gave to some sounds were actually supposed to be there. No wonder it sounded so natural to say it that way. Perhaps these languages arent so different after all!

 

[Rugi]

THIS POST IS NOT A SELL OUT
If you want to practice writing in the languages you're learning check http://lang-8.com/ out.
You correct people and they correct you. Im practicing Spanish and Japanese with it and having a great time.
and its free!

 

[Rugi]

Edit: So I realized that the Spanish accent I gave to some sounds were actually supposed to be there. No wonder it sounded so natural to say it that way. Perhaps these languages arent so different after all!

Japanese phonetics is weirdly similar to some of dialects of Spanish and Italian. Even the consonants have around the same level of aspiration. I've heard Japanese poeple speak Spanish more fluently than I can and when I speak Japanese native speakers tend to be surprised at just how "not foreign" I sound. Really the two toughies are pitch accents and getting that "r" noise after "n"(Japanese has no rolled r). Also remember that the Japanese "u" is different from the Spanish "u" and that the "fu" sound shouldn't have your teeth press against your lip and your pronunciation is set.

I'm glad that Spanish, English, Japanese is such a common combination. That means that there are plenty of people around the world that I can use all three languages with!

 

[Soul Fly]

Hi. Are any of you aware of a good online resource to help me with japanese? I was planning to take it up and had hunted down a Japanese professor who'd help me out, but it turns out I'm going to be moving out pretty soon to some small college town for my postgrad which means that I won't have an instructor to help me, Japanese isn't really a commonly learnt language where I live.

I am primarily interested in it because it appeals to the cultural-linguist in me. I want to learn a language from a different cultural/syntactical heritage than that of the Germanic one of English. I believe the language of any place embodies a lot of the socio-cultural history of the place as well. Not to mention it'll be pretty cool learning a language like Japanese. Everything from the script, to the grammar, an formals/honorifics are in a completely different paradigm, not to mention I get to read some superb literature if I become fluent enough.

One resource I found after some asking around was https://www.renshuu.org/ does anyone have any experience with this website? I'm open to new suggestions as how to do this without an instructor.

 

[Typhlito]

Hi. Are any of you aware of a good online resource to help me with japanese? I was planning to take it up and had hunted down a Japanese professor who'd help me out, but it turns out I'm going to be moving out pretty soon to some small college town for my postgrad which means that I won't have an instructor to help me, Japanese isn't really a commonly learnt language where I live.

I am primarily interested in it because it appeals to the cultural-linguist in me. I want to learn a language from a different cultural/syntactical heritage than that of the Germanic one of English. I believe the language of any place embodies a lot of the socio-cultural history of the place as well. Not to mention it'll be pretty cool learning a language like Japanese. Everything from the script, to the grammar, an formals/honorifics are in a completely different paradigm, not to mention I get to read some superb literature if I become fluent enough.

One resource I found after some asking around was https://www.renshuu.org/ does anyone have any experience with this website? I'm open to new suggestions as how to do this without an instructor.

I've been using this app on my phone called tae Kim's learning Japanese and it pretty detailed imo. I'm not far into it yet but it offers practice sheets to practice writing and videos to help you if you are more of a visual learner. It even offers some excersies right on the app itself. It also offer a few other resources like additional sites. You should give it a try.

 

[Martin]

Hi. Are any of you aware of a good online resource to help me with japanese? I was planning to take it up and had hunted down a Japanese professor who'd help me out, but it turns out I'm going to be moving out pretty soon to some small college town for my postgrad which means that I won't have an instructor to help me, Japanese isn't really a commonly learnt language where I live.

I am primarily interested in it because it appeals to the cultural-linguist in me. I want to learn a language from a different cultural/syntactical heritage than that of the Germanic one of English. I believe the language of any place embodies a lot of the socio-cultural history of the place as well. Not to mention it'll be pretty cool learning a language like Japanese. Everything from the script, to the grammar, an formals/honorifics are in a completely different paradigm, not to mention I get to read some superb literature if I become fluent enough.

One resource I found after some asking around was https://www.renshuu.org/ does anyone have any experience with this website? I'm open to new suggestions as how to do this without an instructor.

I've not used it so I can't back up the claims, but multiple people have told me that http://www.guidetojapanese.org/learn/complete is an exceptional online resource for learning Japanese. I'm prolly gonna use it a fair chunk myself over the next few weeks so I'll find out first-hand whether it's really as good as people have told me it is, but yeah give it a try.

 

[Rugi]

Hi. Are any of you aware of a good online resource to help me with japanese? I was planning to take it up and had hunted down a Japanese professor who'd help me out, but it turns out I'm going to be moving out pretty soon to some small college town for my postgrad which means that I won't have an instructor to help me, Japanese isn't really a commonly learnt language where I live.

