Language Help/Discussion/Advice Thread

[Jam Scone]

Communication has been around for a long time. Though humanity's ways of communicating vary, its most prominent and used form of communication is through language. Speech is a key element of communication, though the languages spoken throughout the world vary to an extent that there are over 6,500 diverse languages currently on record.

Here, feel free to discuss what languages you speak, whether they're fluent, moderate, or still a beginner. The aim of this thread is for users to exchange phrases, words, facts and etc about language, in order to improve each other's understanding of a language.

To start off, what languages do you speak, how well do you speak it, and what would you like to learn? c: People who speak the language and know the phrase/word in question, feel free to answer any questions.

Look below for list of who speaks what language. Have fun!

List of Languages Spoken by Bulbagarden Users: (Last updated: 10/05/2013 by Dirk)

Ada:
TheMissingno. (moderate)

Chinese:
Jolene (beginner)
Sourcandy (beginner)
porkchopsandwiches (beginner)
☆♪Meloetta♪☆ (fluent)

Cyrillic Script:
Jolene (read)

English:
Meulin Leijon (fluent)
Jack Pschitt (fluent)
Zima (fluent)
maria (fluent)
Jolene (fluent)
Shadows (fluent)
PkmnGreen (fluent)
Voltaire Magneton (second language)
Buoy (fluent)
Sourcandy (simple conversations *?*)
Shinobu (native)
SharKing (fluent)
Chespin (fluent)
White Phoenix (fluent)
Mr Fahrenheit (fluent)
porkchopsandwiches (moderate)
☆♪Meloetta♪☆ (fluent)
Money Store (native)

Estonian:
Mr Fahrenheit (beginner)

Finnish:
Mr Fahrenheit (native)

Fortran:
TheMissingno. (moderate)

Filipino:
Voltaire Magneton (native)

French:
Jack Pschitt (moderate, few years self-teaching)
Jolene (moderate)
Caite-chan (beginner, self-taught)
Shadows (beginner, 2 years)
PkmnGreen (beginner)
Buoy (advanced)
Goodbye Blue Monday (?)
☆♪Meloetta♪☆ (advanced - fluent)
Money Store (intermediate)

Hiragana:
Jolene (read)

Hungarian:
Mr Fahrenheit (beginner)

German:
Meulin Leijon (moderate, 2 years learning)
Caite-chan (beginner, one year learning)
Buoy (moderate)
Jolene (beginner)
White Phoenix (previous language/beginner?)
Mr Fahrenheit (moderate)
Goodbye Blue Monday (beginner)

Greek:
Chespin (native?)

Irish:
Buoy (advanced)

Italian
maria(beginner, no longer practicing)
Jolene (beginner)

Japanese:
Caite-chan (beginner, one semester)
Shadows (beginner)
Jolene (beginner)
Shinobu (intermediate)
SharKing (beginner)
White Phoenix (beginner)

Katakana:
Jolene (read)

Matlab:
TheMissingno. (moderate)

Portuguese:
Jolene (beginner)

Russian:
Zima (beginner)
Jolene (beginner)
porkchopsandwiches (beginner)

Spanish:
Meulin Leijon (beginner, 1 year self-teaching)
Buoy (advanced)
Jolene (beginner)
Sourcandy (moderate)
Shinobu (intermediate)
Money STore (beginner)

Swedish:
Mr Fahrenheit (fluent)

Welsh:
Meulin Leijon (native/fluent)

[Jack Pschitt]

I'm a native speaker of English, but I've been teaching myself French for a few years. Progress is very slow, and I'm not exactly "good" at it. So yeah, I'm boring.

[Stahl]

My native language is American English, so I'm naturally fluent in that, and I am a beginner at Russian.

[Fab]

I speak English, 'Scots' and I can do an okay Welsh accent.

[TheMissingno.]

I'm passable at C++ and Matlab, and I can understand Fortran and Ada but I can't write in them.

[Jolene]

I know English. The only language I truly know. I've been studying French since 6th grade. I can understand when it is spoken to me an I can read it well. However, I cannot speak it to save my life. I think I am doing it wrong.

[Jack Pschitt]

I know English. The only language I truly know. I've been studying French since 6th grade. I can understand when it is spoken to me an I can read it well. However, I cannot speak it to save my life. I think I am doing it wrong.

