Language Learning Forum: What is on your radar?

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What is on your radar?

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Forum Discription: Discussion about language learning for people who study languages on their own.
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Printed Date: 18 August 2021 at 9:46am

Posted By: Solfrid Cristin
Subject: What is on your radar?
Date Posted: 08 November 2013 at 11:04pm

Now my definition of a language on my radar is a language I do not study today, and may not know a single
word of, but that still holds my interest and is a potential future language - it may also be a language I have
already studied before. A language I would probably have or try to get some study material for. A Christmas
wish list for the languages I would like to study if someone granted me an extra life or two, or a full time job as
a language learner. In the thread about who you would like to meet on the forum, Chung said he and I did not
share any languages, but when I read his log I realised that a lot of the languages he does are on my radar.

And do you know the nice thing about languages that are on your radar? That it is equal footing for everyone
regardless of how many languages you have under your belt. :-) This is the stuff which dreams are made off.
Very democratic:-)

Greek: In theory one of my focus languages this year, but unfortunately I have forgotten everything. Will learn
it some time though. I know I will. Have got Assimil, Pimsleur and Michel Thomas ++
Turkish: Did a little bit a couple of years ago. Liked the language and the people. Have got TY ++
Arabic: Did it a bit 35 years ago. Have got TY since I thought I would be going to Tunis last year, which I
didn't.
Polish: Did it 20 years ago but the materials I have are ancient. Cassette tape ancient. Will get back to that
though.
Ukrainian: have TY, Assimil, Talkmore ++
Slovak: Have Colloquial Slovak - would like to learn it to complement what I hope will once be my other Slavic
languages.
Hebrew: Loved it once - will come back to it. No present century language material.
Swahili: Bought an Assimil course when I thought I would be going to the Seyschelles. Doubt that I ever will
now, but it would still be cool to learn it.
Dutch: Have a couple of very old courses from 20 years back- might get back to it. Some native material.
Portuguese: No courses, never done it, but I still hear the siren call. Have a few regular books in it.
Mongolian: Have Colloquial Mongolian which I bought before going to Mongolia last year - would be very
interesting to learn. Not entirely sure that I will though. It was way more difficult than Russian. I was not even
able to learn:" Where is the toilet".
Mandarin: Have Assimil, Pimsleur, Michel Thomas, Rosetta Stone and a heap of other beginner material for
it. Will learn a bit at some point. No idea of when.
Japanese: have Assimil, Pimsleur and Michel Thomas. Must learn a bit some time.
Kasakhstani: A few pages of one phrase book and a couple of Internet links. Want to learn the very basics.
Uzbek: Ditto.
Turkmenistani: Ditto without the Internet resources.
Icelandic: Have TY++ and some native material plus 50 native speakers in my family. Unfortunately I only
know 5 of them, but I get Icelandic on my Facebook feed regularly.

Am trying not to get interested in Slovenian, BCMS and Rumanian.

So: What shows up on your radar?

Replies:

Basically every other language on this planet, so I'll keep it short...

Icelandic: should be studying it and speaking it already, but keep not being able to
devote my full attention to it (which sucks - it's so beautiful). In 2014, I promise
you, Icelandic my love. Have materials, have been to Iceland and can actually say some
phrases.
Mandarin: Because one day I have to speak Mandarin. I have the Assimil for this one.
Portuguese/Spanish/Italian: I can pick them up quickly anyways. I have material for the
first two of these. Actually I have uttered a few phrases of all of these at some point
but I just don't know the grammar. I need to sit down, study either of them for some
months and then I'll probably speak it.
BCMS: I have a Russian textbook for this, an FSI course, a friend from Bosnia, and an
uncle with a Serbian partner. I could learn this one fairly quickly too I think, and it
is a toss-up between this one and Czech for my next Slavic language.
Czech: I have been there and want a west Slavic language on my resume at some
point...no materials
Swahili: Have an FSI course. That is about it. I need to study an African language, my
guess is it will be Swahili.
Malagasy: Because I want to travel the jungles of Madagascar one day. I have Assimil
for this one.
Irish: Because I want to travel the green fields of Ireland one day.
Finnish: Suomi finland metal perkele etc. For old times sake, and for metal music's
sake.
Tagalog: Because I want to travel in the Philippines
Ancient Greek and Modern Greek: I count Greeks among my best friends and will have the
opportunity to visit again. Only if I speak better Greek than they do I will probably
be the most annoying person éver. Ancient Greek because I wanted to study it at school
but it was never offered.
Arabic: Only the Levantine variety. Just to get the other side of the equation in
Israel. I already have gone for Hebrew of course.
Farsi: I like Iranians, and count a few among my friends.
Japanese: well. Japanese. is cool.

