xLiraelx Posted April 2, 2015 Share Posted April 2, 2015 I just started teaching myself Swedish, just because I enjoy doing it and it stretches my mind. Anyone else have hobby languages? Link to post Share on other sites
LadyWallflower Posted April 2, 2015 Share Posted April 2, 2015 I'm learning Japanese on Japan, although there are no classes out here in the country. Link to post Share on other sites
Palovana Posted April 2, 2015 Share Posted April 2, 2015 YEEEEEEEEEEEESSSSSSSSSSSSS. YYYYYEEEESSSSSSS so much lol. I don't have the time at the moment, but I want to teach myself Italian, Norwegian, Swedish, Finnish, Russian, Czech, Hungarian - uh, let's just say I have an insatiable desire and fascination with language and culture and it's kind of a thing of mine to become a hyperpolyglot lol. I already speak French and German, it's not nearly enough yet haha. Link to post Share on other sites
kelico Posted April 2, 2015 Share Posted April 2, 2015 I love learning languages...but I haven't learned any new ones since school. The main language I've learned on my own is Japanese. (I did take 2 classes in high school, but I already knew everything we learned by myself before!) I'm by no means fluent though lol. :P But if I found more time, I'd definitely love to learn more. Link to post Share on other sites
Notte stellata Posted April 2, 2015 Share Posted April 2, 2015 I just started learning Italian a few weeks ago because I like Italian operas (but more importantly, because I love language in general). I learn from YouTube videos and other free online resources. I don't have any particular goal in mind, just learning a little bit whenever I feel like it, and it's fun exactly because there are no external motives. I met an Italian pen pal (who also likes operas!) online and we write emails in both English and Italian. It can take me several minutes of looking up the dictionary to write a simple sentence, but it's good practice. Link to post Share on other sites
Philip027 Posted April 2, 2015 Share Posted April 2, 2015 Would absolutely never do this just "for fun" :/ I have a hard enough time just getting my native language straight sometimes. Would definitely need a reason/motivation to try to learn another. Link to post Share on other sites
Kazu Posted April 2, 2015 Share Posted April 2, 2015 I love foreign languages. I've tried to teach myself numerous times before but seldom get past the basics or just bits and pieces/random phrases. I've been learning German since late September though and I've been more serious about it than my past attempts. I only about 220 words though. I'd love to live in Switzerland at some point so that's my motivation to stick with it! (though in Switzerland they speak Swiss German which is a bit different from regular German!) I'd love to also learn conversational (not necessarily fluent though becoming fluent would be cool) Norwegian, Dutch, Irish, Korean, Japanese, and/or Chinese. And I'm hoping to become fluent in Icelandic and Ojibwe along with German. One of my goals is to be a polyglot actually c: Link to post Share on other sites
ThaHoward Posted April 2, 2015 Share Posted April 2, 2015 I tried to learn Chinese once since I had a chinese friend in class. He even wanted me to take me to China when he was going to visit it :P Other than that I had some youtube lessons in Spanish... Other than English I learned myself some basic Dutch. Link to post Share on other sites
LaMaestra Posted April 2, 2015 Share Posted April 2, 2015 Count me in on this! I learned French at school and that started my love of languages. I have since learned Italian, Spanish and Gaelic. I tried Greek but gave up because I found it difficult. Link to post Share on other sites
Salmacis Posted April 2, 2015 Share Posted April 2, 2015 Back when I had no job and plenty of free time to kill I used to spend hours and hours teaching myself Latin - expanding my vocabulary and grammar. I loved it. I also used to take Japanese lessons for pleasure, but now I'm married to a Japanese man and am expecting a baby (who will speak predominantly Japanese), improving my language skills has become a necessity. I would like to learn a Scandinavian language one day. Link to post Share on other sites
Sage Raven Domino Posted April 2, 2015 Share Posted April 2, 2015 I'm glad that fun is a sufficient stimulus for you all to learn languages; generally, the process goes much faster if there's a compelling reason to learn the language, like living in a country that speaks it. I'm so lazy that I'll likely never learn languages of those countries where I don't want to live. Congrats on forming a wonderful family, Salmacis! Link to post Share on other sites