You know, I never understood how people can read or even hear a language and understand it, but not speak it (my gramma's the same way with Polish, and I never understood that). I'm the opposite, at least with the French I know (or maybe that's what people mean and I just suck at French all around). When I know what to say, I can speak and write okay (remembering where all the accents go bugs me, however), but although I'm pretty okay at reading it (actually, that's probably my strong suit between hearing, reading, speaking and writing), but I can't understand a signle word when it's spoken. And I have a goofy accent when I speak it.

[Caite-chan]

German (Beginner, Half year in High School)
Japanese (Beginner, Semester in College, hiragana & katakana)
French (Beginner, Self taught)

[Shadows]

I'm a native English speaker and I've been learning French at school for almost 2 years. I'm also trying to teach myself Japanese, but lately I've been busy and haven't been doing it as much.

What usually happens to me when I try to learn languages (especially ones that don't use the English alphabet) is that I learn how to read and write long before I learn how to speak or even understand. A few years ago my mom was trying to teach me a language that her parents speak, and I got up to the point where I could correctly write down a phrase if she dictated it to me without knowing what it meant. That's around when she gave up. ^^;

[Jam Scone]

I'm a native speaker of English, but I've been teaching myself French for a few years. Progress is very slow, and I'm not exactly "good" at it. So yeah, I'm boring.

I'll add you to the list now. c: Well, how broad is your knowledge of French? Can you hold a decent conversation? :3c I don't speak a word of French myself, but it looks like quite an interesting language. Though some of the words look very confusing. ^^;;

My native language is American English, so I'm naturally fluent in that, and I am a beginner at Russian.

I'll add you in now. c: Wow, Russian?! That's amazing! :o I've always seen Russian as such a complicated language, do you find it complicated?

I speak English, 'Scots' and I can do an okay Welsh accent.

Silly fab, accents don't count as a language. xP

I'm passable at C++ and Matlab, and I can understand Fortran and Ada but I can't write in them.

... You know, I'm actually going to count Matlab in, as it is technically a form of communication in another language. UI'm going to count the other two in as well.

I know English. The only language I truly know. I've been studying French since 6th grade. I can understand when it is spoken to me an I can read it well. However, I cannot speak it to save my life. I think I am doing it wrong.

I'll add you in right now. Wow! That's amazing! So, you can read and understand French but can't speak it. :o I've never really understood that, but I don't think you're doing it wrong! Maybe just a little verbal practice is in order. c:

German (Beginner, Half year in High School)
Japanese (Beginner, Semester in College, hiragana & katakana)
French (Beginner, Self taught)

I'll add you in. c: Japanese, huh? Another complicated language! Do you find it easy or hard? I've always seen it as quite an intimidating language to learn, myself.

I'm a native English speaker and I've been learning French at school for almost 2 years. I'm also trying to teach myself Japanese, but lately I've been busy and haven't been doing it as much.

What usually happens to me when I try to learn languages (especially ones that don't use the English alphabet) is that I learn how to read and write long before I learn how to speak or even understand. A few years ago my mom was trying to teach me a language that her parents speak, and I got up to the point where I could correctly write down a phrase if she dictated it to me without knowing what it meant. That's around when she gave up. ^^;

I'll add you in too, then. Shall I put you down as beginner for French? c:

And ah, don't be disheartened! All learning a language takes is a bit of dedication, and it's always a great skill if you stick to it. I've grown up switching between English and Welsh (I started English when I was about three or four), and after I'd perfected those I went on to do German in school and begin teaching myself Spanish and Italian. I gave up on Italian to make room for Spanish, but I'll pick up on it one day.

[Caite-chan]

@Meulin Leijon I always had to write out the words in Romaji a head of time so I could speak it because I couldn't remember what all the characters where.

[Jam Scone]

@Meulin Leijon I always had to write out the words in Romaji a head of time so I could speak it because I couldn't remember what all the characters where.

I think it must be really complicated. All the kanji symbols represent a sound, don't they? Or something like that, I don't speak any Japanese. What do you find easier, writing or speaking?

[Caite-chan]

@Meulin Leijon I found it much easier to speak once I knew what it was I was saying. xD (And I cheated always writing everything in Romaji in my books...lol.)

[Jack Pschitt]

@Meulin Leijon; Oh, lord, I could maybe have a conversation with a three-year-old. And English is really a language that's been fucked up beyond belief when it comes to pronunciation and word forms and stuff like that, so French makes a ton of sense to me, but all the memorizing is hard. Then there's the occasional word that's not pronounced the way it's spelled, like "travail" (it sounds like "travile" instead of "travale" like it should).

[Fab]

@Meulin Leijon; Updated the OP, I speak, read and write a little Italian from my school days.

I'm not good at it xD