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A dead honest language CV... | ||
Tags: Curriculum Vitae (CV) | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| Solfrid Cristin Heptaglot Winner TAC 2011 & 2012 Senior Member Norway Joined 5115 days ago 4143 posts - 8864 votes  Speaks: Norwegian*, Spanish, Swedish, French, English, German, Italian Studies: Russian | Message 1 of 104 01 November 2013 at 12:34pm | IP Logged | |||||
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In another thread we have been discussing how to put passive languages on your CV - and it struck me, that if you are to be absolutely dead honest, your language CV could be curious reading. Also because some claim to speak languages they have forgotten, or hardly even studied. I'll give you mine, with warts and all and look forward to yours :-)
Formal background (and the honest appraisal...) English: C2 - 4 years of University education (But my daughters say I have a phony accent, and a native speaker says my vowels are too short.) Still - good workable knowledge - struggle with spelling mistakes due to a gallopping case of dyslexia, and I suffer from a bad case of informality, but otherwise fine, both orally and in writing. Spanish: C2 - 4 1/2 years of University studies - 3 years in Spain, 8 boyfriends - (Pretty good speaking and listening skills still and I get really good feed back on those, but I have hardly written in it for 30 years, and I have no skills within formal administrative language) French: C2/C1 - 1 year of University studies, 1 year in France, 1/2 a boyfriend (still fairly good listening and speaking skills, get good feed back on those - takes me for ever to write anything in it though, and I would get a heart attack if I had to use it daily in writing. No clue on administrative, formal language, but I am the king at chatting at lunch) Italian: B1? A couple of evening classes, 6 weeks in Italy in the last century - 3 boyfriends - (Used to speak it very well, am getting incredibly rusty - still enough to get a smile on every Italian's face though. Would fail miserably if I tried to use it for work purposes) German B1 - 1 year at high shool, a few evening classes and a 2 weeks' intensive course in Munich - (can speak it at a simple level without difficulties, but would literally die if I had to write in it on a daily basis. Great at verbs, a walking disaster at cases) Russian - A2 - A number of evening classes and two intensive courses in Kiev. No boyfriends. Yet. (Can say simple things, could not use it professionally for another 5 years) Swedish: Passive C2 - Active A2 - Massive exposure through TV as a child, and through work as an adult. (100% oral understanding, 95%-98 reading understanding can speak it, but not write it.) Danish: Passive C2 - Active A0 - (90%-95 oral understanding - 99% reading understanding - cannot speak it or write it) Polish: A0 - Evening classes and one month in Warsaw (Yes, I know I have a document which says I can do some Polish, but at this point all it does is mess up my Russian. Got a 19 year marriage out of attending the course though, which partly explains my lack of study time.) Latin A0: 6 months at the University. (I have the papers for it, but I hated it then, and I hate it now. No skills whatsoever.) Dutch: A0 active- A2 passive skills - A few evening classes with a Dutch monk that started chasing me around. Put a stop to my Dutch language studies. (Can understand enough to read an Agatha Christie in it, but understand zero and zilch when they open their mouths) Portuguese: A0 active - A2 passive skills. A tiny bit of exposure while in Portugal - 2 weeks alltogether. (Can read an Agatha Christie, understand about 60-70% of the spoken language if they speak slowly.) Arabic: A0 6 weeks classical Arabic, 6 weeks Egyptian Arabic at the university in the late 70ies. (Can say 3-4 phrases and recognize some words in other languages - otherwise - nothing. Forgotten the alphabet). Hebrew: A0 - 6 weeks classical Hebrew at the University in the late 80ies (can say a few words - otherwise nothing. Forgotten the alphabet. Languages I have started and of which I now remember nothing at all: Greek, Turkish. 9 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Zireael Triglot Senior Member Poland Joined 4432 days ago 518 posts - 636 votes Speaks: Polish*, EnglishB2, Spanish Studies: German, Sign Language, Tok Pisin, Arabic (Yemeni), Old English | Message 2 of 104 01 November 2013 at 3:32pm | IP Logged | |||||
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I love the A0 ones. Where did you get the idea for this denomination?