Dodecahedron314 Posted April 2, 2015 Share Posted April 2, 2015 I've been trying off and on for years to learn German because that's where my family is from and I'd like to eventually live there. My level of fluency is inversely correlated with the amount of other stuff I have to do, meaning I could probably barely order a pretzel right now. (Mmm, pretzels...) Link to post Share on other sites
kiaroskuro Posted April 2, 2015 Share Posted April 2, 2015 I'd love to live in Switzerland at some point so that's my motivation to stick with it! (though in Switzerland they speak Swiss German which is a bit different from regular German!) Ha ha, you bet! Swiss TV shows generally need to be subtitled when broadcast in Germany because we'd have a hard time understanding the language otherwise. I'm not saying this to discourage you, though! Good luck with your plans to move to Switzerland, and if you need any help with German, just ask. Link to post Share on other sites
ghoul Posted April 3, 2015 Share Posted April 3, 2015 I suppose I am always learning more English, but I wouldn't say I've really "studied" it as most people think of studying a language, I've just simply been using it. I used to study Japanese quite a bit, but I dropped it, but I got to such a point that it practicaly became my third language, due to knowing so much vocabulary, grammar, and a lot of phrases.. I am currently looking into studying Korean and Hebrew. Korean because the writing system seemed appealing, and I love Korean films, and Hebrew because I think it will help me with my theology studies, and also to be able to communicate with Israelis, or Jews that speak Hebrew. Link to post Share on other sites
Autumn Season Posted April 3, 2015 Share Posted April 3, 2015 Yay, languages! <3 I'm currently studying Chinese (in university) and it's so much fun. Challenging, but also very rewarding. No matter what I'm doing with my life at the moment, I always feel the need to learn a language. xD It's like an urge. In the past I've studied English, French, Spanish and Japanese. Also, German and Russian are my native languages. I also like Korean, but I only learned a couple of phrases from my Korean friends, because it's fun to communicate in the same language. Link to post Share on other sites
7Dragons Posted April 3, 2015 Share Posted April 3, 2015 YYYYYYEEEESSSSS Intermediate in Spanish (formal, high school classes), but it doesn't fit for me. Beginner in Russian. (Any help, please?) Actually listening to Russian music right now. Self-studying in my spare time (try ten minutes a week), but actually doing okay I think. Then again I haven't gotten past nominative case. I have an awesome grammar book and a dictionary. And the unreliable internet. Going to take Chinese instead of Spanish 4 next year. Studied Japanese for a while, but gave it up. With NO MATERIAL, it's freakin' hard. Languages I want to learn: French (I have a stack of Instant Immersion CD's from my sisters, but I haven't had the time to take it on as well. Yet.) German Hindi Arabic Welsh (heard it was beautiful) Japanese Swedish Irish Gaelic (I have Irish/Sottish heritage, although we never managed to get back across the ocean in our genealogy, we just know kinda who it was that came from there with immigration records. I think it would be cool to learn it.) Offered at high school: Spanish More Spanish. AP Spanish Year 1 Chinese. No other year, my friends just keep taking it over and over. I'm so sick of Spanish I'm taking this next year.) To me, languages have something like a personality, and its like no one else gets that. Some (Russian), just roll off my tongue like I've been reading it since I was three. Spanish is difficult, annoying, frustrating, sounds all wrong, and I hate it so much. I can't pronounce it, or understand it, and its all around not for me. It doesn't click. It doesn't fit. It's uncomfortable. And they still make me take it. Arg. Anyone know some colleges with really great study abroad/language programs? So far, Kalamazoo and Middlebury have been suggested. I applied to the NSLY-Y Russian program, became a semi-finalist, but then was rejected. Link to post Share on other sites
daveb Posted April 3, 2015 Share Posted April 3, 2015 I love languages! But I am total rubbish at learning them! :( Link to post Share on other sites
Larkaloke Posted April 4, 2015 Share Posted April 4, 2015 I began learning German back in highschool partly because it interested me, and partly because I've always felt that I ought to know it -- my oma is from Austria, my opa and my mom both spent a good deal of time there, and I grew up hearing stories about the country (and Vienna in particular) and have always wanted to visit some day. I didn't get very far teaching myself in highschool, so I took four courses on German in college, and that improved my command of the language dramatically. My reading is doing pretty well these days, and my writing is -- if slow -- not horrible, but I really need to work on my listening and especially speaking. I don't have terribly many opportunities