2G21 - 4: Second language

Fei Ayanami · Post by **Fei Ayanami** » Wed Mar 17, 2021 3:17 pm

BONJOUR

So, I have lived in a Frenchy sort of place for 7.5 years now and tried to use this language “French” a decent amount, though I’ve never become fluent enough to really feel like I can call it my second language. It’s the closest thing I have, though.

And over the pandemic I decided to learn Japanese, and can sort of read some easy things now I guess.

And lately my significant other has been getting certified to teach English as a second language, and teaching (practicum) courses online.

So I have been thinking about this language learning business a lot!

What are your experiences with second+ languages? Do you feel fluent in more than one language? How was your experience learning or dabbling in other languages? Etc! Discuss.

P.S. I once met a couple whose spoken language at home was Esperanto.

Damien · Post by **Damien** » Wed Mar 17, 2021 3:21 pm

I'm crap at languages. Know little bits of French, Japanese, Swedish and Spanish but have never been confident enough or adept at learning. I'm also very much not confident in trying to speak anything I may think I know. I'll just settle with forever being impressed that I can read some words in katakana

WaWard · Post by **WaWard** » Wed Mar 17, 2021 3:50 pm

I learned English mostly through sg. Other than tactical learning languages before travelling I don’t really go and learn them anymore. They don’t stick unless I practice.

Damien · Post by **Damien** » Wed Mar 17, 2021 3:55 pm

I think I'm perhaps a little ADHD and have too many things I want to be doing at any given time to sit down and actually learn languages, at least to the point where anything will be retained.
England is absolutely shocking at languages anyway. We were "taught" French in school but never given any information on why we'd maybe want to read/speak French one day. Was always just like "here's how you buy an Orangina in a café in Paris" and we were all just "lol we've never even ordered one in a café in London".

Cid · Post by **Cid** » Wed Mar 17, 2021 5:32 pm

I was quite good at Spanish coming out of high school but I didn't care about Spanish at all so I never used it and forgot it.

Fei Ayanami · Post by **Fei Ayanami** » Wed Mar 17, 2021 5:48 pm

I was also “taught” French in school but despite being in Canada it didn’t feel very useful to me at the time. I only picked up trying to learn it again in 2G13 in advance of moving here. I’m sure it did help that I wasn’t starting from nothing, though I certainly didn’t feel like I remembered almost any of it. I’ve kind of plateaued at a so-so level, since I’m not talking to francophones all that often and too many of them in Montreal speak far better English than I do French, too.

That said, I am currently reading the first Moomin novel in French and it’s going ok!

I took German for a year in university (2G3) and while I was never comfortable conversing, I’m often surprised how much that has stuck with me. When I visited Germany a few years ago, with a little brushing up beforehand, I felt like I was able to get on about as well as I do here in French, and actually better than French when it came to understanding and using numbers (generally when purchasing things).

Fei Ayanami · Post by **Fei Ayanami** » Thu Mar 18, 2021 8:24 pm

WaWard wrote:I learned English mostly through sg. Other than tactical learning languages before travelling I don’t really go and learn them anymore. They don’t stick unless I practice.

Can I live with your family for 6 months to practice my French

EDIT:
8 months tops! I’ll leave by Christmas

EDIT 2:
Unless you want me there for Christmas

WaWard · Post by **WaWard** » Thu Mar 18, 2021 10:34 pm

No!

Edit: absolutely not!

Edit: only if we play root

Edit: NO!

Fei Ayanami · Post by **Fei Ayanami** » Sat Mar 20, 2021 11:02 pm

Oh we’ll play Root

Damien wrote:I'm crap at languages. Know little bits of French, Japanese, Swedish and Spanish but have never been confident enough or adept at learning. I'm also very much not confident in trying to speak anything I may think I know. I'll just settle with forever being impressed that I can read some words in katakana

I also had/have the confidence problem. I first went to Germany in 2G4, right after learning German for a year, and I think I barely tried to use the language. But going again in 2G18 after being used to using shitty French in Quebec for years, I was much more willing to try using shitty German.

