Can Europeans Speak More Languages than North Americans?

[Dreadmaker]

Interesting, could you tell me how long you've been learning German and when you started?

The main problem is, that you can't really master German, I don't mean that you can't learn every word, that is the case for every language, but it's basically impossible to learn all the Grammar, stylistic things, "Kommatierung" (placing commas) etc.

If you should ever be able to use the correct genetive case all the time (spoken and written) I'll salute you and will congratulate you that you gained an ability that about 98% of the Germans (and maybe even more other German speaking people, like the Swiss) don't have.

By the way, it's really nice to hear that you enjoy learning German, hopefully you'll keep that up.

I started learning German seriously in April. So, I've got about a month or so. I know I'm going fairly quickly at the moment, but it's largely for academic reasons.

See, I'm a history major, and my hope is to actually become a historian; that means getting a doctorate and likely teaching at a university. I love that idea. I don't know about other places, but in Canada, you have to know 2 languages to complete a history doctorate, and while I could easily do french, German is a more prominent language for academic purposes. Realistically, if you have any desire to study any history prior to 1500, you need to be fluent in German because of the many prominent German historians (Jakob Berkhardt, to name one that particularly shaped the modern field of Historiography).

So, my goal in learning German is, in fact, to become fluent, and not necessarily to speak it well, but rather to read academic, university level texts. I have no illusions that I'll ever get perfectly fluent; I think that nobody gets perfectly fluent in any language other than their mother tongue. A more interesting poll here would have been 'how many languages do you know well enough to read at a university level?" I think the universal answer would be one or two, not 3-5, as has been the case with this poll.


So to answer your question, Apeking, I've been doing it for one month. I would also argue that comma use is something unique to each language; In a number of your posts, you've made both comma and contraction errors, but they haven't been particularly grievous. That's all I want. Evidently you know how to write English well, and on the surface, especially in a forum like this where not everyone is past a university level of education, nobody would be able to tell the difference between you and a native speaker. However, under scrutiny, it's evident. If I could get to that level of German in the relatively near future, that's all I could ask.

 

[The Apeking]

I started learning German seriously in April. So, I've got about a month or so. I know I'm going fairly quickly at the moment, but it's largely for academic reasons.

See, I'm a history major, and my hope is to actually become a historian; that means getting a doctorate and likely teaching at a university. I love that idea. I don't know about other places, but in Canada, you have to know 2 languages to complete a history doctorate, and while I could easily do french, German is a more prominent language for academic purposes. Realistically, if you have any desire to study any history prior to 1500, you need to be fluent in German because of the many prominent German historians (Jakob Berkhardt, to name one that particularly shaped the modern field of Historiography).

So, my goal in learning German is, in fact, to become fluent, and not necessarily to speak it well, but rather to read academic, university level texts. I have no illusions that I'll ever get perfectly fluent; I think that nobody gets perfectly fluent in any language other than their mother tongue. A more interesting poll here would have been 'how many languages do you know well enough to read at a university level?" I think the universal answer would be one or two, not 3-5, as has been the case with this poll.


So to answer your question, Apeking, I've been doing it for one month. I would also argue that comma use is something unique to each language; In a number of your posts, you've made both comma and contraction errors, but they haven't been particularly grievous. That's all I want. Evidently you know how to write English well, and on the surface, especially in a forum like this where not everyone is past a university level of education, nobody would be able to tell the difference between you and a native speaker. However, under scrutiny, it's evident. If I could get to that level of German in the relatively near future, that's all I could ask.

Yeah, a poll about how many languages you're able to read texts in fairly well probably would've been better.


Okay, if you're mainly going for the reading part you should be able to manage that pretty well , since you can always understand things out of context of a sentence and all the stuff lose a lot of their importance because of that and of course you seem to be a smart guy, which is always helpful.

And if you should ever come to Germany you shouldn't have a problem talking to people using your German, we are used to so many different horrible accents that make it nearly impossible to understand anything and people not talking one word of German after living here for thrity years that it would be really difficult to be worse than these guys.


Since you're doing your history doctorate, did you do or rather had to do Latin? I'd guess so, but I'm not sure.

In Germany you need to have a latinum to study various things, including history.


Btw. excuse my mistakes, but I can neither write proper German nor proper English all the time.

 

[Dreadmaker]

Yeah, a poll about how many languages you're able to read texts in fairly well probably would've been better.


Okay, if you're mainly going for the reading part you should be able to manage that pretty well , since you can always understand things out of context of a sentence and all the stuff lose a lot of their importance because of that and of course you seem to be a smart guy, which is always helpful.

And if you should ever come to Germany you shouldn't have a problem talking to people using your German, we are used to so many different horrible accents that make it nearly impossible to understand anything and people not talking one word of German after living here for thrity years that it would be really difficult to be worse than these guys.


Since you're doing your history doctorate, did you do or rather had to do Latin? I'd guess so, but I'm not sure.

In Germany you need to have a latinum to study various things, including history.


Btw. excuse my mistakes, but I can neither write proper German nor proper English all the time.

Yeah, I'll be doing latin next year. it isn't actually a requirement, but I'm doing it anyhow, because I have at least some interest in the middle ages, so it's virtually required.

Anyhow, I appreciate the encouragement, and yeah, nobody can write language perfectly; I'm going to go ahead and say I probably make as many or more mistakes than you do in a day.

 

[Tee Hee Hee]

Yeah, I'll be doing latin next year. it isn't actually a requirement, but I'm doing it anyhow, because I have at least some interest in the middle ages, so it's virtually required.

Anyhow, I appreciate the encouragement, and yeah, nobody can write language perfectly; I'm going to go ahead and say I probably make as many or more mistakes than you do in a day.

You'd be amazed how much studying Latin helps with other languages...especially languages that are derived from it. I learned more of my English grammar from my Latin classes. Enjoy it and you'll be amazed how easy it becomes to see the root of a lot of common words.

P.S. its also insanely useful if you're going into medicine, just fyi!

 

[The Apeking]

You'd be amazed how much studying Latin helps with other languages...especially languages that are derived from it. I learned more of my English grammar from my Latin classes. Enjoy it and you'll be amazed how easy it becomes to see the root of a lot of common words.

P.S. its also insanely useful if you're going into medicine, just fyi!

My thoughts exactly, mabye except for the "enjoy" part.

 

[Dreadmaker]

You'd be amazed how much studying Latin helps with other languages...especially languages that are derived from it. I learned more of my English grammar from my Latin classes. Enjoy it and you'll be amazed how easy it becomes to see the root of a lot of common words.

P.S. its also insanely useful if you're going into medicine, just fyi!

Pretty well exactly what everyone's told me, and exactly why I'm so interested in doing it.

 

[Captn Bean]

French, English and Spanish

 

[lplkassm]

You'd be amazed how much studying Latin helps with other languages...especially languages that are derived from it. I learned more of my English grammar from my Latin classes. Enjoy it and you'll be amazed how easy it becomes to see the root of a lot of common words.

P.S. its also insanely useful if you're going into medicine, just fyi!

That's exactly why I want to learn Latin soon. I am heading into Pharmacy and learning Latin will not only help me learn other languages, but greatly help in my medical career! I am almost done learning German to the point where I can get around perfectly fine and not be considered a 'tourist.'

My hope is that I begin learning Latin somewhere in the beginning of next year, if not a month or two after. Anything later and I wont be motivated enough to do it anymore.

However, as difficult as German has been I really have enjoyed learning the language and researching some of their customs and history

 

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