I am primarily interested in it because it appeals to the cultural-linguist in me. I want to learn a language from a different cultural/syntactical heritage than that of the Germanic one of English. I believe the language of any place embodies a lot of the socio-cultural history of the place as well. Not to mention it'll be pretty cool learning a language like Japanese. Everything from the script, to the grammar, an formals/honorifics are in a completely different paradigm, not to mention I get to read some superb literature if I become fluent enough.

One resource I found after some asking around was https://www.renshuu.org/ does anyone have any experience with this website? I'm open to new suggestions as how to do this without an instructor.

Use a youtube channel called nihongo no mori and Tae kim's guide for grammar. And memrise and your own volition to learn vocab. There is no easy way to learn kanji. You just have to learn every single one, one by one, focus on radicals and more common kanji first. Use lang-8 to practice writing. Play kids games like Pokemon and youkai watch that use very basic kanji (or none at all) to practice reading. Watch kids shows to practice listening comprehension.

For a japanese dictionary use Jisho.org and for looking up kanji use kakijun.jp (its interface is in Japanese but it shouldn't be too hard to figure out)

As someone whos been taking language classes in Japanese and Spanish since I was kid, the only thing they're good for is practice. Most of the stuff I learn is of my own accord and the classes are only for practicing and cementing knowledge. I never learnt how to read and write Japanese properly in class. If it was like that I would only know a hundred or so kanji.

 

[Cresselia~~]

Actually, have any of you met anyone who's fluent in more than 1 language?
I feel that I have never ever met one like that.
Not even half Chinese people can do it-- the ones you see who are very good at English usually don't know any Chinese.
But of course, lots of Chinese people actually don't put any effort into Chinese because they think that English is posh/ more important, etc.

I can't believe that another Chinese person decided to comment "Your English is bad" on my videos!
I know that my English is not good, but this comment somehow makes me very unhappy.

I think I'm unhappy because, whilst most Westerners are really nice to Asian people, Asian Americans just have to be harsh towards other Asians, as if they think they are better.

 

[squidlick]

I'll bite.

As a Mexican-American living in Guadalajara but otherwise born (and lived for 7 years) in Texas, I've got a near perfect grasp on both English and Spanish(to the point that my current university curriculum doesn't require me to take English classes). I have some fluency in French too but not enough to consider it dominance.

Been trying to learn Japanese for a while now; going to Japan is one of things I want to do in life before I die. I'll probably try out those sites mentioned above.

 

[Cresselia~~]

I'll bite.

As a Mexican-American living in Guadalajara but otherwise born (and lived for 7 years) in Texas, I've got a near perfect grasp on both English and Spanish(to the point that my current university curriculum doesn't require me to take English classes). I have some fluency in French too but not enough to consider it dominance.

Been trying to learn Japanese for a while now; going to Japan is one of things I want to do in life before I die. I'll probably try out those sites mentioned above.

I'm not required to take English classes in the UK because they say my English is good enough, but there is a slight touch of Cantonese accent in my English.
And some Asian Americans just love to pick on people with this slight accent.
Some Asian Americans think they are better because they are qualified to immigrate.

 

[Vinc2612]

Actually, have any of you met anyone who's fluent in more than 1 language?

Having lived at the border between France, Swiss and Germany, I have many friends who speak both French and German as their mother- (and father-)tongues. Then depending on your definition of fluent, it's somewhat common for people here to be fluent in English as well.

About myself, I speak a (hopefully) really good french. Probably better than most of my fellow frenchies actually.
I have a great "foreign" English (read: I understand pretty much everything, I can express myself on almost any subject without any strain, but my pronouncing is terrible and I make many grammatical mistakes).
Finally, I understand a bit of German and can survive in Germany with my poor skills, but I always manage to avoid it with French/English so I don't practice so I don't progress.

 

[Cresselia~~]

Having lived at the border between France, Swiss and Germany, I have many friends who speak both French and German as their mother- (and father-)tongues. Then depending on your definition of fluent, it's somewhat common for people here to be fluent in English as well.

About myself, I speak a (hopefully) really good french. Probably better than most of my fellow frenchies actually.
I have a great "foreign" English (read: I understand pretty much everything, I can express myself on almost any subject without any strain, but my pronouncing is terrible and I make many grammatical mistakes).
Finally, I understand a bit of German and can survive in Germany with my poor skills, but I always manage to avoid it with French/English so I don't practice so I don't progress.

I'd define "good at a certain language" as having no contaminating accent, and sound exactly like a native.

 

[destinyunknown]

I'd define "good at a certain language" as having no contaminating accent, and sound exactly like a native.