Damien · Post by **Damien** » Thu Mar 25, 2021 2:56 pm

Most of the French I've gotten to use (which isn't much) has been in Paris and I find most restaurant staff etc there tend to sneer at and correct you if you say/pronounce a single word wrong. At best, they normally respond in English, which is a little soul destroying. I have a friend who speaks french practically perfectly and he ordered all our breakfasts once. The person taking our order forced out a laugh and corrected him on one word, quite rudely. I think that was the moment I decided that it wasn't worth bothering.

Fei Ayanami · Post by **Fei Ayanami** » Thu Mar 25, 2021 3:13 pm

Damien wrote:At best, they normally respond in English, which is a little soul destroying

Precisely why improving French in Montreal is so hard.

I think this is usually well-meaning/neutral (only occasionally rude) but it’s unfortunately counterproductive to my French getting better.

Damien · Post by **Damien** » Thu Mar 25, 2021 3:15 pm

Similar story but I once ordered every item from the McDonald's €1 menu in Spain (about 10-15 things), in Spanish with no hesitation (was referring to the menu board, but still) and was spoken back to in English. No sneering or correcting, but they're more laid back in Malaga than in Paris

Fei Ayanami · Post by **Fei Ayanami** » Thu Mar 25, 2021 3:29 pm

I think they’re more laid back in Montreal than in Paris too. People in Paris are fuckers! (* I don’t entirely believe this, however French ppl r a funny bunch)

WaWard · Post by **WaWard** » Thu Mar 25, 2021 4:48 pm

Damien wrote:Most of the French I've gotten to use (which isn't much) has been in Paris and I find most restaurant staff etc there tend to sneer at and correct you if you say/pronounce a single word wrong. At best, they normally respond in English, which is a little soul destroying. I have a friend who speaks french practically perfectly and he ordered all our breakfasts once. The person taking our order forced out a laugh and corrected him on one word, quite rudely. I think that was the moment I decided that it wasn't worth bothering.

They were rude to me too because I didn’t speak the language properly.

Meanwhile in other areas in France they love our accent and we love theirs.

Lord Golbez · Post by **Lord Golbez** » Thu Mar 25, 2021 4:53 pm

Damien wrote:Similar story but I once ordered every item from the McDonald's €1 menu in Spain (about 10-15 things), in Spanish with no hesitation (was referring to the menu board, but still) and was spoken back to in English. No sneering or correcting, but they're more laid back in Malaga than in Paris

They must have thought you were American ordering everything on the menu.

Fei Ayanami · Post by **Fei Ayanami** » Thu Mar 25, 2021 5:06 pm

I went to Japan in 2G6 and learned to say “tall coffee please”. I used it at least once on most days! #fluent

Vibing_V · Post by **Vibing_V** » Thu Mar 25, 2021 6:50 pm

Oh man, I used to love learning languages and fancied myself fairly good at it. Thought I'd grow up and be a polyglot. I remember as far back as preschool, learning days of the week and weather in French, simple stuff, and wanting to learn more.

I continued with French through high school (advanced level) and studied Japanese for 3-4 years at uni. I went back and took some French college courses a few years later, because I thought it was a shame to lose all that learning.

I feel like confidence plays a huge role in language learning, which you guys have touched on already - about actually going out and practicing in the world.

I feel kind of like I was better at french back in grade 12 than I have been since. Though I find learning throughout K-12 is a bit more basic -- like "here, learn this thing" or "here practice this tense". Whereas when I took the college courses things were much more rule based which I find a lot easier to process in learning. Possibly also the rule-based language learning with Japanese, which was from scratch as an adult, had something to do with the difference in learning French again later as well.

I had 2 years of Japanese courses behind me when I went there for 8 months. I could definitely get by but probably still only had about 1000 words or so. I could half-read many things. There were a lot of vocab gaps. Over there nobody expects you to speak ANY Japanese if you're white. Just having simple stuff is appreciated, and they are usually very surprised when you can actually make a sentence.

I feel like I should know more French and try to use it more. Being a business in Canada many clients are from Quebec and it kind of feels rude to me to have them speak English all the time. But I also am very shy to have crappy french in a professional setting and I can't remember conjugations and shit anymore.... I can read and understand French emails well enough and just reply in English and this seems to work out. On the rare occasion where it's needed, Google Translate actually works really well these days.

(Also boss speaks French.)

