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What is London like? | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Cultural Experiences in Foreign Languages |  | |
| Biscotti Triglot Newbie United Kingdom Joined 5129 days ago 29 posts - 48 votes Speaks: English*, German, Spanish | Message 1 of 4 21 May 2012 at 11:14pm | IP Logged | ||
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I'm kinda lacking motivation at the moment, mostly because of a lack of context and usage for my
languages. Next year it's likely that I'll be at university in London, so I'm looking forward to getting lots of use and enjoying the city's culture. For those that have lived/worked/spent time in London, what is it like culturally and linguistically? Are there many opportunities for speaking languages? Which languages and cultures are particularly prevalent? 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Elexi Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5564 days ago 938 posts - 1840 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: French, German, Latin | Message 2 of 4 22 May 2012 at 10:50am | IP Logged | ||
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English is quite prevalent in London.
Seriously, there are groups for speaking most languages in pretty much every borough - and pretty much people from everywhere in the world lives in London - if you want to speak a language on a daily basis find a shop that sells food from whatever country where the language you want to speak is spoken and strike up a conversation: most of the time the shop keep will be all-to-happy to speak to you. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| jellyfish Triglot Groupie Japan Joined 4784 days ago 50 posts - 70 votes Speaks: English, German*, Japanese Studies: Thai, Persian, Russian | Message 3 of 4 26 May 2012 at 5:49am | IP Logged | ||
You'd think so - but if you're a white person in South London, chances are people will speak to you in Russian or Polish by default. ;) I love London to bits, not only for its linguistic diversity, but that's a huge part of it. Especially at a London university, you're quite likely to find speakers of whichever language you happen to be studying. And as Elexi said, nationalities/ethnicities (for lack of a better term) tend to cluster in certain boroughs to some extent - SW has loads of Carribeans and Africans, for instance, and I remember there being many Greeks around Turnpike Lane. That kind of thing. And of course there's South Asians EVERYWHERE. ;) Don't know where your particular languages are most prevalent, but they're there. Which uni are you going to? There will probably be Italian/Spanish/German societies. Alternatively look out for language exchange meetings on meetup or couchsurfing. I miss the place way too much now. Can't wait to be back in a few months. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| cordelia0507 Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5837 days ago 1473 posts - 2176 votes Speaks: Swedish* Studies: German, Russian | Message 4 of 4 02 June 2012 at 9:25am | IP Logged | ||
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I have not noticed any Russian in London, on the other hand, Polish is very common. I'd say that's in North London though.
You have the whole Brick Lane area where Urdu and Pakistanian culture rules, and Edgware Road where it is Arabic and Islam. Southhall is so Indian that the sign at the train station is in Hindi. There are quite a few Chinese people in Chinatown in Central London - although Chinatown is a bit of a letdown. Sometimes tourists ask for the directions there and don't realise they are already in Chinatown. The place where I lived was sometimes called Frankfurt-on-Thames because of the large number of German expats, but you don't notice it much other than occasssionally hearing people speak German to eachother or on the phone. There are enclaves of French speakers in Kensington... I think the big change is that you stop caring about what somebody's national or language background is, you just relate to them only as people. London has people from just about any super exotic background you can imagine. 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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