tarvos on 08 November 2013

Arabic - Perhaps after Farsi
Greenlandic - Just because
Finnish - I'd like to go there one day
Japanese - I respect the Japanese for some reason
Hebrew - Respect the Israelis/read Israeli newspapers
Afrikaans - I'd love to visit SA one day
Swedish - So I can talk to my Swedish friends in...O_O...Swedish
Cajun French - My great-grandfather was Cajun
Danish - So I can watch Flammen y Citronen without subtitles
Indonesian - Uhh...no idea
Russian - It's such a neat language

KidRoberts on 09 November 2013

Great thread, Solfrid. Depending on the day, I may want to spend the rest of my life engrossed in Chinese and Spanish, or I may want to branch out. In any case, I think I'll be happy with my level in these two languages in a few years and I'll decide then. On days that I dream about studying other languages, the following interest me more than most:

Arabic: I feel like the Arab world will be the cradle of most of the interesting events that happen in my lifetime, and I would like to get the perspective of the people living through those events. On the other hand, my primary study technique is reading a lot, and the diglossia seems to add an extra dimension that I may not cope with well.

German: If I learn a 4th language, it will probably be German. I am very interested in the philosophy from Germans.

Swahili: One of my favorite things about language learning is seeing the world from a different perspective, and being able to read African literature fascinates me.

Ancient Greek and Latin: I feel like I will spend my retirement on these two languages.
MixedUpCody on 09 November 2013

Danish + Swedish - Tons of matching books and audio for LR, Scandinavian movies are awesome, and I'd like to work in either country one day. I've done a bit of Assimil Swedish before, and although the pronunciation is crazy, it was still rather easy for me to get a hold of. I'd like to make Danish my Summer project next year.

German - Love/hate relationship. I study it, leave it, study it, leave it. I love the language, but I hate learning it. I've gotten through 3 Assimils & one reader so far.

Japanese - I like Japanese movies & authors. I don't think I'd have the will power to learn it up to B2 though. I'd like to visit.

Portuguese - Knowing three other romance languages, why not add this one?

Latin - Not sure. I just really like the idea of knowing it.

I can only see Danish & maybe Latin happening in the near future. Maybe Japanese also if I take a course first.
sillygoose1 on 09 November 2013

sillygoose1 wrote:

I've done a bit of Assimil Swedish before, and although the pronunciation is crazy, it
was still rather easy for me to get a hold of. I'd like to make Danish my Summer project next year.

.

Oh boy. If you feel that the pronunciation of Swedish is crazy, I can barely wait to hear what you'll
think about Danish.
Solfrid Cristin on 09 November 2013

So these are languages that we aren't going to learn, right?

Italian: It sounds nice, it's the language of a country I would badly like to visit, but it just isn't really that important.

Chinese: It's also the language of a country I would like to visit, but I doubt I ever will.

Ancient Egyptian: needs no introduction

Ancient Greek: It interests me because it is the language of the New Testament and looks cool besides that. However, when I was studying it, it really kicked my butt.

Biblical Hebrew: Language of the Old Testament.

Arabic: This one might be on my hit list, but it also might get dropped if the next one in line is too difficult for me. I know people who speak it which would be a real change from the languages that I'm studying.
Darklight1216 on 09 November 2013

Darklight1216 wrote:

So these are languages that we aren't going to learn, right?

My understanding is that they are languages we aren't currently learning, but may someday.
MixedUpCody on 09 November 2013

Mine really is short (I think):

Keeping with the idea of language families:

Celtic:
After hopefully getting Welsh up to a good level, Cornish, then Irish.

