Do you speak any foreign languages?
 

Since this is a fairly diverse forum with people from all over the globe I was wondering how many of you speak a foreign language or another.

My native language is Portuguese, as you could probably tell from my location.

I've been fluent in English since I was 13-14 or so. It's always been my best subject at school, dunno why. I could take the risk of not studying at all for a test and still getting one of the highest grades in class.

I also speak German at an intermediate level. Made a lot of progress in the last year or so. If I was more exposed to it I'd become fluent in it faster, I'm sure of it.

I've studied French from 7th to 9th grade(compulsory foreign language alongside English here) but that was a long time ago and I barely remember any of it. Can read up to 50% of a text in it due to being a Romance language like Portuguese and also having several words similar to English, but there's no way I can speak it all.

I find linguistics to be a fascinating subject. It's good for your brain and very helpful when travelling or talking to people from all over the world. Looks good on your CV as well. Also, apparently, bi-lingual people are less likely to get Alzheimers in the future. ;)

How about you?

I only speak English but I do know a couple words in Spanish and French and goodbye in Japanese but that's about it.

I know some Japanese words and expressions from all the anime I've watched in the past few years. But never felt like learning it due to not being very useful outside of Japan.

English is my second (third as Norwegian technically have two written languages) language, something we're taught at a very young age.

I did start learning Japanese, but after the first year of basics it kinda died off as I rarely have anyone to converse with.

And since the Scandinavian languages are pretty similar I can read and verbally understand Danish and Swedish pretty well. The modern written Norwegian language is basically a harder Danish anyway.

Well, I can read Galician and Spanish/Castillian/Catalonian pretty well due to them being Ibero-Romance languages as well. As for verbal understanding of them, it depends on the speaker and its accent. Also can read and understand spoken Italian to some degree as well. But since I've never studied any of those 4, I didn't think it was worth including them in my list.

I tried learning German once, but it didn't last long since that was in High School and I had to transfer to another school that didn't offer it. Makes me sad because I love that language and I'd kill to learn it.

Not the best online resource but you can always try Duolingo for a while. It should help you learn some vocabulary at least.

Spanish. Some Italian and German. Want to learn more German though.

Only English. Obviously took Spanish in High School but forgot it all.

English is all you really need, but I do sometimes wish I knew Spanish just so I could understand what all these random pedestrians are saying when I'm out on the street.

Only in countries where it's the native language. Sure it's the lingua franca, but good luck going to France, Spain, Italy or several Eastern European countries and speaking nothing but English.

I speak English as my first language, but I know a bit of French.

Not really, but I am slowly trying to learn Japanese.

I'm learning Finnish.

I know a handful of cuss words in a few different languages, a tiny bit of German (from highschool and listening to German metal) but not enough to really count, and a teensy handful of words and phrases in Japanese due to anime/manga... :lol: but I don't speak any foreign languages - I would love to though.

I'll probably never visit those countries, so it doesn't really matter. And I would hope those countries have people speaking english in the modern year of 2014. There's no reason people in France, Spain and Italy shouldn't all be fluent in english.

If I were to ever go to a country where English isn't the first language I'd make it a top priority to learn as much about the native language as possible before going. This is why people over in other countries don't like American tourists. They don't bother because they think everyone is "obligated" to learn English. They're not.

Well, then saying English is all you need in the USA is nothing other than stating the obvious. Just like people in, let's say Japan, don't really need anything other than Japanese.

All of them? Do you actually think everyone in the world speaks English? Especially in countries where everything is dubbed, including tv shows and movies?

Hate to break it to ya, but the only countries in Europe where you'll get away easily by speaking in English to people of all age groups are the UK, Republic of Ireland, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, the Netherlands, Belgium(Flanders), Austria and Switzerland. Portugal, Germany and Greece to some degree as well.

I've been to France, Spain and Italy before and it was pretty hard finding someone who spoke English there. And the ones who did spoke a very broken English. Not to mention people in big countries are more proud of their language and culture and probably will take offense if you just start speaking English to them.

It depends, really. In my country, no one really expects a foreign tourist to speak Portuguese. So, as long as you won't be rude and start yelling in English in people's faces, no one will feel upset if you speak English to them.

Spanish, english, french and a little of portuguese.

It is kinda absurd to presume that all the people have to speak english, some people don´t need to ´cuz that is not vital in their life/job...

I took Spanish in high school and college, so I know some things. Also took sign language in college which was cool. I know some French from watching the Canadian version of Sesame Street when I was little.

After pretty unsuccessful 4 years education in French (long ago), it remains at a sufficient English next to my mother tongue German ...