If you could learn one or more languages instantly, which one would you choose?

[Guest]

I would like to learn many languages, but laziness and lack of discipline prevent me. I would like Mandarin, German and maybe Russian; fascinating languages for me. Mandarin stands out due to the huge amount of works that could be enjoyed in its entirety (books, authors, history, etc.) and also for being a language of vast influence. I just find the diction and structure of German speech amazing and I would love to learn it too, as well as Russian.

Language and communication both as a practical phenomenon as well as its philosophical implications is quite intriguing and curious and interesting to learn.

 

Would you be interested in learning other languages? Are you currently studying one? Which one would you instantly learn if you had the power? Oh, have you learned other languages already!? Share what your journey was like and how interest arose!

 

(If any members are polyglot I would be extremely impressed!).

[Helyx]

I'd learn the language of love, so I could be a cunning linguist.

[Guest]

3 minutes ago, Helyx said:

I'd learn the language of love, so I could be a cunning linguist.

damn it. you just closed the topic with that answer. learning the language of love must be a life hack haha

[Pumpkin Head Cthulhu]

10 minutes ago, Helyx said:

I'd learn the language of love, so I could be a cunning linguist.

priceless answer and it makes me think of Van Wilder Freshman year.

 

I would say German and Japanese. I remember so little German form when I tried to learn it back in school plus both sides of my family are from Germany.

Edited March 8, 2022 by Void

[Guest]

15 minutes ago, Helyx said:

I'd learn the language of love, so I could be a cunning linguist.

a more serious answer, it is quite possible to learn "love language" with psychology. and if you are straight, psychology + female psychology, and also you can appeal to neuro persuasion and other lifes hack. I know guys who went from complete virgins to having sex every week studying this shit. just unbelievable lol. or else you may regard all of this as a dirty tactic or without merit for not being "organic".

 

anyway, psychology is also a very good area to read regardless of anything.

[Helyx]

Just now, kevao97 said:

if you are straight

 

You trying to tutor me, bro?

[Guest]

3 minutes ago, Helyx said:

 

You trying to tutor me, bro?

???

[StewartBros]

57 minutes ago, Helyx said:

I'd learn the language of love, so I could be a cunning linguist.

 

Not a master debater?

 

 

I was quite fluent in French back in my school days; got the 2nd highest grade in the oral part of the exam.  Sometimes I think I should take it up again, to relearn an old skill, but since I don't actually know anyone who's French, or who speaks French on a frequent basis, it could be seen as not being worth it without having the opportunity to practice it outside of dediacted "studying" time.

 

OT: I would learn Japanese in a heartbeat if I could.  I would love to visit Japan some day - maybe even live there for a time - plus, Japanese women are very attractive.... ?

 

Also, sign language would be interesting and challenging to learn.

[Guest]

1 hour ago, Helyx said:

I'd learn the language of love, so I could be a cunning linguist.

or alternatively you can stack all versions of The Language of Love

1 hour ago, Helyx said:

 

 

Edited March 8, 2022 by kevao97

[Ephemera_5]

This topic particularly interests me as I am a polyglot and translation student.

I am fluent in three languages (native Italian plus English and French) and can say I kind of master Spanish although I have not studied it anymore since I finished high school. I also studied Japanese for three years but my level is basic.

 

If I could just snap my fingers to learn any other language I would learn them all, more work for me?

 

Jokes aside, Japanese would come first for me as I unfortunately did not have the chance to get to a good level and I really regret this. It is a wonderful yet terribly complicated language, that becomes even harder (at least for me) due to the culture that is completely different from mine.

I would also be interested in learning German and Russian but for no reason to be honest. I like how these languages sound and it would be a great to add them to my "collection".

[wiesbadenIIX]

Japanese.  I spent some time in Japan, and Tokyo is hands-down my favorite city on Earth.  But it's actually quite easy to navigate around in, since the "Western" words are almost always written beneath the Japanese script.  And as many of us are well aware, Japanese is actually quite phonetic and easy to pronounce.  Unlike, say, Chinese.   

 

I'm already fluent in 3 languages. 

 

English, of course.

 

German--having spent a cumulative total of 9 years there... 4 in the military.   Then returning several years later and spending another 5 years as a DoD civilian employee.   In between those 2 events, I took German in college which only reinforced what I already knew having been stationed there previously...but this time learning proper Hochdeutsch.

 

Spanish.  I grew up in California and that was also the language I took in high school.   When I was deployed to the Balkans, I frequently had to translate between Spanish and British NATO forces since many young Spaniards who join the Spanish Army don't speak very good English.    

Edited March 11, 2022 by pvtcaller202

[VigilantCrow]

I've never been able to learn languages, always more a math guy.

Would love to learn Gaelic instantly though if I could, since it means an immediate pay raise haha.

[Baranov_925]

I think spanish, since the only thing I can say is "Soy un perdedor"

[Yukiko Miyamoto]

Japanese, Since I know a little bit of Japanese ?.

[Raidou Kuzunoha XIV]

Being a weeb and all, Japanese. I do understand a little, but I've been very slowly, casually learning the language for a couple of years now and my comprehension is still only around N5 proficiency. I've tried making a bit more of a serious effort these past few months, but it takes me a while to really ingrain new words and kanji into my head, so I feel I don't have much choice but to learn slowly in order to actually learn.

 

If I could instantly learn it, that'd obviously be great, though it is actually surprisingly fun to learn regardless. Even if it does break my brain occasionally.

 

It'd be nice to finally be able to fully comprehend Japanese games that never released here, or even just the ones that did and didn't really have the best translations. One thing I learnt very early on about Japanese is that there's a lot of things that don't really translate well to English, nuance is lost, and there's some words and phrases that don't really have English equivalents. And translators often seem to take quite a few liberties, which I can understand, but after understanding the language a bit and playing some games with Japanese audio and English text, it's honestly very jarring to hear the characters say one thing, and the text doesn't really translate what they're saying properly.

