Hey EMC! So I finished Latin 4 recently and it got me thinking, what languages did you choose and why? EDIT: I chose Latin because it helps a lot with English and prepares me for the SATs
Spanish, or Español, is the only other language I speak, though I speak it badly. I chose it because I am an American, and as such I live in a country with a huge number of Spanish speakers, including many that don't speak English. Thus, it's an extremely useful language to have. I also think that for the most part it's an extremely beautiful language, though I admit that it does have it's moments of sounding like a chicken that's had waaaaay too much caffeine. In the future, I'd like to learn Italian (and have started with Duolingo) because I think it's a beautiful language, and of course knowing more languages is very useful. I would be interested in learning German, Greek, or Russian at some point simply because they interest me, but Italian is a much more logical first step because it's very closely related to Spanish, making it much easier to learn. If you're wondering, I didn't choose French because I believe French to be the ugliest language ever spoken in the history of words. It's probably more useful than Italian, but the sacrifice isn't worth it. I do like Latin just because of the sound and its many, many roots in English (which would allow you to pick up some good English/Romance language vocab); however, I obstinately refuse to learn it because it is a dead language and as such isn't useful at all in itself.
I studied Japanese, french, german, russian, latvian, belarusian, ukrainian, and georgian in high school and continued through out collage.
I took French in High School (4 years), although I have not used it much since then, so don't remember much. I took French mostly because everyone else was taking Spanish, so I wanted something different. Turned out to be the best decision I made in High School, because I had the same French teacher all through High School and she was my favorite teacher. (Note: She was born and raised in France, so a native French speaker. She was fluent in English too though, so it was amazing being taught the language by somebody who was raised using that language.) P.S. Hash, French is one of the most beautiful languages (much more so than English). The language has a flow to it, where your words smoothly transition from one to the next. Much more elegant than our more guttural English language.
i would love to learn spanish for obvious reasons russian i play csgo and i would love to understand the words my team scream at me(I think they are swears... XD) or french because what girl doesn't like a french speaking person ?..... now that i say this knowing my luck it becomes the most hated language over night
I took French in high school and I'm pretty okay at it. I've recently been learning Czech because of my heritage and I've also dabbled a little in Japanese
Took french from grade 2 to 9 as it was Mandatory as i live in Ontario, beside Quebec. I also Took Ojibwe In college for a Semester... was very different, and learned the history.
You say what did I choose, well I chose none, but it was French, German, or Spanish and of them I took Spanish. 3rd year of having it in high school currently.
The only other language I can speak besides English and chicken talk is German. Been learning it for the last year and half and it's a blast. In 2 more years if I stick with our schools program, I'll be eligible to go on the school's trip to Germany so that's always cool. The reason I took it is because my heritage and the fact that my school offers a trip over there.
As a result of many, many years (419, to be exact) of England being subject to ownership and genocide by France (part of the reason why England hates France so much - that, coupled with your usual superpower rivalry). We also have influences from the native Celts (Welsh, Cornish, Picts, Scottish, Irish), whose languages are entirely nonsensical. They completely messed up our Germanic grammar rules and spelling and as such our language is awful. Then England just had to go spread this gross language to the rest of the world #RemoveBaguette1485 Anyway; foreign languages! I love them. I have a qualification in Spanish - don't be fooled, I speak absolutely none of it. I can't form a proper sentence in it anymore. It's a shame, because I have a lot of relatives in Spain (as a result of my dad's grandparents being Spanish refugees from the civil war from 1936 until 1939) and I'd like to be able to make them proud. I was the best in my class at the language next to someone who had actually lived in Spain for a good portion of their life, and I passed every single one of my exams first try, but the whole thing just hasn't stuck at all. I have no idea why - probably because the UK's language education might as well not exist - but I am fairly certain I will not have a use for Spanish in my life and I do not have the desire to learn it anymore. My Welsh is pretty rough