Germanic:
After hopefully(! - ? - !) getting Danish up to a reasonable level....
Kickstart Norwegian.
Start Icelandic from scratch
Try to get at least some passive understanding of Swedish.
Revisit Dutch (after many decades....).

Probably as background activities:
Look more seriously at Old English, and If I've made any headway with Icelandic,
Dabble with Old Norse. I gather Icelandic is close to Old Norse, but not identical.

Romance:
Revive the Spanish I knew, and try to step it up a gear, especially speaking and
listening.
Try to get at least some passive understanding of Portuguese.

That's enough to keep me busy I think, even if rather parochial by HTLAL standards.

montmorency on 09 November 2013

Solfrid Cristin wrote:

[...]So: What shows up on your radar?

Well... my next meal (chicken or fish?) not to mention the work that I need to take home with me for the weekend are on my radar. There's also a blip in another quadrant on the screen representing a hottie whom I met recently...

Ooh, riiight. We're talking about languages!

What's on my profile's hit list is what's on my linguistic radar. However out of what's there, I think that just Afrikaans and Azerbaijani are the most likely blips on the screen to which I would react in the next year (if at all). I've never done more than dabble in an "easy" language, and Afrikaans seems to fit the bill while Azerbaijani is part of a long-standing interest in Central Asia where I'd like to get some grounding (if not fluency) in other Turkic languages and Mongolian.

Chung on 09 November 2013

MixedUpCody wrote:

Darklight1216 wrote:

So these are languages that we aren't going to learn,
right?

My understanding is that they are languages we aren't currently learning, but may someday.

That's right :-)
Solfrid Cristin on 09 November 2013

Interesting question! Some languages I want to learn are just purely for fun, while
others may have a practicality

Yiddish: The language is interesting to me, and I just want to say "Ya I speak Yiddish"
Hebrew: Interested in politics, and would love to be able to read Israeli news, and
anything written regarding their politics
Mandarin: So many speakers, just a fun challenge :P
Cantonese: Just for pure fun, actually more interested in learning this over Mandarin
Ukrainian: Will start this language soon. After learning a good amount of Russian, I
want to learn this language too

Currently I have no resources for any of the languages, but I am patiently waiting for
some resources to become available.
Bbcatcher 08 on 09 November 2013

German: I will definitely learn this, I have German friends, I've traveled around the country, I'm interested in
their literature. To be honest it feels absurd that I don't know their language yet. I did some Rosetta Stone a
few years ago before traveling there and that was about as succesful as you'd expect RS to be...

Portugese/Italian/Occitan: I read French/Spanish/Latin so these are crazy transparent to me already.

Classical Chinese: Strong literature, won't be too big a leap once I'm confident enough with Japanese.

Urdu/Persian/Arabic: Like the look of their literatures, Ghazals are an amazing form of poetry.

Indo-Malay: I have friends from Malaysia and, being Australian, Indonesia is my neighbour.

Tok Pisin: Neighbours again. But also really interesting to learn a language so strongly related to my own.

Old English: Want to read beowulf and learn more about the roots of my language.

AlexTG on 09 November 2013

Well, since I have no power of will and so on, these are mostly dreams, some of them even are weak ones...

Swedish. I really don't know why, but I do want to learn it. I just do.
French. It would've been great to read in it. I don't think I'll ever be worrying about speaking French, but to read Les Rois maudits in original is definitely something that worth working for.
Italian. It has more chances than French, plus I won't give up speaking as a target so easily.
Esperanto. Maybe I'll turn in one of this crazy people with huge ambitions to turn Esperanto in lingua franca? Or, maybe, I'll drop it with thoughts "it's useless"? Interesting...
Bulgarian. If I should learn another Slavic language to add up to Russian, I'd choose Bulgarian. Not Polish, as I thought few years ago.
Hungarian. Once again, I thought about learning Finnish exactly the same few years ago, but now I tend to look at Hungarian more.
Sanskrit. Only when I'll consider myself as a polyglot. I could learn it as a reward, maybe.

