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How many languages are you fluent In?

One. English. :<

Would like to learn Japanese or German, but the only languages my school offers are Spanish and French- so I have to be content with Spanish xD
 
I know english and polish. Thought about learning another but I'm undecided between a couple languages, so I just don't.
 
Epic_Idort said:
English, portuguese, spanish, french, italian, dutch, german and russian. My parents are language teachers, I know loads :p
I know others but not as well.
Click to expand...

I would question whether you know the true definition of "fluency".

Think alot of people in this thread are getting "fluency" mixed up with "knowledge of".

For example, I have studied spanish for 9 years, traveled to costa rica, guatemala, mexico, nicaragua, panama, and argentina, yet I do not speak it "fluently".

On the other hand, I have "knowledge of" french, german, chinese, spanish, italian, and Thai, because I have either spent time in said country learning the language, or have taken college level classes in it.


Dave. said:
Just english, im gonna try and teach myself german over the next year using books, rosetta stone and watching films in german.

Anybody got any tips on how to learn a new language?
Click to expand...

Personally I avoid Rosetta stone, i don't like the style at all.

The best way to grasp a language, in my opinion, is by understanding the building blocks (i.e grammar).

Rosetta stone does a great job of functional usage, however it doesnt teach you the grammar side so you cannot manipulate the language at will.

For example, RS might teach you to be able to say a certain useful phrase or sentence, but if you need to change the tense, gender, number, etc, you may not be able to do it since they do not drill you with grammar.

Get a good school textbook on the language of choice and learn about the grammar. The rest stems from it.
 
Dave. said:
Just english, im gonna try and teach myself german over the next year using books, rosetta stone and watching films in german.

Anybody got any tips on how to learn a new language?
Click to expand...

Dave. Get a satellite, and start watching children's TV. It teaches you more of the language that you can apply to real life talk.

In school, most of what you learn will be about a certain subject, however children's TV - an example of a German version is Toggo - can give you more commonly used phrases.


Films are a good idea, too, as they generally speak slower.
 
Plznate said:
I would question whether you know the true definition of "fluency".

Think alot of people in this thread are getting "fluency" mixed up with "knowledge of".

For example, I have studied spanish for 9 years, traveled to costa rica, guatemala, mexico, nicaragua, panama, and argentina, yet I do not speak it "fluently".

On the other hand, I have "knowledge of" french, german, chinese, spanish, italian, and Thai, because I have either spent time in said country learning the language, or have taken college level classes in it.




Personally I avoid Rosetta stone, i don't like the style at all.

The best way to grasp a language, in my opinion, is by understanding the building blocks (i.e grammar).

Rosetta stone does a great job of functional usage, however it doesnt teach you the grammar side so you cannot manipulate the language at will.

For example, RS might teach you to be able to say a certain useful phrase or sentence, but if you need to change the tense, gender, number, etc, you may not be able to do it since they do not drill you with grammar.

Get a good school textbook on the language of choice and learn about the grammar. The rest stems from it.
Click to expand...

Knowledge of and fluency can be the same. You don't have to know everything there is about a language to be fluent in it.
 
blindkilla said:
Knowledge of and fluency can be the same. You don't have to know everything there is about a language to be fluent in it.
Click to expand...

Incorrect, as the true definition of fluency means not only a basic ability to read/write/speak well in the language, it goes much farther than that. Generally the accepted definition of fluency, or at least the best indicator of it, is the ability to think completely in the language.
 
Plznate said:
Incorrect, as the true definition of fluency means not only a basic ability to read/write/speak well in the language, it goes much farther than that. Generally the accepted definition of fluency, or at least the best indicator of it, is the ability to think completely in the language.
Click to expand...

Then I guess people just have different opinions on the true definition of fluency.

If someone can communicate in a language without problem, I would consider that person fluent.
 
blindkilla said:
Then I guess people just have different opinions on the true definition of fluency.

If someone can communicate in a language without problem, I would consider that person fluent.
Click to expand...

I would consider that "conversational/functional fluency" : P

Its a pretty pointless debate that gets so much time spent on it in all honesty (just graduated two months ago with my language degree, and good god hearing some professors argue over that crap gets old).

The point I was trying to make was that when most of the posters in this thread say they are fluent in 9 languages, I find that hard to believe, even for a conversational level ; )
 
What are these unmentionables that people are saying?
 
Come on Nate, you should be able to easily figure it out with your modly (cwutididthar) powers.
 
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