How many languages do you know?

[crimsonyte]

Just out of curiosity, how many languages can the individual members of the escapist speak/understand? I'm pretty sure there's a lot of bilingual people here if not trilingual. How did you go about learning the language? I have a few friends who learned the language just by watching a crap load of movies/series. They speak funny when they use the language (a lot of slangs) but regardless, they picked it up. Currently, I'm trying to match my parents, they speak 5 languages

I know 2 languages proficiently (English and Chieu-Chow(country dialect in China (<--anybody else know this language =p ))) and can partially understand 3 others, if spoken slowly to (Mandarin, Cantonese, Spanish). English/Chieu-Chow are my native languages used when growning up. Mandarin, Cantonese and Spanish I've picked up from spending time with friends and friend's family.

 

[ae86gamer]

English
Spanish
Japanese

And thats about it.

 

[Zacharine]

Trilingual? Frak that.

I speak my native language, finnish. Then I'm also proficient in english (duh), german and swedish. I can also speak haltingly japanese and spanish.

And English, swedish and german as foreign languages came from standard education (well, swedish isn't officially foreign, but...). Japanese I got the spark from a japanese foreign student and spanish from the fact my family almost moved there when I was 13 (so I was prepairing).

I'm don't even particularly like learning new languages anymore, never did. Physics, math, history, chemistry and biology were more my thing before I got to the uni.

EDIT: Come to think of it, I can't name a single friend of mine who is just trilingual. Most speak 4 or 5 languages and that's as a minor sidestudy, not majoring in any language or even humanistic sciences.

 

[cainx10a]

French, English.
I kinda understand Urdu/Hindi.

 

[Neonbob]

I only know one and a quarter.
English and Latin.
I say a quarter because I can kinda read Latin, but only if I have some kind of translation for the tougher ones in the back.
I cannot write it to save my life, and speaking it is right out.

Hooray for being the first ignorant American on the thread?

 

[Anachronism]

I am fluent in over six million forms of communication.

No, wait, that's not right.

English is my native language.
I can speak and understand quite a lot of Welsh.
I know a similar amount of French, and can just about get by in Italian.
Other than that, I study two dead ancient languages: Greek and Latin, and am good at both.

 

[Julianking93]

English

German

...sign? Okay, I know you don't speak it, but its fun to do.

And I can understand Spanish and some Japanese but for some reason, I haven't learned to speak it.

 

[L4hlborg]

Finnish
Good English (trust me, not very common here)
German relatively well
Swedish (compulsory in schools)

That's about it.

 

[ace_of_something]

Only English, I know smatterings in Nuer, (norther dialect) Spanish, Swedeish, and Norwegiain. I couldn't write any of these. So truely I only know One language.

Spanish and Nuer I've just learned commands like 'give me your hands' and 'get on the ground' for my occupation. The other two my grandparents spoke a lot and I know little phrases here and there but I couldn't get through a conversation if you held a gun to my head. I am signed up for french classess so I can learn enough to converse with my fiance when she speaks it. This is being done in secret to surprise her.


Also

English ************! Do you speak it!?

 

[Kajt]

I speak English, Swedish, German and some Finnish.

Auf wiedersehen, Dummkopf.

 

[Torque669]

English, German and someone Chinese is really all I know.

 

[Trivun]

English as my first language. Not 'American English', which doesn't exist, but pure proper English. True English, from God's green pastures (and yes, England is the home of said pastures, just listen to the hymn 'Jerusalem').

I also speak a little German and French, but only very badly (I can probably recognise a few words, but I got B and C respectively at GCSE then gave up). I want to learn Japanese after listening to the soundtracks for half of the Final Fantasy and Kingdom Hearts series, but never ask me to speak Spanish. I gave up after the first year of teaching, I was hopeless.

EDIT: I'd also like to learn Irish, although that's because I reckon the language is just really sexy and I love Ireland anyway and hope to spend a lot of time there when I graduate university. If possible.

 

[crimsonyte]

Aside from the US, it seems a lot of the secondary languages are learned through school at an early age assuming you grew up using the country's primary language. For example, you grow up in China using Mandarin, you go to school and you learn English making you bilingual. The reason I say "aside from the US" is because a good portion of American's don't learn a secondary language until middle school if not high school. Of course there are those among us who are forced to be bilingual; you grew up using your parent's native language and you learn the country's language as you grow up.

It appears that a lot of the multi-lingual people are usually from the European areas. Is this because of the diversity of languages available and thus necessitating you to learn in order to get by? I know understanding multiple languages is require in some parts of China since the languages is often split between Mandarin and Cantonese.

Where does everyone begin when they start learning a new language? I always start with the basics: counting, greetings and asking for directions. I find that slangs are usually the hardest part to learn since they constantly change.

 

[Lazy Kitty]

Human languages: Dutch, English and French. (I want to learn Japanese.)
Programming Languages: Java, VB.Net, php, C++.

 

[Nechti_Visara]

Two, but that's one full language and half of two others.

I speak English, and I'm learning Spanish in school. I'm also trying to teach myself Al Bhed (I know, I know, but it's for secret messages, and besides, it sounds cool). I'd also like to learn Italian, Japanese, Portuguese, and Gaelic, so I think I should really get started.

(Also, because I know some Spanish, I can usually decipher French and Italian to some extent. Portuguese just looks beautiful, and I'd love to learn it.)

 

[DrunkWithPower]

English
Spanish
French
Greek

 

[crimsonyte]

Human languages: Dutch, English and French. (I want to learn Japanese.)
Programming Languages: Java, VB.Net, php, C++.

Aww, no Klingon? Would seem fun to say you also know an alien language =p

 

[timmytom1]

English (first language so no probs)

French (spent 5 years over there so that`s pretty good)

German(weak can`t get my tenses right so my sentences come across odd)
Spanish(even weaker only know a handful of words)