to speak it. I need to get back into practicing more writing, too; reading is most of what I've done lately. I can't think of a single language I'm not at least a little bit interested in, though. I wish I could learn them all. I've considered working on Welsh, but haven't found the time yet; Italian has always been particularly interested to me, as have Latin, Arabic, Russian, and various Scandinavian languages. I tried learning French for a while when I was younger, as my other mom speaks French fluently, but I seem to have a good deal of trouble pronouncing it and gave up at that time. I might try to pick it up again some day. I also keep attempting to teach myself Quenya, but that probably doesn't exactly count, not being an actual real-world language and all... Link to post Share on other sites
kiaroskuro Posted April 4, 2015 Share Posted April 4, 2015 To me, languages have something like a personality, and its like no one else gets that. No, I totally get it. I feel the same way about languages. There are some that I can't stand and others that I love so much, but each of them in a different way. By the way, Hindi and Swedish are two languages I'd absolutely love to learn at some point, too! Link to post Share on other sites
PastelBread Posted April 4, 2015 Share Posted April 4, 2015 Oh! I love learning languages! I am currently working on German and Japanese! :) Link to post Share on other sites
Linzi82 Posted April 4, 2015 Share Posted April 4, 2015 I love to learn new languages. I'm currently learning French and Dutch. I also have Chinese (Mandarin) and German courses on standby. And a very long list of languages that I want to learn at least the basics of. It's all done in my own time for me rather than something I need to do. Link to post Share on other sites
SexNotHaver Posted April 4, 2015 Share Posted April 4, 2015 I'm trying to learn a bit of Irish and French. I know Irish is spoken by approximately 0% of the planet, but I don't speak very often anyway so that makes little difference to me - I wouldn't be having many conversations in that language even if there were 1 billion speakers. Link to post Share on other sites
korik Posted April 5, 2015 Share Posted April 5, 2015 I love languages in general, and I like to learn a little bit from as many languages as I can. However, I am not motivated enough to learn any of them to a very proficient level. Link to post Share on other sites
Khoshekh's Kitten Posted April 5, 2015 Share Posted April 5, 2015 I am attempting to learn Spanish. Some days I do very well taking the time to study, but if I ever miss a day then I have noticed the next day I might skip again and start to lose momentum. I've also been watching television shows to get used to hear it being spoken naturally, not in the slower clear paces used in learning videos. I almost through with season 2 of Velvet. I don't use English subtitles, only Spanish. In college I took several years of French, but never used it and have forgotten so much of it. Link to post Share on other sites
EmotionalAndroid Posted April 5, 2015 Share Posted April 5, 2015 I have tried learning Russian on my own before, but I couldn't get myself to stick with it. Now I've decided to try learning Japanese, since I listen to a lot of Japanese music and would like to be able to appreciate it more. I am hoping I can stick with it. I've just only memorized the vowels thus far. Dx Link to post Share on other sites
om-nom-nomigon Posted April 5, 2015 Share Posted April 5, 2015 I am trying to learn Mandarin at the moment, which is great fun but I don't seem to have much free time for it at the moment. Perhaps if I ever do get a bit more free time then I might start with German. Link to post Share on other sites
The Void Walker Posted April 5, 2015 Share Posted April 5, 2015 I want to learn Latin, but it is not offered anywhere near me.I'm considering trying to learn it online, though historically that hasn't worked very well for me. Link to post Share on other sites
Xeres Posted April 6, 2015 Share Posted April 6, 2015 I don't have much time right now either, but I want to learn czech, russian and japanese. I already (beside German and English) speak a little French and studied Latin for six years. Link to post Share on other sites
RunLikeAFox Posted April 6, 2015 Share Posted April 6, 2015 I'm trying to teach myself Russian right now, since I have always wanted to learn it. I think I have finally got the alphabet down. It took a while since a lot different, but now comes the really hard part since I have no one to practice with Link to post Share on other sites
Cosmisnebulae Posted April 6, 2015 Share Posted April 6, 2015 I want to learn German,Latin, and Persian(Farsi). I'm actually going to teach myself over the summer when I have time. Link to post Share on other sites
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