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What is bilingual to you? | ||
Tags: Multilingual | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| tarvos Super Polyglot Winner TAC 2012 Senior Member China likeapolyglot.wordpr Joined 4489 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 41 of 63 06 November 2013 at 7:52pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
If their Dutch is very good that would just be patronizing... only if they feel they'll be better off if I do 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| Maralol Nonaglot Newbie France Joined 4800 days ago 35 posts - 75 votes Speaks: Spanish, French*, English, German, Italian, Dutch, Swedish, Portuguese, Catalan Studies: Polish, Danish, Russian, Mandarin, Japanese | Message 42 of 63 06 November 2013 at 8:51pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
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To me, bilingual = you grow up speaking two languages because they're your native
languages. 3 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| dampingwire Bilingual Triglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4447 days ago 1185 posts - 1513 votes Speaks: English*, Italian*, French Studies: Japanese | Message 43 of 63 07 November 2013 at 12:41am | IP Logged | |||||||||||
Reading through the other posts, there are obviously places where this is the case. So you can describe yourself as bilingual, because you know your own history. But no- one else can make that assessment (unless you volunteer the information) without knowing something about your history. Doesn't that devalue the word somewhat - especially since there are plenty of heritage speakers who speak one of their native languages a little but (by their own admission) not very well? 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| beano Diglot Senior Member United KingdomRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4404 days ago 1049 posts - 2152 votes Speaks: English*, German Studies: Russian, Serbian, Hungarian | Message 44 of 63 07 November 2013 at 1:18am | IP Logged | |||||||||||
But Dutch families don't speak English to each other. Why would they want an au-pair who had no real intention of using the household language? 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| Hekje Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 4485 days ago 842 posts - 1330 votes Speaks: English*, Dutch Studies: French, Indonesian | Message 45 of 63 07 November 2013 at 4:18am | IP Logged | |||||||||||
I can't really answer that, as that was a story Tarvos heard, not me. Your guess is really as good as mine. I suppose that if both parties can communicate, that's all that matters. Also, sometimes families actually want their children to practice a foreign language with the au pair. Edited by Hekje on 07 November 2013 at 4:19am 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| beano Diglot Senior Member United KingdomRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4404 days ago 1049 posts - 2152 votes Speaks: English*, German Studies: Russian, Serbian, Hungarian | Message 46 of 63 07 November 2013 at 9:46am | IP Logged | |||||||||||
Yeah, I guess in some parts of America you have Spanish-speaking domestic staff. But it just seemed a bit unusual, travelling a long distance to practise English but not going to an English-speaking country. Like going to Cananda to learn French but not heading for Quebec. Edited by beano on 07 November 2013 at 9:47am 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| eyðimörk Triglot Senior Member France goo.gl/aT4FY7 Joined 3881 days ago 490 posts - 1158 votes Speaks: Swedish*, English, French Studies: Breton, Italian | Message 47 of 63 07 November 2013 at 10:50am | IP Logged | |||||||||||
In my opinion, yes, it does devalue the word. There are people with two half languages (or three or four, when we throw English and a third language in the mix) who are called "bilingual". Meanwhile, many of my classmates from secondary school would not qualify even though they had gone through 12 years of schooling in 100% English immersion schools, and lived in the UK ever since. I'm not about to get prescriptive here and tell people how they should use the word "tvåspråkig", but yes, it's not necessarily a very useful word for describing language ability. In many situations, it's mostly descriptive of someone's past social environment. Unless applied to certain situations, of course. Unlike myself, my husband did not do his secondary education entirely in English and did not take English that is equivalent to a UK native A-level. His was a "tvåspråkig utbildning" (bilingual education), that is to say: certain classes were taught in English (even if he teachers weren't always natives). The education can be "tvåspråkig", but no one would ever emerge from either of our educations "tvåspråkig". Edited by eyðimörk on 07 November 2013 at 10:51am 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
 Iversen Super Polyglot Moderator Denmark berejst.dk Joined 6485 days ago 9078 posts - 16473 votes Speaks: Danish*, French, English, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, Swedish, Esperanto, Romanian, Catalan Studies: Afrikaans, Greek, Norwegian, Russian, Serbian, Icelandic, Latin, Irish, Lowland Scots, Indonesian, Polish, Croatian Personal Language Map | Message 48 of 63 07 November 2013 at 11:27am | IP Logged | |||||||||||
It doesn't devaluate the notion, but it removes the focus from the level achieved. In Denmark we have had suggestions that the socalled bilingual 2. or 3. generation immigrants really are semilingual, because thy can't even speak one language properly, but mix them. But the consensus here still is to call them bilingual. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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