Taru LuojolaOct 9, 2017

Hey #SocialCoop'ers, as a newbie I'd like to know you better. What languages you speak/understand/are studying?

For me the list following:
#Finnish / #suomi native
#English fluent
#Swedish / #svenska fluent
#Dutch / #Nederlands studying
#Spanish / #espanol basics
#German / #Deutsch basics

And scrap knowledge of a host of other languages.

Show threadhOct 9, 2017

@Stoori English, Spanish fluent.
French, Portuguese, and a little Italian with more difficulty due to lack of frequent use these days. Dropped out German and Dutch class but may pick those up again in the future. One Eastern Asian language could be useful, but I don't have ambitions of becoming a linguist, nor a languages professional of any sort so that's more of a distant thing in the future than an immediate project.

Who knows, priorities can change given the right opportunity, right?

Show threadTaru LuojolaOct 9, 2017

@h That's an impressive list anyway.

Some East Asian language could be good to learn. My own motivation is part just for the fun of it, but also part in that I could read in new languages and reach articles, books and phenomenons that would be unavailable to me otherwise.

Anyway, I don't think I would have much professional use for other new languages than Dutch and perhaps Spanish. There's a limit in how many working languages one can get, and professional level needs constant practicing.

Show threadhOct 9, 2017
@Stoori That's always been my main motivation as well. When I was in school it was compulsory to choose one language of Spanish, English, or French. I already spoke Spanish and English, so it made more sense for me to learn French than boring myself to death. Then I spent a lot of time travelling to Brazil, and knowing Spanish, it's very easy to pick Portuguese there. So, it's been more of random chance for me than something that I sought with a deliberate purpose. I merely absorbed it.
Show threadTaru LuojolaOct 9, 2017

@h When I was in school, English and Swedish were compulsory. In addition to that I also studied some French and later Russian. Then I ended up studying linguistics and took also courses in Estonian, Spanish and German. After that I've studied Romanian and Dutch by myself.

Only Dutch has been motivated by external reasons (planned migration in the future), other voluntary languages are just for fun. I've also interested in Dutch Sign Language, but alas, there's so little time for all this.

Show threadTaru Luojola
@h But in general it's pretty easy for me to reach basic reading abilities in European languages. That's why some more exotic languages (Korean perhaps) could be interesting, to have a look at a completely different world.
Oct 9, 2017 at 10:42pmWeb
Show threadhOct 9, 2017
@Stoori Basque may be the most challenging of Western European languages I've looked into. It doesn't have any relation to Romance, Germanic, or Slavic languages.
Show threadhOct 9, 2017
@Stoori The weirdest language I've heard in spoken form is Maltese. At first I couldn't quite make what it was, a mix of English, Italian/Latin, and Arabic. A definitely unique combination you don't hear often elsewhere.
Show threadTaru LuojolaOct 9, 2017
@h Oh yes, and it's generally favoured by language connoisseurs just because it's an European oddity. :D It also has ergative case system, which makes it even harder for common Europeans.
Show threadhOct 9, 2017
@Stoori I'm not much of a linguist as I said before, languages just happen to be an incidental thing for me, I just happened to have Basque friends, and I was generally interested in Basque cuisine and broadly in their culture.
Show threadhOct 9, 2017

@Stoori Is it true that Finnish is a challenging language? (for someone from a cultural background like mine)

Main Finnish products I know are Linux, F-Secure, and Tarja Turunen. hahahah

Show threadTaru LuojolaOct 9, 2017
@h It's different than Indo-European languages, so with that background it can be challenging. But generally no language as a whole is hugely ”harder” or ”easier” than all the other languages, it's just that different languages have complexities in different parts of the system. Finnish is quite light on syntax compared to the heaviness of its morphology, and the opposite can be said of English and many other European languages.
Show threadhOct 9, 2017
@Stoori Finnish is taller and thinner, English is shorter but wider. Sort of.