Hehe, weird list, but nothing more comes up in my mind. So that's it for now, I think...
Via Diva on 09 November 2013

tarvos wrote:

Finnish: Suomi finland metal perkele etc. For old times sake, and for metal music's sake.

*____________________*

As for my list...
Swedish
Karelian
Norwegian
Icelandic
Welsh
Breton
Catalan
Corsican
Napoletan if you consider it a separate language
Czech
Bulgarian
Estonian
Luxembourgish
Swiss German
Yiddish
and the various Finno-Ugric/Uralic languages of Russia.

At least half the time, the difficulty outweighs the interest/benefits. Often the difficulty is down to the resources rather than the language itself.
Serpent on 09 November 2013

Oh and Papiamento sounds like fun :))) And also Guarani while I'm at it.
Serpent on 09 November 2013

I must be the only person on this site who doesn't suffer from wanderlust. :)

Portuguese - I want to live and travel through all of Latin America soon. I'm learning Spanish now and Portuguese is
on my horizon. Pretty simple for me. :)
LeadZeppelin on 09 November 2013

Right now I'm actively learning Italian. I'd like to learn the languages of the Mediterranean:
review French

learn Hebrew

Turkish

Arabic

Spanish

Portugese

and a couple more, that is German and Russian.

I also keep coming back to latin, but I don't see that happening to be honest. One never knows!

I keep studying Greek as well. I have a good mind one day to grab Athenaze and read it from cover to cover.
renaissancemedi on 09 November 2013

Serpent wrote:

tarvos wrote:

Finnish: Suomi finland metal perkele etc. For old times
sake, and for metal music's sake.

*____________________*

Haha. The first sentence is a joke. But that's also part of my reason for learning
Swedish, actually. I should do the same with Finnish since some of those bands started my
path to musical development. One certain Finnish band forum gave me long-term
relationships and friends all over the world. (though nothing to do with Finnish).

So one day I should learn Finnish.
tarvos on 09 November 2013

German - There are several Great Books originally written in German. Librivox.org already has a lot of them.
Russian - Has many great novelists, but harder than German for an Anglophone.
Greek and Latin if life expectancy is increased by 30 years or more.
luke on 09 November 2013

I guess that I'll list the ones at the top of my list:

German - I took it for six years in middle school and high school. At one point, I was pretty good at it. It is probably the foreign language that I would probably be able to pronounce the best as well. I'm pretty sure that it will be the next language that I start working on.

French - I've always wanted to learn this language, even when I was in middle and high school. Unfortunately, it's never anything that I've gotten around to... German was the only language offered in middle school, when I got to college Spanish seemed to be the most useful, and so I never really had the chance to study it. I've dabbled in it a bit, but not even too seriously with Rosetta Stone.

Italian - I lived in Italy for a while and I should pick up the language again.

Chinese - I think that Chinese is a practical language considering how the country is an up-and-coming economic powerhouse.

Hebrew/New Testament Greek - For Bible study.

Arabic - Mostly to give me an edge as a blogger. There are certain "news makers" who will say one thing to the English-speaking world and will say something else in Arabic.

That will keep me busy for a while :-)
Lorren on 09 November 2013

Like tarvos I want to learn pretty much every language, so I'll limit this list to just the languages for which I already have some resources (at least, more than just unaccompanied audio courses and bookmarked links). Right now I'm studying for JLPT N1, so most of my non-Japanese languages are in standby mode and taking up new ones is out of the question (or supposed to be... I just couldn't resist the temptation of Latin), but here are some of the languages I'm prepared to take up once I'm satisfied with my Japanese (which may or may not be "never").

Mandarin: The more I learn about and become fascinated with the Sinitic languages, the more I develop the kind of dismissive attitude towards Modern Standard Mandarin that Chung has towards Russian and Serpent towards French. Unfortunately, Mandarin appears pretty much unavoidable if I intend to study any other Sinitic language without having a direct access to native speakers. Besides, I take the train between Moscow and Saint Petersburg quite frequently and I nearly always travel together with tourist groups from China, and it feels increasingly awkward to be able to recognize their Beijingese r's and h's while being unable to engage them in conversation. Resources: Pimsleur, a pronunciation and character guide companion to Pimsleur I, an old Chinese-Russian dictionary.

