|
 |
Opportunity for immersion - Various langu | ||
Share with:
| ||
 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| Maximus Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 1518 days ago 417 posts - 1 votes Studies: Spanish, Japanese, Thai | Message 1 of 23 25 May 2008 at 2:42pm | IP Logged | ||
|
Within the languages of the world, which are good for immersion opportunity and which are bad in this respect.
I know that if I were to become desirous of learning the likes of, German, Dutch, the Scandanavian languages, Finnish acheiving immersion would be difficult as the people of those countries would just throw English at me on discovering that I am a foreigner. This is because their level of English seems to be quite high. I once had a German girl ask me, "You like languages Luke, why don't you learn my language, German? It will be a good challenge for you!" My response was, "If I did study German, nobody would let me practice and they would all just force English on me, even if I could still manage to express myself sufficiently. Therefore I don't wish to learn it only to have English forced upon me despite my attempts" When choosing which language to learn, one factor in the criteria is immersion opportunity. Languages of countries where English isn't spoken widely or well (preferably monolingual countries) already have a strong influence on my decision. Good languages for that in my opinion seem to be the likes of Spanish (in most locations in Spain nobody seems to even care about English, what a positive!), I have heared that Japanese too is like this according to various areas of this forum. Any opinions on good languages for immersion and the opposite? Luke | |||
| TheElvenLord Diglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 849 days ago 917 posts - 12 votes 1 sounds Speaks: Cornish, English* Studies: Spanish, French, German Studies: Portuguese, Mandarin | Message 2 of 23 25 May 2008 at 2:47pm | IP Logged | ||
|
I think if you ask politly they will be more than happy to speak your target language!
TEL | |||
| Maximus Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 1518 days ago 417 posts - 1 votes Studies: Spanish, Japanese, Thai | Message 3 of 23 25 May 2008 at 3:04pm | IP Logged | ||
Dude, I would rather just avoid those English abundant countries and choose only "immersion friendly" environments. The Eigo bandits are always a molestation for my studies! Mostly people are too disposed to showing off. I really dislike shoffing off foreigners who insist they "speak ingris very good" and just keep molesting me with their unwanted discourses. I would rather stay in an "Anti-English language country"! | |||
| guilon Pentaglot Senior Member Spain Joined 961 days ago 227 posts - 2 votes Speaks: Spanish*, PortugueseC2, FrenchC2, Italian, English | Message 4 of 23 25 May 2008 at 6:20pm | IP Logged | ||
|
All Spanish speaking countries (except maybe Puerto Rico) are good places for immersion, English is a significant
handicap to us. | |||
| leftyjace Groupie United States myspace.com/meanphoe Joined 1349 days ago 43 posts 1 sounds Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 5 of 23 25 May 2008 at 6:21pm | IP Logged | ||
|
you could always push your foreign language on them... they answer in yours, you answer in theirs... that way you'll at least know if you're speaking good enough to be understood! :)
| |||
| Maximus Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 1518 days ago 417 posts - 1 votes Studies: Spanish, Japanese, Thai | Message 6 of 23 25 May 2008 at 6:47pm | IP Logged | ||
I have no doubt that I am being understood. And I don't particularly enjoy those battles in which both jock for position with their languages until one gives in! Like I said, I would just rather avoid it all. For that I opened this thread. To allow language learners to know which places are immersion friendly environments and to enable us to choose our newly added languages taking into account practical factors like easy of achieving total immersion. | |||
 DaraghM Pro Member Ireland Joined 920 days ago 1249 posts - 58 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, Russian, Danish, French Personal Language Map | Message 7 of 23 26 May 2008 at 5:02am | IP Logged | ||
|
So far, I've found Spanish to have the greatest immersion potential. In Madrid, I found they rarely speak English, and it really pushed my Spanish. Barcelona wasn't as intense, and I got to pick up a small bit of Catalan. I was suprised in Ibiza, the town side of the island, how little English was spoken. Obviously, the far side of the island, is a whole different story. Finally, Cuba, is impossible to get around without Spanish. I met an Irish couple who had no Spanish, and they found the whole experience intimidating.
Other countries have immersion potential if you stray off the beaten track. I found I was forced to use my extremely limited Hungarian, Thai, Croatian, or Latvian, in various odd circumstances. Edited by DaraghM on 26 May 2008 at 5:02am | |||
 ChristopherB Triglot Pro Member New Zealand Joined 1085 days ago 722 posts - 84 votes 2 sounds Speaks: English*, German, French Studies: Spanish, Mandarin, Bulgarian Personal Language Map | Message 8 of 23 26 May 2008 at 5:09am | IP Logged | ||
|
Are Finland and Germany really that English-strong? I know Scandinavia and the Netherlands are, as you mentioned. China would be a good place for it too, though as I'm aware of it, many can speak English to some degree now. I've also heard conflicting things about Korea: in some cases it's apparently impossible to not get English 'thrown' at you when you venture to speak Korean, whereas in others I've heard most barely know a word. I guess it depends where exactly in those countries you do go. An out-of-the-way Chinese village is likely to be monolingual, as opposed to bustling Beijing, but I've never been there so I can't vouch. My Aunt is there at the moment, and she said she had a fair bit of trouble communicating in Beijing, so there you go.
|
|  | 
Printable version
|
| Copyright 2010 FX Micheloud - All rights reserved No part of this website may be copied by any means without my written authorization. |
