Countries good at 2nd foreign language? (General discussion) Language Learning Forum

Countries good at 2nd foreign language?
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beano
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Message 25 of 41

16 July 2012 at 11:42am | IP Logged

Solfrid Cristin wrote:

We Scandinavians are often being praised for being good at languages, because our level of English is so
high. And we are generally quite good at speaking English, compared to many other countries. There are
however some very specific reasons for that, which do not apply to the other languages. English is a closely
related language, we learn it from the age of 6 (or even before), 90% of what we watch on TV is in English
and most Internet related activities are in English. If you want to, you can be almost fully immersed.

To have a fair idea of how we really do at learning foreign languages, we have to look at 2nd foreign
languages, and then the picture is not so rosy anymore. We start learning them at the age of 13, we get
absolutely no help from the media, and I doubt that more than 0.1% of the language learners use Wikipedia
or other Internet sources in those languages. In short, we are in the same situation as e.g. an American
learning French.

Sadly, our results are mediocre at best. Those of my generation, who had to study German, can usually get
fed or get train tickets in Germany, but would mostly be unable to hold a conversation with a native
educated speaker. This is after 4 years of study in a closely related language. Personally I have had only 2
years of German, but I have tried to read a bit on my own, it is however still the weakest of my languages.

Those who choose French and Spanish do no better. They lose the advantage of studying a closely related
language, they have a lot more vocabulary to learn, and particularly in French, they struggle with the
pronunciation.

It is refreshing to hear that Scandanvians have problems with other languages. A lot of people make the lazy assumption "these guys speak English really well, they must be naturally gifted at languages"

I've been to Denmark, Norway and Sweden and I was very impressed with the level of spoken English. That's one thing that works against a British person who has learned a foreign language. We can use this language in a certain area but in other countries we are regarded as monolingual English speakers. Meanwhile, Scandanvians can use their flawless English across the globe and garner respect in the process, perhaps reinforcing the language guru stereotype.

I remember being in a large bookstore right in the middle of Oslo. Around half the titles were in English, so you obviously get lots of reading practise in addition to wide exposure on TV and in cinemas.

As a Norwegian, you must be able to speak Danish and Swedish to a certain extent but I'm not sure if you regard those languages as "foreign"? Finland is a different case, their language is not Germanic therefore both English and Swedish will be in some ways alien to them. Also, there must be parts of Finland where Russian is understood. So I give the Finns my vote for best Scandanavian country with 2nd foreign languages.

Edited by beano on 16 July 2012 at 11:44am
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Serpent
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Message 26 of 41

16 July 2012 at 3:31pm | IP Logged

They're not a Scandinavian country either :P And a lot of Finns who aren't bilingual are only good at either English or Swedish, not both.

Oh yeah, bookstores... I was in Akateeminen kirjakauppa yesterday *___* Books in English are also often cheaper than their translations! In fact it was MUCH easier to find books like HP, LOTR, Twilight in English than in Finnish or especially Swedish. (nope, I didn't buy these :D I already have most Tolkien translations because they're so awesome, and I bought HP7 in Swedish for my collection)
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showtime17
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Message 27 of 41

26 July 2012 at 9:28pm | IP Logged

Nobody has mentioned Belgium. That's one of the few countries where even the homeless people are often fluent in three or four languages. :) This especially applies to the Flemish, as a considerable number of the Walloons are monolingual in French only. Belgium also has three official languages: Dutch, French, German (although German is spoken only by a 1% minority in the extreme east).
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Edudg
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Message 28 of 41

26 July 2012 at 10:12pm | IP Logged

What about Luxembourg? I think people there speak luxembourgish, German, french and english at least. Maybe
because I met this one girl from Luxembourg and she could speak 5 or 6 languages so well I have this idea that
everybody there is naturally multilingual...
Anyone from Luxembourg here?

Edited by Edudg on 26 July 2012 at 10:12pm
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tarvos
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Message 29 of 41

27 July 2012 at 8:35am | IP Logged

Flemish learn French but they hate it. Most younger people speak English though. Older people usually
speak French better. German I'd say is insignificant. Wallonia is pretty much bad at everything languages,
but then wallonia is also a shit place to be. It's a mini France with more issues
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Fabrizio
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Message 30 of 41

27 July 2012 at 1:43pm | IP Logged

showtime17 wrote:

Nobody has mentioned Belgium. That's one of the few countries where
even the homeless people are often fluent in three or four languages. :) This
especially applies to the Flemish, as a considerable number of the Walloons are
monolingual in French only. Belgium also has three official languages: Dutch, French,
German (although German is spoken only by a 1% minority in the extreme east).

I don't want to sound disrespectful as I genuinely love Belgium, but guys, let's be
honest: this "trilingual country" Belgium claims to be is fictional. People in the
southern part of the nation speak French only, - I've been living in Brussels for 1
year now and the vast majority of my French speaking friends are monolingual and/or
speak terrible English - and while people from the northern side generally "hate"
French they still speak a fairly good - certainly not flawless! - English in addition
to their native Flemish. What about those living in the German speaking part? No
offense, but nobody seems to know anything about them... :P
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Iwwersetzerin
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Message 31 of 41

27 July 2012 at 2:32pm | IP Logged

Edudg wrote:

Yes! You are right, in the Luxembourgish school system Luxembourgish, German, French and English are compulsory, so anybody who went to school here (with the possible exception of the European and international schools) has a good knowledge of all 4 and often more as other languages can be taken as optional courses in high school (I took Latin and Spanish) and many people also speak another language at home, as Luxembourg has many immigrants, especially Portuguese and Italians.
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Ogrim
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Message 32 of 41

27 July 2012 at 4:42pm | IP Logged

Fabrizio wrote:

showtime17 wrote:

Nobody has mentioned Belgium. That's one of the few countries where
even the homeless people are often fluent in three or four languages. :) This
especially applies to the Flemish, as a considerable number of the Walloons are
monolingual in French only. Belgium also has three official languages: Dutch, French,
German (although German is spoken only by a 1% minority in the extreme east).

The German-speaking Community of Belgium has about 75000 inhabitants, of which about 12000 are non-Belgians (about 10000 are Germans).

You may learn more about them on this site: http://www.dglive.be/desktopdefault.aspx

According to information on this site, the German-speaking children learn French as first foreign language already from primary school. I haven't spotted information as to whether they learn more languages though.

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