But um yeah, language is very much use-it-or-lose-it and I don't make time to practice or listen so

Seemed to be easier to integrate and make time for these things when I was a student.

I'm also kind of annoyed that I didn't learn more language stuff at a younger age. Would've been easier and would've stuck better. There are lots of French Immersion schools around here, but my mother thought doing language immersion was emotionally damaging to kids or some bullshit so she never put me in. I get that it might not suit everyone, but I'm pretty sure I would've done well with it.

Fei Ayanami · Post by **Fei Ayanami** » Thu Mar 25, 2021 7:28 pm

I remember that you studied Japanese. I did not remember that you lived in Japan for 8 months! Where were you? What year?

A lot of people I know studied Japanese at university age, so it feels a bit weird finally trying to learn it now almost 2 decades later.

Vibing_V · Post by **Vibing_V** » Thu Mar 25, 2021 7:51 pm

Fei Ayanami wrote:I remember that you studied Japanese. I did not remember that you lived in Japan for 8 months! Where were you? What year?

A lot of people I know studied Japanese at university age, so it feels a bit weird finally trying to learn it now almost 2 decades later.

We were at peak weeabo age! I was in the same Japanese 100 (or was it 101?) class with Andrew the very first term at uni. And I met John via English class and found out he was in the intensive Japanese class. I also joined Anime Club. And that's how I came to know all of you people!

I was there from May-Dec 2003 teaching English. I lived about a 10 min train ride from Kyoto. It was a very ideal location as most placements were farther out in the boonies. Shaun & Mariko went to work for that company right after I came back.

I took another 2 years of Japanese after that but then there were struggles in general with school and life and stuff so I stopped.

Fei Ayanami · Post by **Fei Ayanami** » Fri Mar 26, 2021 7:47 pm

Nice! I do remember that Andrew met you via Japanese-related university things.

I visited Japan when Ziggy was living there and stayed with him for a couple weeks. Mostly Osaka, but we took short excursions to Tokyo and Kyoto too. As this predated smart phones and I spoke/read no Japanese, it was a bit unnerving going out by myself at first and making sure I could find my way back.

It’s also funny learning Japanese now because I really haven’t been heavily into anime or anything since the early 2Gs. It’s been cool though! I am using WaniKani to learn kanji (& vocab) and it is a ludicrously effective system.

Mitsurugi CP · Post by **Mitsurugi CP** » Sun Apr 04, 2021 7:45 am

I have been trying to learn Vietnamese for nearly a decade so our kiddos will hear it spoken around the house (and my wife has been gently trying to convince me that we should retire to Vietnam in 30-40 years). Vietnamese already has a high learning curve for English speakers because it is a tonal language, it has a lot of commonly used phonemes that do not exist in English, and while it uses Latin script, many letters have entirely different pronunciations than they do in English.

The other big wrinkle is that my wife's family is from southern Vietnam. There are not a lot of good Viet language resources as it is (paid or otherwise), but nearly all resources for English speakers are in the Northern dialect, which has its own pronunciations, grammar, and tones that are not found in the south. (one example: the letter "d" is pronounced as a soft Y sound in the south, but a hard Z sound in the north)

This is despite the fact that the vast majority of Viet living in North America are from the south. But the high learning curve, combined with the difficulty of finding any halfway decent language resources in the southern dialect, has been very frustrating and pretty much killed my motivation.

Damien · Post by **Damien** » Sun Apr 04, 2021 7:52 am

Never knew that about Vietnamese. Sounds like a right pain in the arse to try learning

Lord Golbez · Post by **Lord Golbez** » Sun Apr 04, 2021 4:28 pm

Isn't your wife a better language resource anyway? Most books/cds/etc. for languages are extremely limited vocabulary, unless you're straight up using a dictionary, which isn't very user friendly for learning a language.

Fei Ayanami · Post by **Fei Ayanami** » Sun Apr 04, 2021 5:40 pm

I doubt his wife wants to be his only language resource though? That’d be a lot of work.

That also does sound like a pain. Reminds me of how much easier it is to find Parisian-French resources than Quebec-French resources, except the Vietnamese situation sounds a lot worse.

WaWard · Post by **WaWard** » Sun Apr 04, 2021 6:06 pm

Your city is your resource calisse!