Cantonese: Probably the only somewhat realistic option if I were to try to properly learn a Sinitic language without the intermediation of Mandarin. Besides, I find Hong Kong fascinating and would really like to travel there someday. Resources: Pimsleur, FSI course.

Korean: as someone with http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Koryo-saram - Koryo-saram ancestry, this one is a heritage language. Would love to learn the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamgy%C5%8Fng_dialect - Hamgyeong dialect , which is most likely what my ancestors spoke and which is about equally far removed from the southern and the northern standard Korean, but resources for it not in Korean are probably quite scarce. My Japanese should help, considering the shared Chinese borrowed vocabulary and similar grammatical structures. Resources: Pimsleur, an old North Korean self-study book.

Estonian: Have long wanted to get into Uralic languages. Always thought I would start with Finnish, since it's spoken near my hometown and has plenty of resources, but my mother went to Estonia last year and bought an Estonian self-study book as a souvenir for me, so it's been tempting me ever since. Besides, Estonia is about as close and actually interests me a little more.

Ingrian: A critically endangered Uralic language indigenous to the area where I was born. While I have no immediate ancestral connections to this language, I still feel obliged to familiarize myself with it at least to some extent, before it disappears from the face of the Earth. Resources: a self-study guide.

Bashkir: A Turkic language indigenous to the area where my paternal ancestors are from (although it's not part of modern Bashkortostan and there aren't many Bashkirs left). Even though my family denies this, my surname sounds like it could be Bashkir in origin. Additionally, I find something intriguing about the idea of a Turkic language whose phonology contains dental fricatives (the only other one, AFAIK, is Turkmen). My familiarity with Kazakh, another Kipchak Turkic language, makes Bashkir slightly transparent to me already, so it wouldn't require me to divert too much attention from my other languages. Resources: an academic grammar book.

Ukrainian and Belarusian: probably not going to aim for high level productive skills, but I think it would be nice to develop perfect passive understanding, which is something many Russians mistakenly believe to possess without any dedicated study. Resources: Ukrainian Pimsleur (already completed), bilingual (Ukrainian/Russian) collection of fairy tales, bilingual (Belarusian/English) text of King Stakh's Wild Hunt.

Chechen: after having dabbled in Abkhaz my appetite for the languages of the Caucasus has been piqued, so now I would like to familiarize myself with a Northeastern Caucasian language in order to compare and contrast. Unfortunately it's unlikely to go beyond dabbling, since race relations in Russia aren't pretty right now and from what I hear many Chechens don't take kindly to what they perceive as http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cultural_appropriation - cultural appropriation . Resources: self-study book.
vonPeterhof on 09 November 2013

I have German and Mandarin.

I took Mandarin for six months in school as a second subject but now am trying to maintain what I have until I can
save up for a course. Since it isn't related to English, I can't just absorb it through watching TV like German to the
same degree. The grammar is much more natural for me than German since it is analytical too. Yet for me the lack
of cognates make it so time consuming and the writing system is bothersome.

German is harder but less time consuming as many of the words come naturally. I have peaked on and off for
months at what certain words are so by the time I started attempting to immerse myself two week ago, I knew what
the endings were and what for. I make trips to grammar websites to check what a particular word is for or what the
word order is. I just have that hunch if I lived in Germany for a few months I would pick it up. For now I just
attempt to read and watch.
Papashaw on 09 November 2013

OMG. This is but a pipe dream, but here it goes:

Azeri and/or Turkish - I <3 Azerbaijan and its traditional and jazz music. Turkish
speakers might be easier to find in places other than Moscow.

Ukrainian - My mother asked me the other day for the name of that Ukrainian song that
became the anthem of the Ukrainian Orange Revolution, and I answered her in Ukrainian:
"you mean that song they sang on Maidan Nezalezhnosti? Razom nas bahato, nas ne
podolaty?" She looked at me as if I were insane, and I had no idea how I was able to
say that. :)) Most of my family has Ukrainian roots, so it would make sense for me to
learn to understand the language.

