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Polygot under 18 | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Polyglots |  | |
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6595 days ago 9753 posts - 15779 votes  4 sounds Speaks: Russian*, English, FinnishC1, Latin, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Danish, Romanian, Polish, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Croatian, Slovenian, Catalan, Czech, Galician, Dutch, Swedish | Message 9 of 113 13 January 2007 at 6:04am | IP Logged | ||
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Unfortunately I'm not one... But I'm 16, so I still have a couple of years to reach basic fluency in Finnish, Latin and German :) don't think I'll make it though, as Finnish demands too much effort, so I'll be focusing later on the other two.
@jeff_lindgvist: I've nothing to say about other languages in Sweden, but the level of English met my expectations, I can't remember anyone who didn't speak it perfectly or almost perfectly. I've been only to Stockholm and Uppsala though. Edited by Serpent on 13 January 2007 at 6:07am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
 jeff_lindqvist Diglot Moderator SwedenRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6907 days ago 4250 posts - 5711 votes Speaks: Swedish*, English Studies: German, Spanish, Russian, Dutch, Mandarin, Esperanto, Irish, French Personal Language Map | Message 10 of 113 13 January 2007 at 10:14am | IP Logged | ||
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What I had in mind was the assumption that many people in Sweden speak English fluently without an accent, and possibly German and/or French to a high level (thanks to Swedish education, which unfortunately doesn't take one very far in terms of fluency).
The knowledge of English is generally good, and basically everyone under 40 has studied it since at least third grade, but I believe that the book "So you think you're good at English" was written for a reason.... Well, Swedes probably speak better English than those who never hear the language in movies and on TV (there we have a real advantage). 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| exocrist Diglot Newbie United States Joined 6547 days ago 7 posts - 7 votes Speaks: English*, German | Message 11 of 113 15 January 2007 at 1:56am | IP Logged | ||
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In Luxemburg, they're taught in three different languages (German, French, and Luxemburgish) at school, and switch languages after so many years. I don't recall the exact procession. Also, their government is done in three languages.
Some people from Switzerland (depending on where) could have a good chance of having 2 - 3 languages (French, German, Swiss German if you want to count it, English, and / or Italian). I think Southeastern Asia looks pretty good for polyglot upbringings, but borders between countries with different languages would probably be pretty good two. I'm a counselor at a German camp, and I've seen one or two kids who were fairly fluent (German, French, Japanese, English, Spanish) in several languages before the age of 18, but they're not too common. Edited by exocrist on 15 January 2007 at 1:57am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Vlad Trilingual Super Polyglot Senior Member Czechoslovakia foreverastudent.com Joined 6582 days ago 443 posts - 576 votes 2 sounds Speaks: Czech*, Slovak*, Hungarian*, Mandarin, EnglishC2, GermanC2, ItalianC1, Spanish, Russian, Polish, Serbian, French Studies: Persian, Taiwanese, Romanian, Portuguese | Message 12 of 113 15 January 2007 at 2:49am | IP Logged | ||
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I was wondering,
here in southern Slovakia it is quite common, that people are fluent in 3 Languages: Slovak, Czech and Hungarian. With English and a second language (German or French mostly) being compulsory in a lot of elementary schools, it is quite easy to find kids under 15 that are very fluent in 5 languages. I wanted to know..given the history of this region, the Hungarian language is spread far beyond it's borders..what is the situation in the South-west tip of Ukraine, Northern Serbia, Northern Croatia and especially North-east Slovenia. There must be a very very high posibility of finding young kids fluent in 5-6 languages and they didn't even have to try that much:-) It was so funny and interesting when I was traveling by car to Italy from Slovakia and about 30 minutes into the Slovenian territory I could not talk Slovenian or English with the locals to get directions but Hungarian was working out just great. As for north-east Slovenia..the people I met for sure spoke Slovenian, Serbo/Croatian and Hungarian. It's quite close to Austria, some towns might be German speaking. if English and a second language..say Italian are compulsory in schools and if you count Serbian and Croatian as two languages..some kids in North-Eastern Slovenia under 14 might be able to speak 7 languages fairly well. but it's only my guess. can anyone confirm this? 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Journeyer Triglot Senior Member United States tristan85.blogspot.c Joined 6866 days ago 946 posts - 1110 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, German Studies: Sign Language | Message 13 of 113 15 January 2007 at 10:12am | IP Logged | ||
Concerning English at least, I have to admit that I thought this was the way it was in Scandinavia, not for everyone, but for the majority of them at least. It's not true? I guess the reason I thought this was because nearly everyone from Denmark or Sweden, (although Norway, I can't say, I've only met one, but I didn't really see why it would be different) spoke very good English, most of them with a fairly small accent, if any at all. Especially Sweden. I've met some. I should say though that naturally not everyone from these countries that I've met have been like this, and also that I really haven't met many Scandinavians. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Linguamor Decaglot Senior Member United States Joined 6616 days ago 469 posts - 599 votes Speaks: English*, German, Italian, Spanish, Swedish, Danish, French, Norwegian, Portuguese, Dutch | Message 14 of 113 15 January 2007 at 3:55pm | IP Logged | ||
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It seems to be a common misconception that everyone in Scandinavia has learned English to a very high level. I have taught English (and French) in the public school system at the high school level in Norway, and I can tell you that this is not the case. The level of English proficiency in Scandinavia varies greatly, with many people speaking very good English, but many others speaking a hybrid variety of English heavily influenced by the native language.