Fei Ayanami · Post by **Fei Ayanami** » Sun Apr 04, 2021 7:01 pm

No it’s been taken over by France people haven’t you read the scare pieces!

Mitsurugi CP · Post by **Mitsurugi CP** » Mon Apr 05, 2021 1:01 am

Lord Golbez wrote:Isn't your wife a better language resource anyway? Most books/cds/etc. for languages are extremely limited vocabulary, unless you're straight up using a dictionary, which isn't very user friendly for learning a language.

Knowing how to speak a language and being able to teach that language in a structured way are two very different skills and levels of time investment.

Fei Ayanami wrote:I doubt his wife wants to be his only language resource though? That’d be a lot of work.

That also does sound like a pain. Reminds me of how much easier it is to find Parisian-French resources than Quebec-French resources, except the Vietnamese situation sounds a lot worse.

What differences between the two stand out? The only one I know about is "tabarnak", because dirty words are always the first ones you learn.

Fei Ayanami · Post by **Fei Ayanami** » Mon Apr 05, 2021 1:25 am

Lots of random differences in vocab—sort of like US/British English differences, like elevator/lift, trunk/boot, sneaker/trainer, chip/crisp, that sort of thing. Different pronunciation of many vowel sounds. Way different when you start getting into informal language, but I’m not much of an authority on that. WaWard can probably answer this better than me.

WaWard · Post by **WaWard** » Mon Apr 05, 2021 1:59 am

Plenty of differences all about. It really is as broad as the delta between North American English and uk English.

One interesting development is that French is being anglicized differently in France and CanadammIt’s pretty wild. Here they’re all older words because we invented new words for new stuff. Like. For example, podcasts. But for older words it’s a free for all. In France it’s the reverse n

Fei Ayanami · Post by **Fei Ayanami** » Mon Apr 05, 2021 11:28 am

I feel like both France and Quebec are appalled at the other’s use of English for certain things, while mostly overlooking their own uses of English

WaWard · Post by **WaWard** » Mon Apr 05, 2021 11:53 am

Yes.

Fei Ayanami · Post by **Fei Ayanami** » Mon Apr 05, 2021 1:21 pm

I like trolling France people by saying “bienvenue” for “you’re welcome”.

WaWard · Post by **WaWard** » Tue Apr 06, 2021 12:59 am

This news is highly relevant to this topic

https://montrealgazette.com/news/local- ... -is-french

Fei Ayanami · Post by **Fei Ayanami** » Tue Apr 06, 2021 2:19 am

LOL! That guy even looks like he’s from Quebec

Vibing_V · Post by **Vibing_V** » Tue Apr 06, 2021 2:47 am

I had a vague notion that France is okay with loan words like "le popcorn" whereas Quebec is more militant (le mais souffle!)

I remember seeing STOP signs in France. Not ARRET.... STOP.

Also du becomes dzu in Canada.

That's about all I know.

WaWard · Post by **WaWard** » Tue Apr 06, 2021 12:11 pm

Vibing_V wrote:I had a vague notion that France is okay with loan words like "le popcorn" whereas Quebec is more militant (le mais souffle!)

I remember seeing STOP signs in France. Not ARRET.... STOP.

Also du becomes dzu in Canada.

That's about all I know.

Like I said, it's more a matter of time and emergence of words. For newer words, we try to make sure we use the new/"invented" ones, but English expressions are engrained pretty deep in our language too, with varied results depending on where you live. I come from Quebec City where there was very little of that, and here in fordnation, sometimes sentences are in Franglish and I struggle keeping up with them despite the fact that I know both languages very well.

Also we use le popcorn all the time here.

Fei Ayanami · Post by **Fei Ayanami** » Tue Apr 06, 2021 1:05 pm

https://www.cbc.ca/radio/asithappens/as ... -1.4296637

Mitsurugi CP · Post by **Mitsurugi CP** » Tue Apr 06, 2021 5:09 pm

That is entirely too many syllables for something as mundane as grilled cheese. It's why we abbreviate PB&J by default.

Peanut butter and pickle sandwich I don't have a solution for. Except not eating it.

Fei Ayanami · Post by **Fei Ayanami** » Tue Apr 06, 2021 5:39 pm

Peanut butter and daaayyyammmm