There are many natives with a contaminating accent that makes the language hard to understand

 

[Martin]

I'd define "good at a certain language" as having no contaminating accent, and sound exactly like a native.

While it is important to develop an accent when you speak (when I practice Japanese there is a change in the sound of my voice, for instance), I think that this is an extremely unfair metric to use to define fluency personally. It is almost impossible to rid yourself entirely of your base accent because it is something which you have developed when growing up around people who are speaking with similar tones (see: Britain--there is no umbrella "British" accent because just by going from London to Yorkshire you get a complete change in accent just within the "white British" demographic), and you get lots of different dialects as a result. Just knowing this it is incredibly difficult to say "your accent is wrong" because there are a lot of different ways to speak a language.

When I judge someone's fluency in English, there are a small number of things which I look for:

• Pronunciation/intonation--are they pronouncing things correctly. For instance, if I ask someone to pronounce my surname I know that they aren't fluent if they pronounce it as "e-vans" ("e" like in "e-mail" and "vans" like the vehicle). Alternatively if they are speaking "Engrish."
• Adherence to conversational conventions--if they are overly formal in a casual setting or if they mess up word order etc. they aren't fluent. Similarly, if they say things which are technically not incorrect but can be interpreted as rude under standard conversational etiquette (e.g. if someone is speaking "Singlish" (English with Chinese conventions, typically used among Singaporians (hence the name)) they are not fluent.
• How easy they are to understand--if I were to take a sample of native English speakers with different dialects (e.g. middle-class London, cockney, Cornish, English Midlands, Yorkshire, Welsh, Scotch, Irish, Northern Irish, Northern USA, Southern USA, Queensland, Victoria etc.--kinda generalising but you get my point) how many of them would be able to understand them? Alternatively, how well can I understand the person I am talking to in a one-to-one conversation? That said, it doesn't need to be perfect to come under fluent (e.g. I can't understand parts of accents like Cornish and Yorkshire (umbrella terms) despite them being native English accents).

There are a few other things that I consider, but yeah these are the key considerations. If someone is speaking English with their accent contaminated by Spanish or French or Japanese or Chinese or whatever, I do not use that contamination when considering fluency. I don't think it is possible to become fluent in a language without spending a significant number of years living in a country (for instance if I were to finish learning Japanese in it's entirety tomorrow and moved to Tokyo I probably wouldn't be fluent, but then if I were to spend 10 or 15 years living in the city my Japanese would adapt to match that of the people around me and I would become fluent.

I think it is probably possible to be fluent in two languages, but if you do not maintain one you could easily lose fluency even in your native language (which is a concept that I have personally thought about before and is probably the only case where I can imagine someone's "first language" being substituted by one of their "second languages"). As such it's probably a very difficult task to maintain fluency in your mother tongue when moving somewhere where it is not commonly spoken unless you move abroad with a pre-formed family group or you maintain contact with friends at home, and if anything it's probably a much easier task now than it was, say, 10 years ago for someone who moves abroad permanently without a family to retain their mother tongue due to access to tools like Skype and Discord to keep in verbal contact with their existing friend groups as well as if they are a member of communities such as this one which they visit regularly to both form and maintain international friendships, but that's a separate topic all together to the identity of fluency.

 

[Typhlito]

Just a quick note about myself since we are talking about accents, there are so many local american english accents. I was born and partially raised in new york city which is a place that prononced a stronger "o" but then move close to boston which is a place that pronounces its "a" stronger. Ended up getting a mix of the two although to a lesser degree for both since my time in both places where basically cut in half compared to people who lived in one area their whole lives.

Ive been fortunate to have a long distance truck driver as a dad so I was able to visit cities as far as San Antonio, Texas. Along the way, there is the deep southern accents in Louisiana, country accents in Missouri, and several others. One oddity that I noticed when it comes to a constant accent is florida which changes as you go south. But then again, its florida. People from all over goes there which explains the lack of a uniform accent excluding people who speak english as a second language (ex: hispanics).

As for getting rid of the foriegner accent, I agree with martin. Its extremely difficult to get rid of your original accent completely but doing so isnt necessary imo. You could get close by immersing yourself in the language for a few years and thats all you should need. As long as you can communicate fluidly and with the right grammer/context, you should be fine.

 

[squidlick]

I'm not required to take English classes in the UK because they say my English is good enough, but there is a slight touch of Cantonese accent in my English.
And some Asian Americans just love to pick on people with this slight accent.
Some Asian Americans think they are better because they are qualified to immigrate.

I know the feeling, I was picked on for the longest time because my American accent carried over as I learned Spanish.

Though after over 9 years of living here I have far less of an accent, but notable enough to make people ask where I'm from, in good taste of course. Hell, people tend to ask me for help these days. :)