 

I was recently playing Valyria Chronicles Remastered after dropping the original game on PS3 several years back (and honestly, I still couldn't get super into this game, it just isn't my kind of SRPG). I played with Japanese audio, and the text was clearly still based on the English dub; sometimes a character would be talking and there'd be no text for a bit, or another character would start talking as text for the previous character was still being displayed. And I often heard things that didn't really match up with the text translation. It wasn't a bad localisation by any means, you can never do literal translations for Japanese games and expect them to be comprehensible in English, but there were definitely a few confusing choices for how they translated some of the dialogue.

 

You don't even need to understand any Japanese to notice that the text and audio sometimes didn't match up at all, there were a few instances where a character might apparently be saying "yes" according to the text, but they clearly just say another character's name in the audio. Japanese is the kind of language where words are purposefully dropped and there aren't really plural versions of words, they're assumed based on context, so it's understandable to often see text that will mention a word you won't be hearing the character mention in the Japanese audio, or changed to something else in English so it's more understandable what they're discussing based on the rules of our own language. But some of the dialogue seem to just be outright changed for reasons I can't comprehend, but maybe that's just because I'm still an amateur. This definitely isn't an issue in every Japanese game I've played though, this is actually the only one that's bothered me in a while, and it probably is just because the text is based on the English dub rather than the Japanese one.

 

The last one I played that irritated me even more was Grandia 2 (Switch version), but that was more because it would sometimes literally cut out the audio due to the text (based on the English dub, again) being faster than what was being spoken. But based on what little Japanese I do know, there weren't very many instances where I was left confused by the translation choices, even when the text was still clearly based on the English dub. They definitely took some liberties with what Ryudo (the main character) was saying sometimes, making him a bit more snarky and sarcastic in English, but I can't say I disliked them, they did suit his character well enough and I think it was a good localisation choice.

 

It does make playing Japanese games nowadays a little annoying sometimes, unfortunately, but it is nice sometimes being able to ignore the subtitles because I actually understand what they're saying. And it's nice sometimes being able to understand the nuance that is otherwise lost when translated to English. Hopefully I'll eventually get to the point where I won't need subtitles at all, even if it does take me a decade.

[DaveMcDamage]

Japanese would be good, or Mandarin perhaps. Though I still wish Esperanto would have taken off. Have your own national language and then Esperanto has a global language. But that would have benefited people too much and governments can't be having that now. 

[Lava_Yuki]

I'm bilingual in Japanese and English, which are the languages I need as I play games in Japanese and have Japanese friends having lived in Japan, but I live in the UK where it's all English. I have never felt the need for another language other than these two tbh.  But if I were to pick a third I'd probably go for maybe Spanish because I like going to Spain on holiday, plus it sounds pretty cool

[exsentry]

Korean as my wife is Korean and would like to be able to communicate with her in both languages and her family.

[EDGES]

I would love to know Japanese, it would help me to enjoy my entertainment so much more, but I don't have the time to learn something so complicated, learning another language that's based in the same letters/rules is time consuming enough, but something like Japanese might as well be an alien language for me

[Jermster_91]

I would love to know German. Having been a World War 2 buff since I was a pre-teen, I would love to be able pronounce vehicles, weapons, and be able to understand that video clips from that era. 

[buckallmighty]

I wouldnt mind picking up a little more Spanish. I can already ask where the bathroom is and order a beer.

 

It would be really nice to be able to communicate with everyone though when i inevitably flee to Mexico.

[kinnyman]

On 3/8/2022 at 1:20 AM, StewartBros said:

Not a master debater?

I think the joke goes something like if you’re a man have the ability to catch a lot of fish in any location, then you are a master fisherman.  If you’re a man who can’t catch any fish at all....then, you’re just a master baiter.  lol

 

I learned Portuguese via breaking up with an ex gf while living with her in Brazil.  I had lived there for about 8 months, but she was my translator.  I never had a class and only knew very basic things.  After we split, I moved in with a friend.  The next day it hit me that I needed to learn this language or else life was going to be very difficult for me.  Now I wouldn’t consider myself fluent, but I can speak at about a 1st grade level, and it was enough to get by for things I needed to do.

 

It came with a lot of trial and error.… A LOT of trial and error  lol  I had people laugh in my face when I spoke wrong.  Got laughed at going to bakeries, gas station to recharge my cell phone with minutes, internet cafe.  Went to the federal police to extend my visa, and even they laughed.  lol  At 1st it pissed me off, but then I stopped giving a shit and laughed too (especially at policia federal because even my dumb ass was smart enough to know this ain't the place to start some shit lol) and the person was much more receptive to helping me. 

 

I swear every other time I walked to the market to get groceries, I would have someone in a car pull up next to me and ask for directions.  I would stumble through the conversation telling them I’m not the guy to ask and not understanding what they were saying.  After the 2^nd time it happened, I was looking around like “ok, where’s the fucking camera?  This has to be a tv show"  Perguntou o gringo 

 

It was almost like playing a really difficult game and screwing up over and over again thinking "this is impossible" but then after awhile something clicks in your brain, and it starts to make sense.  Then you start to make progress and realize you can get through this.  I used to be high strung and get all crazy over dumb things, but this experience was a gift in my life.  Besides learning the language, it was a valuable life-lesson for my state of mind.

 

Anyway, the point is immersion worked the best for me because it was my only option at the time.  There's something about [need to learn] vs [want to learn / interest] that makes your brain more receptive to learning.  So I think if you can revolve your life (as much as possible) around the language you would like to learn, it will make you much more receptive to learning that language.

Edited March 22, 2022 by kinnyman
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