Multi/Bilingual Language Thread

[Nabiki]

The problem with Japanese is that there are so many ways to say things, depending on situation. For example, there are about eight ways to say "I". Which one you use depends on your gender, your age, your social status, the social status of the person you're addressing, and the situation.

 

[fluffycrow]

I get it. While not as bad in Greek, there are so many ways to say the same thing, and some are appropriate in different situations

 

[KayisforKale]

The problem with Japanese is that there are so many ways to say things, depending on situation. For example, there are about eight ways to say "I". Which one you use depends on your gender, your age, your social status, the social status of the person you're addressing, and the situation.

It is just like Korean in that aspect. I ditched both languages to learn Chinese because their structure is more closely aligned with English than the other two.

 

[Blue Raptor]

I have at least begun learning 12 languages throughout my life. Right now, I am concentrating on passing the HSK4 test (Mandarin Chinese), and becoming conversational in Russian.

Swedish
Norwegian
Spanish
Chinese
Russian
Arabic
German
Korean
Japanese
Italian
French
Polish

Wow!

 

[Nabiki]

It is just like Korean in that aspect. I ditched both languages to learn Chinese because their structure is more closely aligned with English than the other two.

Japanese, Korean, Mandarin, Cantonese are all similar like English, French, Spanish, Italian, and Portugese are similar.

I found another issue. The Japanese means Japanese person, not just Japanese. Japanese language is nihongo, Japanese person is nihonjin, Japanese cooking is washoku, etc.

 

[Nabiki]

I ran out of hearts in Japanese (got halfway through level 3). Decided to start Welsh. It is kind of fun.

 

[KayisforKale]

Japanese, Korean, Mandarin, Cantonese are all similar like English, French, Spanish, Italian, and Portugese are similar.

I found another issue. The Japanese means Japanese person, not just Japanese. Japanese language is nihongo, Japanese person is nihonjin, Japanese cooking is washoku, etc.
View attachment 3639110

What I meant was that Chinese has the same general structure as English. And there are minimal rules concerning the age/gender of the person you are speaking to/about when choosing which words to use.

 

[Karasu]

The problem with Japanese is that there are so many ways to say things, depending on situation. For example, there are about eight ways to say "I". Which one you use depends on your gender, your age, your social status, the social status of the person you're addressing, and the situation.

I've been using Duolingo but also heavily relying on DH for help - he is half Japanese and spent about half his time there growing up, and spoke the language at home, so he's been quite helpful for some of Duolingo's more... interesting bits.

 

[Nabiki]

I've been using Duolingo but also heavily relying on DH for help - he is half Japanese and spent about half his time there growing up, and spoke the language at home, so he's been quite helpful for some of Duolingo's more... interesting bits.

Now that works. You can rely on Duolingo for some basic syntax and vocabulary and your DH for real world knowledge. I took three courses over a summer at Soko Gakuen from native speakers, and it really helped.

I'm half Japanese, but back in the 60s and 70s it wasn't okay to be a half breed, so my mother didn't teach us Japanese.

 

[Evadig]

This is really nice when you get tired of repeating Hablo, hablas, habla…
I was able to skip two levels before I had to stop because I didn’t know the vocabulary.