Latin - There are so many interesting things written in ecclesiastical and classical
Latin! Besides, I went to a Catholic school for nine years (without being Catholic). It
would be kind of cool to read the Pope's tweets in Latin.

A hardcore Germanic language (read: not modern English) - either German, Dutch,
Norwegian or Old English.

espejismo on 09 November 2013

vonPeterhof wrote:

Estonian: Have long wanted to get into Uralic languages. Always thought I would start with Finnish, since it's spoken near my hometown and has plenty of resources, but my mother went to Estonia last year and bought an Estonian self-study book as a souvenir for me, so it's been tempting me ever since. Besides, Estonia is about as close and actually interests me a little more.

I would tell you to start with Finnish if you indeed are interested in both, and not because I'm Finnish. The thing is that after Finnish you would understand why Estonian is so irregular and at least in my case I know it would bother me a lot less. Such as things like "why is the genitive of "mees" mehe" because Estonian has lost a lot of word final sounds that make it seem impossible but knowing Finnish will help with the understanding of why they are as they are.

For example:
Finnish: "maja": N: "maja"; G: "majan"; P: "majaa"
Estonian: "maja": N: "maja"; G: "maja"; P: "maja"

Just a friendly piece of advice.
Henkkles on 09 November 2013

Portuguese and Arabic.

Once Japanese and Italian are under control, maybe!
Leurre on 09 November 2013

Catalan/Valencian: Barcelona and Valencia are two of my favorite cities on the planet and I'd like to spend a longer period of time in both. Thanks to Spanish and French, I can understand Catalan quite well, but would also like to speak it. I have Assimil Catalan with Spanish as base language.

Portuguese: I wanted to start it this year, but had to postpone, because I started a masters degree in law and am simply lacking time. I have Assimil, Teach Yourself, a grammar book and a few bilingual books.

Croatian: I went to Croatia a few years ago and loved the country. I was lucky to win Assimil Croatian last year when Assimil had a giveaway on Facebook.

Greek: no real reason to learn it, I simply find the language beautiful and like the fact that it has its own alphabet

Swedish or Norwegian: I'd love to learn a Scandinavian language, but can't decide between Swedish and Norwegian.

Icelandic: I've never been to Iceland, but both the country and the language fascinate me for some reason I don't know myself

Thai: my husband and I both love Thailand and would like to spend an extended period of time there.

Japanese: one of my best friends lives in Tokyo and I find the country absolutely fascinating. I have Assimil Japanese.

Nahuatl or Maya: my husband is Mexican, I spend a lot of time in Mexico and am very interested in Mexican culture and history, so learning an indigenous language is very tempting. I have a Maya-Spanish dictionary.

I notice a pattern: if I visit a country and like it a lot, I almost always become interested in the language.
Iwwersetzerin on 09 November 2013

Languages on my radar...

Latin, Ancient Greek and Egyptian Hieroglyphs - I'm a history buff. Being able to read all of the surviving historical documents (and walls) from the ancient kingdoms I have spent and still spend so much time reading about would be great.

Hindi and Bengali - I love their writing systems. I've already begun learning Bengali writing but I have no idea when I'll get to actually learning the language.

Irish - One of the lines of my family tree is Irish.

Scots and Scottish Gaelic- One of my ancestors was sent to the US as an indentured servant due to him being on the losing side of the Jacobite Rebellion of 1715. He was from a rural area near Edinburgh. I have no idea if he spoke Scots or Scottish Gaelic. From what I've looked into, probably Scots (if it was just one instead of both), but I'm willing to bet some of his ancestors spoke Gaelic, so I'll throw both on my "on my radar" list.

Filling out the Germanic and Romance languages - German, Swedish, French, Italian and Spanish are ones that I will, 100%, get to some day. Any other language that would fill those language families out are "on my radar". I already have resources for Dutch and Catalan. I don't plan to go all out to fill out these two language families, because I am more interested overall in Asian languages (I'd say my goals for all of these languages save for French and German are to get them to a solid B1 - French and German are the ones I want to be at least B2).