around the edges - although this isn't really a foreign language because people speak it like, 20 miles away from me and they're on the same landmass. I know some basic stuff, because my Welsh grandmother used to teach me as a child and I started practising it when I was about fourteen years old. I can't speak it very fluently at all, but I know basic phrases and I can decipher conversations people who think I'm not Welsh at all have when I visit there. I hear some funny stuff. Fun facts about Welsh: Welsh is part of the Brythonic (British) group of Celtic languages alongside Cornish (spoken in Cornwall), Breton (spoken in Brittany, France) and Cumbric (now extinct, was spoken in Cumbria, England). It was widely spoken throughout England until the Anglo-Saxons invaded in the late fifth century and they killed/assimilated (it isn't clear which one) the natives. They were pushed West into modern-day Wales, branded as the 'Welsh' (meaning 'foreigner'), and while England was under French rule they were subjugated and incorporated into England. Over the last 100-200 years, the Welsh language has seen a resurgence in use due to Welsh nationalism and efforts to stop it from going extinct. Welsh people also have funny traditional dress that my mum was forced to dress in as a child, so I cannot thank them enough for that. I'm also learning German at the moment to 1) impress a girl, 2) be eligible to move to Germany, and 3) just for fun. It's pretty fun to learn and I suck at it, as evidenced by my German friend/the girl I'm trying to impress telling me my pronunciation is abysmal and I have absolutely no grasp of basic grammar rules. I'm improving though and I know way more of it than I ever did for Spanish - I guess I'll find out when/if I go to Berlin in March 2018 (and more unlikely, but still a goal: Frankfurt in October 2017) ^_^ I also have a veeeeeeery loose grasp of Serbian. Like, I know a few swear words, some basic sentences, basic phrases, and how to say 'Hello' and that's pretty much it - oh, and also 'Happy Birthday' because I also needed to impress that girl by using her language to wish her a happy birthday (for anyone wondering, "srećan rođendan" or "Срећан рођендан"). I plan to start learning it somewhat properly when I feel confident in my German. If I ever hope to truly impress this girl - who is ethnically Serb - I'm going to have to. And if I ever get to the point of meeting her parents (going to be at least two-three years lol), I will have to learn it to impress them too, otherwise they will probably break my legs - my genetics having no trace of Serb is bad enough, never mind being an uncultured little shit and not learning their language. Examples: Hello, I speak English. Helo, fy mod yn siarad Cymraeg. Hallo, ich spreche Deutsch. Zdravo, ja govorim srpski.
Latin, really ? Wow I would have taken that but it was never offered. I know a little bit of Spanish. My art teacher was trying to learn Italian since her fiancé was born and raised in Italy. That's a lot. Do you speak them all fluently or just know a few phrases in each language? My cousin took French but she's forgotten most of it. Yeah me too. Czech is that a hard language? Also my cousin he dabbles in Japanese to. Mostly cause he's into Anime. Mandatory language. I wish we had that in the states. Ojibwe didn't know you could take such a college course.
That's a lot. Do you speak them all fluently or just know a few phrases in each language? I speak Japanese enough to live there. I spent much time in mizuho and hiroshima the others i speak at a high school equivalency
I'm currently taking Spanish 2 but am formally fluent in Russian. I chose Spanish due to future businesses may deal with the spanish speaking countries and Russian well because I'm Russian
I took 3 years of French in high school. I chose it over Spanish for a lot of the same reasons JHall did. Everyone took Spanish and I wanted to try something different. I also think French is a beautiful language. I can still speak it mostly because I stay in practice by teaching my son for the past few years. It's still a lot easier to understand someone speaking it than to speak it though. I've picked up basic Spanish because a large percent of the population here is Hispanic, but I'm nowhere near close enough to speaking it fluently.
It was the way I learned it. I took an online course. Defiantly not a good idea for that language, it makes it very hard to learn. I too learned Japanese for anime purposes
As a Canadian I do speak french. I ended up going to a french school for 10 years Junior Kindergarten to 8th grade. I'm not one to write in French, to be honest I'm quite awful at it, but I can speak it with some ease and I'm wonderful at translation from french to English. French has lots of rules and can be a very complicated language, kinda why I don't bother with it much these days.
Did not expect this many posts! I do have to say, I did not realize there were so many different languages learned around EMC!
