Préposition Diglot Senior Member France aspectualpairs.wordp Joined 5115 days ago 186 posts - 283 votes Speaks: French*, EnglishC1 Studies: Russian, Arabic (Written), Swedish, Arabic (Levantine)
| Message 1 of 4 14 March 2011 at 10:31pm | IP Logged |
I'm having a bit of a silly debate with someone, and I was saying that I found making a difference between my mother tongue and English quite difficult. They then replied saying that true polyglots can manage this very easily, and that it was bad that you couldn't make a difference, but I see it as being quite the contrary. For me, if you have troubles telling which language you're using, then the language has probably became so natural that you need to stop and actually think about it, which I believe is a good thing, as opposed to still being able to say "oh wait, this is X language, I know it, I've just made a mistake or can't pronounce such or such word".
What's your view on the matter?
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Solfrid Cristin Heptaglot Winner TAC 2011 & 2012 Senior Member Norway Joined 5335 days ago 4143 posts - 8864 votes Speaks: Norwegian*, Spanish, Swedish, French, English, German, Italian Studies: Russian
| Message 2 of 4 14 March 2011 at 10:55pm | IP Logged |
I agree with you, and I doubt that your oponent is much of a polyglot himself.
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Cainntear Pentaglot Senior Member Scotland linguafrankly.blogsp Joined 6012 days ago 4399 posts - 7687 votes Speaks: Lowland Scots, English*, French, Spanish, Scottish Gaelic Studies: Catalan, Italian, German, Irish, Welsh
| Message 3 of 4 14 March 2011 at 11:29pm | IP Logged |
I've lost control of my internal monologue. I sometimes find myself trying to talk to myself in one language and my brain stubbornly deciding it wants to speak a different one. I can drift through several languages in one imagined conversation.
It's external factors that chose the language for me. I don't normally speak the wrong language to someone. If I know someone speaks several languages I can find myself unintentionally wandering between them.
But unfortunately I've only ever once spoken a non-native language when I thought I was speaking English. So I've got a long way to go yet.
Edit:
On the other hand, I've had lots of experiences where I'm not really aware of what language I'm listening to. I'll be watching a film in one language and I'll try to quote, but I'll unconsciously translate the line, then realise that I've said it in the wrong language.
Language is supposed to be effortless and subconscious, so I figure once you stop being consciously aware of your language you must be getting better....
Edited by Cainntear on 14 March 2011 at 11:32pm
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napoleon Tetraglot Senior Member India Joined 5017 days ago 543 posts - 874 votes Speaks: Bengali*, English, Hindi, Urdu Studies: French, Arabic (Written)
| Message 4 of 4 16 March 2011 at 9:22pm | IP Logged |
Préposition wrote:
I found making a difference between my mother tongue and English quite difficult. |
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This happens to me quite often, I think.
"You are not alone..."[Singing]
LOL :-)
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