2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Solfrid Cristin Heptaglot Winner TAC 2011 & 2012 Senior Member Norway Joined 5115 days ago 4143 posts - 8864 votes Speaks: Norwegian*, Spanish, Swedish, French, English, German, Italian Studies: Russian | Message 3 of 104 01 November 2013 at 3:36pm | IP Logged | |||||
I'm creative :-) 5 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| montmorency Diglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4609 days ago 2371 posts - 3676 votes Speaks: English*, German Studies: Danish, Welsh | Message 4 of 104 01 November 2013 at 3:41pm | IP Logged | |||||
Makes perfect sense to me (as a one time computer low-level programmer. Computer addresses start at zero, not one). I'm slightly surprised that Cristina rates herself as possibly as low as 95% comprehension for reading Swedish, but I guess that's natural modesty or caution. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Solfrid Cristin Heptaglot Winner TAC 2011 & 2012 Senior Member Norway Joined 5115 days ago 4143 posts - 8864 votes Speaks: Norwegian*, Spanish, Swedish, French, English, German, Italian Studies: Russian | Message 5 of 104 01 November 2013 at 3:46pm | IP Logged | |||||
Yep. That's me. Naturally modest :-) 3 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
 emk Diglot Moderator United States Joined 5313 days ago 2615 posts - 8806 votes Speaks: English*, FrenchB2 Studies: Spanish, Ancient Egyptian Personal Language Map | Message 6 of 104 01 November 2013 at 3:58pm | IP Logged | |||||
I love your measuring system! And what a fun idea. French: Got paperwork to prove I'm B2, and could probably pass a C1 reading exam without much trouble. Listening comprehension is 90+% half the time, and the other half, who knows? Except French movies and cop shows, many of which thoroughly defeat me. I'm too lazy to keep up my writing skills, but I can fake it if you give me a web connection. Speaking is a mess. Specifically, I'm good enough that people no longer give me compliments. Instead, they just assume I'm an idiot. Socially I'm OK, but if I have to talk for more than a few sentences at a time, I never know what the result will be: Sometimes I can almost fake C1, but other times, they'd take away my B2 certificate if they heard me. Do not put me in professional situations unless the customer is desperate to do business with us. Latin: I studied this for years. I can probably still translate pieces of "The farmer is kind to the wretched slaves," but not assemble them into a grammatical sentence. German: I can still sing some of "O Tannenbaum" and remember some of the major function words and prepositions. Not so hot for two years of classes. Italian: I had an excellent accent and 200 word vocabulary when I went to college. After college, I had a 200 word vocabulary. Ancient Egyptian: If you let me wander around the Louvre long enough, I can probably translate a few formulaic fragments of funeral inscriptions. I would do better if I knew more than 6 verbs and a few dozen nouns. But hey, I'm up to date on my Anki reviews! Edited by emk on 01 November 2013 at 4:59pm 5 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| beano Diglot Senior Member United KingdomRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4403 days ago 1049 posts - 2152 votes Speaks: English*, German Studies: Russian, Serbian, Hungarian | Message 7 of 104 01 November 2013 at 4:25pm | IP Logged | |||||
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English - Native language. Born and raised in Scotland so I also have a healthy Scots vocabulary.
German - I put my level at C1. I've never sat any official exams, but I can converse fluently with native speakers, using lots of idiomatic terms. Wife is German so I have had a lot of exposure to the language over the years. I have also attended evening classses and studied grammar books, so I know how the cases work. I can watch movies without subtitles. I read novels with only occasional recourse to a dictionary. I maintain several friendships in German only. But to bump myself up to C2 I think I'd have to spend a couple of years in Germany using the language constantly. Russian - No higher than A1. I've worked through a couple of audio courses and can build a few simple sentences but that's about it. I know how each letter in the Cyrillic script sounds. I have Russian friends but I speak to them in either English or German. Hungarian - Can introduce myself, exchange pleasantries, recite the alphabet, count to 20. A solid A0 Serbian - See Hungarian. Edited by beano on 01 November 2013 at 4:27pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| tarvos Super Polyglot Winner TAC 2012 Senior Member China likeapolyglot.wordpr Joined 4488 days ago 5310 posts - 9399 votes Speaks: Dutch*, English, Swedish, French, Russian, German, Italian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Romanian, Afrikaans Studies: Greek, Modern Hebrew, Spanish, Portuguese, Czech, Korean, Esperanto, Finnish | Message 8 of 104 01 November 2013 at 4:39pm | IP Logged | |||||
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Besides Dutch,
English - C2: used from childhood, native delivery, entirely idiomatic, fully capable of anything, have international baccelaureate diploma. French - B2+ - understand practically everything, can express myself very well and rapidly without much word-searching. Still need to work on some vocabulary holes and register though. German - B2, understand everything (unless in dialect), can speak fluently, make some funny mistakes and have a charming accent Swedish - B2 (see German) Russian - B2 (but slightly lower) No problems with speech, can converse and maintain friendships in this language, still some advanced grammar mistakes and my literary register isn't too good Romanian - B1 could travel independently and write messages but don't have enough spoke experience to put it at B2 - can understand a lot though Breton - spoken A1, written B1 - can read a novel slowly if I understand the content, can do personal messaging, but have never really spoken it - could come up with something though Hebrew - A2+ - can produce a lot, understand most of the grammar, but lack experience and can't read very well - still need to work on reading Hebrew. Spoken and oral understanding is slightly better Icelandic - A1 - have some beginner notions of the language and the grammar, can do greetings and construct a few simple sentences, maybe some touristic things, but no more Korean - A1 (see Icelandic) Latin - A1 - can understand and translate some simple things but can't speak it for the life of me Portuguese/Spanish/Italian - understand a fair amount of these languages, but can't speak them as I have never studied the grammar ~ A1 rest is irrelevant really except that I can read a lot of Norwegian and Danish except when the vocab isn't guessable or identical to Swedish. 4 persons have voted this message useful |
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