Losing my native language

[procyonlotor]

If the UN convened and decided that, say, Esperanto was going to be the main language for all international communication then that would certainly go a long way toward creating a more universal standard, something that goes beyond the language of the most politically and culturally influential countries.

And it's always been about those.

 

[kintaris]

I don't think a newly created artifical language would ever catch on if we had to learn from scratch. You say yourself that you're too stubborn to learn languages, well, so is everyone else.

The only way a universal language would come into being is if we all accepted one of the widest-spoken existing languages as our only language. And that would only happen after such a big war (or such an unfathomably long period of social evolution) that there probably wouldnt be many humans left to speak it.

Personally I like the diversity. Language differences fuel cultural, political and artistic differences and make the world an interesting place full of interesting people. I don't want to live in a Brave New World.

 

[Not-here-anymore]

If I remember correctly someone years ago (a lot of yours ago) tried making a universal language... as we can see from today, it was a fail and didn't work.

Mmm... Esperanto. Spoken by approximately... no-one. Mentioned once or twice in Red Dwarf, I believe, but otherwise consigned to the lost property box of history.

Although I have a little book containing insults in many, many languages, including a couple of swear words in Esperanto. Yep, an artificial language, and it still has curse words. Yay!

 

[zehydra]

Language plays a huge role in the philosophies of different societies. For instance, the word "justice" does not translate into Ancient Greek. They had a concept of Justice that was combined with Ethics/Morals into one concept, but when we read translations of the greek texts into English, it gets translated into "Justice" since it's the closest thing we have to such a word.

I would prefer to never have to lose any of the languages that I've learned, and I've never, thankfully lost by ability to speak my native language. While I don't particularly care for English, I need to know it very well in order to write at my academic level.

 

[neoontime]

Sadly, I'm losing my spanish.

 

[Dango]

Nope. Doesn't happen to me, although I have accidentally done my Latin homework in Japanese...

 

[The Procrastinated End]

English is my native language so I can't really say that I have.

 

[Et3rnalLegend64]

I pretty much lost mine a while ago. I learned enough to help around the house and hold basic conversations, but after a while I didn't feel like speaking it anymore since I didn't learn enough and it's a non-mainstream Chinese dialect.

I can still understand what I learned, but I can't really speak it anymore. I figure it'd be more useful to learn Vietnamese at this point anyway since the older generation seems to default to that with each other (Grandparents moved from China to Vietnam before the last generation was born). It's not helping that I watch anime and I'm picking up Japanese a little. Sometimes when I'm trying to think of the word I'm looking for in Chinese, I get Japanese in my head.

 

[UberMore]

As English is my native tongue, I haven't experienced the loss of it ('cept due to the drink of course! Then the Irish pounds through me!(I don't speak any Gaelic though)).
But I could imagine it would be horrifying. To start to forget something so ancient and powerful, something strong enough to communicate freely throughout an entire country without worry, something so core to an upbringing and localized existence; I don't know how I would cope.

 

[Macgyvercas]

English is my native language, so unless I convert to only speaking Sindarin (once I learn it) or pig latin, I don't think I'll experience that.

 

[Prof.Wood]

JOIN USSSSSSS!

All joking aside being english no, however I do want to lose it... ahh to be french or italian.

 

[Daverson]

Welcome to New Wales?

Don't worry, there's always going to be a place for your home tongue. Consider yourself lucky, people who have English as a first language will never have such a great opportunity to be bilingual.

 

[teh_Canape]

Nope. Doesn't happen to me, although I have accidentally done my Latin homework in Japanese...

how did you...

nevermind

as for me, yeah, when I do imagination time and shit, I usually go for english, since, truth be told, sounds more badass than my regular spanish, but I'm not really losing it, since I use spanish all the time, you know, in my actual life =P

 

[Jonluw]

snip

*sob* i feel for you man.

my native language is Greek. however, it is REALLY easy to forget. since i only visit greece in the summer now that i am older (i was born there) i forgot the language almost completely!

and now i can only flirt with girls i know speak english

*sigh*

You just hilariously fulfilled one of my stereotypes/prejudices about Greek people.

 

[chaosfenrir]

A universal language would be great, but language is tied heavily to culture. Many countries fear that by adopting another language they will lose a huge part of their culture.

Also i feel for you. My mother tongue is chinese, but i pretty much don;t use it nowadays. My parents say i speak chinese like one of you guys

 

[Still Life]

I'm an Australian Aboriginal, so my language has been repressed and I was taught English. Things are starting to change, though, which is good. 60 000 years of culture shouldn't be left to wither.

 

[vanthebaron]

that happens alot, i use alot of japanese and spanish to cuss out people

 

[chickenlord]

well its not really your fault that your losing your language, english is the third highest first language is the world, and im not sure of the specifics but i think its the most taught and highest second language the world over, being used by everyone pretty much, i can see a world one day where English is the only language used...

 

[Nazz3]

I have it too. Sometimes when im trying to say something I only remember the English word, sucks.

 

[Revan NL]

My native language is Dutch, but there are times I just can't find the right words in Dutch, so I either finish sentences in English or put English words in the middel of sentences. But even though my native language is Dutch, I usually go to English internetsites, post on English forums, I tweet in English and my computer/consoles/iPhone/iPad are all set to English as the system language.