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Urban legends about languages...

  Tags: Stereotypes
 Language Learning Forum : General discussion Post Reply
81 messages over 11 pages: 13 4 5 6 7 ... 2 ... 10 11 Next >>
druckfehler
Triglot
Senior Member
Germany
Joined 4811 days ago

1181 posts - 1912 votes 
Speaks: German*, EnglishC2, Korean
Studies: Persian

 
 Message 9 of 81
14 July 2012 at 10:41pm | IP Logged 
Rykketid wrote:
Another legend about English is that it has much less words than Italian

That one is both silly and annoying. People who claim this usually cannot be convinced otherwise, even when I explain that English has a very rich vocabulary due to influence from French, regional differences, etc.

Quite surprisingly I recently had a conversation about "this Lebanese guy who speaks 80 languages". I guess the person I was talking to meant Ziad Fazah and even he himself "only" claims to know 59, according to Wikipedia :) But I was happy to have a conversation about polyglots in the first place, I didn't bring up the topic.
3 persons have voted this message useful



Chung
Diglot
Senior Member
Joined 7099 days ago

4228 posts - 8259 votes 
20 sounds
Speaks: English*, French
Studies: Polish, Slovak, Uzbek, Turkish, Korean, Finnish

 
 Message 10 of 81
15 July 2012 at 12:40am | IP Logged 
jeff_lindqvist wrote:
[...]Related topic:
Internet language learning myths


Here's another related discussion: "Linguistic ignorance"
1 person has voted this message useful



montmorency
Diglot
Senior Member
United Kingdom
Joined 4771 days ago

2371 posts - 3676 votes 
Speaks: English*, German
Studies: Danish, Welsh

 
 Message 11 of 81
15 July 2012 at 2:39am | IP Logged 
England has [insert number of your choice] words for tea.

Edited by montmorency on 15 July 2012 at 3:23am

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tanya b
Senior Member
United States
Joined 4721 days ago

159 posts - 518 votes 
Speaks: Russian

 
 Message 12 of 81
15 July 2012 at 3:21am | IP Logged 
1) Native Spanish speakers effortlessly understand French, Italian and Portuguese.

2) Chinese, Japanese and Korean are actually the same language.

3) Macedonian is spoken on that lovely island where they grow macadamia nuts.

4) Iran is just one of them Arabic-speaking countries.

5) The Finnish triple consonant is a typo.

6) Cockney is a separate language.

7) Welsh is a dialect of English.

8) Fluency in Ebonics automatically makes you "cool".

9) Knowing Roman numerals makes you fluent in Latin.

10) Croatian is spoken by persons of mixed Crow Indian/Haitian ancestry.

11) Atlanta is the best place to study Georgian, Rome the best place to study Romanian.

12) This new software will have you conversing in Mandarin within minutes!

Edited by tanya b on 17 July 2012 at 2:21am

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psy88
Senior Member
United States
Joined 5534 days ago

469 posts - 882 votes 
Studies: Spanish*, Japanese, Latin, French

 
 Message 13 of 81
15 July 2012 at 3:44am | IP Logged 
Here are two :
1.Language mastery can occur with ten easy lessons.
2.Just by being exposed to your target language you can pick it up by osmosis, as in the movie The Thirteenth Warrior.
3 persons have voted this message useful



Wulfgar
Senior Member
United States
Joined 4614 days ago

404 posts - 791 votes 
Speaks: English*

 
 Message 14 of 81
15 July 2012 at 6:36am | IP Logged 
jeff_lindqvist wrote:
English has more words than any other language.

Which language has more words than English?
1 person has voted this message useful



Coheed
Triglot
Newbie
Canada
Joined 4629 days ago

26 posts - 40 votes
Speaks: French*, English, Spanish
Studies: Romanian, Irish

 
 Message 15 of 81
15 July 2012 at 8:46am | IP Logged 
Wulfgar wrote:

Which language has more words than English?

Some people might say Arabic. It is said that some words or terms in Arabic can be
expressed in countless different ways. Besides, Arabic is notorious for the wideness and
complexity of its vocabulary. I don't know if actual speakers of Arabic could confirm or
deny the veracity of such rumors...

Edited by Coheed on 15 July 2012 at 8:47am

1 person has voted this message useful



LaughingChimp
Senior Member
Czech Republic
Joined 4642 days ago

346 posts - 594 votes 
Speaks: Czech*

 
 Message 16 of 81
15 July 2012 at 10:43am | IP Logged 
1. All languages are the same, just with different words. You can exactly translate everything. If you can't easily translate, you don't speak the language.
2. Your native language will always be your primary language, you will always just translate into all other languages.


psy88 wrote:

2.Just by being exposed to your target language you can pick it up by osmosis, as in the movie The Thirteenth Warrior.


That's not an UL. It would actually need serious effort to not pick up anything at all if you are surrounded by people who speak the language.



Edited by LaughingChimp on 15 July 2012 at 10:50am



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