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| Captain Haddock Diglot Senior Member Japan kanjicabinet.tumblr. Joined 6766 days ago 2282 posts - 2814 votes Speaks: English*, Japanese Studies: French, Korean, Ancient Greek | Message 15 of 113 16 January 2007 at 2:17am | IP Logged | ||
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^^ Of course, foreigners who visit a country for a short period of time tend to be exposed to a self-selecting statistical sample (sorry for all the s's). The people bold enough to chat with you will naturally be those comfortable in English, or those in the tourist industry. I'm reminded of the psychiatrist who said nearly everyone he met was insane. :)
Likewise, people visit Asia as short-term English teachers tend to think everyone there is friendly and wants to learn English, since that's naturally the kind of people they'll meet in that line of work. On the subject at hand, it takes someone below the age of 18 just as much work as an adult to actually be fluent in 4 languages. Very few societies (if any) are actually multi-lingual at every level. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| NascentOne Pentaglot Newbie Norway Joined 6887 days ago 19 posts - 43 votes Speaks: English, Norwegian*, Hindi, Punjabi, French Studies: German | Message 16 of 113 16 January 2007 at 1:35pm | IP Logged | ||
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In India the situation is very varied. There are two national languages, Hindi and English (strictly speaking an "associate official language") and then again most states have their own state specific languages. From multilingual people knowing English, Hindi and their state language to monoglots knowing only their own language (especially Hindi speakers are notorious for this, who rarely acquire other Indian languages on their own initiative), one can really meet the entire spectrum.
Of course the share of polyglots varies from state to state, with the people in northern Indian states such as Punjab, Gujarat, Maharashtra, Oriya etc. having an easier time learning Hindi as their native languages are usually related to it. But in 2004 I visited the state of Karnataka and I was surprised at the number of people who could communicate in quite good Hindi. Northern Indians tend to think that southern Indians (people whose mother tongues are mostly of the Dravidian family) never learn how to speak Hindi correctly and forget it once they leave school. Boy was I surprised when people out in rural areas were able to understand and even reply in Hindi! The reason I was so astonished, is that in Karnataka the native language is Kannada which is unrelated to Hindi (although both have many common words) and therefore most people in that state have to work harder to learn Hindi. Indeed, the common perception is that many never really learn it. The education system works roughly in the following way in India: 1. People who live in primarily non-Hindi speaking states such as Assam(Assamese), Gujarat(Gujarati), Jammu and Kashmir(Kashmiri and Urdu), Maharashtra(Marathi), Orissa(Oriya), Punjab(Punjabi), Sikkim(Nepali), West Bengal(Bengali), Andhra Pradesh(Telugu), Karnataka(Kannada) and Kerala(Malayalam) learn three languages in primary school: Hindi, English and their state language (which I have indicated in parentheses behind the name of each state). The last three states mentioned have Dravidian languages as their official languages, so it is generally assumed that knowledge of Hindi in those places is considerably lower compared to the other states. 2. In the "Hindi belt", states such as Bihar, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Uttaranchal and Uttar Pradesh already have Hindi as their native language, so schoolchildren only learn English and a third language. The third language is often something like Sanskrit, Arabic or perhaps a European language. Some few might study other modern Indian languages, but I have rarely met native Hindi speakers who can speak other Indian languages fluently (unless they have a compelling reason - like a spouse, a relocation to a non-Hindi speaking state or an interest in languages). 3. Tamil Nadu, the state at the southernmost tip of the country, is the only state where Hindi is not a compulsory subject in state run schools (due to resentment to perceived Hindi-imposition by northern Indians). There, children only learn Tamil and English, but they can probably also have a third language as an elective. The lists I have given above for states and their official languages are incomplete as some states have not been mentioned while some states have several state languages (for eg. in Andhra Pradesh, while Telugu is the state language, Urdu is also considered the native language in some areas and is therefore also recognized as an official state language). The language situation in India is indeed very complex. I have now made it clear why and how there are many hundreds of millions of multilingual Indians and many of them are indeed younger than 18. Almost all my relatives know both Punjabi and Hindi and most of them know English too. In fact, virtually everybody in India who has any kind of higher education will know some English as nearly all text books are written in that language. However what Captain Haddock said about "Very few societies (if any) are actually multi-lingual at every level" is certainly true for India too. But there are still many Indian polyglots out there:-) Edited by NascentOne on 17 January 2007 at 1:11am 1 person has voted this message useful |
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