Vietnamese, Thai, Tibetan and Cantonese - Maybe not even "on my radar" except for Thai. I've dabbled in Thai recently, but I have no idea if or when I'll give it a real go. The same for the other three. I plan to dabble in them a bit, but I don't know if I'll ever actually get to the "for real".
sabotai on 09 November 2013

I have a job that I can do in most countries in the world, so what is on the radar in terms of language is what's on the radar in terms of where I'd be interested in living (which is basically anywhere in East Asia or Europe). Which means that minority languages of countries are probably not something I'm very interested in. I'm only interested in something I could theoretically use in my day-to-day life.

As I see my long-term future in Europe, I think a basis in the major European languages would be ideal (German, French and Spanish, initially). But in reality, I'm not looking past German right now. I've never learned a language to a high standard, so it's best to focus on this one before I start planning the next 20 years.
I'm With Stupid on 09 November 2013

Other then continuing to improve and eventually reach fluency with my Norwegian, I'm planning on taking a Double Major in Russian. Beyond that, I have no way of telling what language I'll learn.
leroc on 09 November 2013

vonPeterhof wrote:

[...]Mandarin: The more I learn about and become fascinated with the Sinitic languages, the more I develop the kind of dismissive attitude towards Modern Standard Mandarin that Chung has towards Russian and Serpent towards French.

hahaha
Chung on 09 November 2013

French and German, and maybe Italian. Not sure yet. But French is definitely up next.
Indíritheach on 09 November 2013

espejismo wrote:

Latin - There are so many interesting things written in ecclesiastical and classical
Latin! Besides, I went to a Catholic school for nine years (without being Catholic). It
would be kind of cool to read the Pope's tweets in Latin.

And in the Vatican City, I believe, you can draw cash from an ATM in Latin. :-)

Thanks for reminding me about Latin.
That should be somewhere in my list.

montmorency on 09 November 2013

Russian: I learned it for three years in primary school, dabbled in a bit a couple of years ago, and I read it from time to time if need be. Some learning materials have been waiting at home for a while. Got really excited when a new Russian channel was added on cable TV, despite the fact I'm not learning Russian.

Esperanto: No learning materials at home but I know the address "lernu.net" by heart... even though I have never actually used it. As a child, I watched "Muzzy in Gondoland" in the Esperanto version. I would really like to go to an Esperanto event (or more of them, if I happen to enjoy it), preferably after having learned at least the basics :).

Those are the two most serious ones. Actually, my language wanderlust seems to be pretty much satisfied for the time being, as I started Swedish and Icelandic, dabbled in my most 'exotic' language so far (Arabic) and decided to take up Dutch seriously, all in the last 16 months (I know, I know, it's far from HTLAL records but for me that's a lot).

The other languages on my radar are:

'easy', i.e. related languages (for passive comprehension mostly, and for some fun in comparative linguistics): other Scandinavian languages, other Romance languages (especially Portuguese), Slovak, Czech (which I learned for a while), Afrikaans

more 'exotic' languages, mostly non-Indo-European (no serious plans here but this might change one day):

Arabic - dabbled with it last summer,
Finnish - can't forget the HTLAL Finnish challenge... and I find the language fascinating,
Hungarian - I did once an Assmil lesson and I would love to go to Budapest,
Korean - no experience whatsoever,
Irish - dabbled with it once, two or three "Speaks" languages ago, if I'm not mistaken - would like to go back to it one day and find out if it got any easier ;),
Turkish - two phrasebooks (with audio), bought before leaving for a week in Istambul. I learned numbers (but I remember "bir" only - yeah, because of the alcoholic association) and some basic phrases,
Modern Greek - added to the language hit list in my HTLAL profile years ago (along with Korean, Esperanto, Finnish, Romanian, Slovak, Hungarian, Danish, Portuguese and Norwegian, by the way... it seems that my list does not change that easily).

'old' languages: Latin (learned it for a year), Old English (browsed through a textbook once)
Julie on 09 November 2013

More polish, and maybe vietnamnese in a near future.
aspie.sharaf on 09 November 2013

Languages on my radar -

Groups:

Germanic - would like to learn any languages ancient or modern that is within the Germanic family. Mostly branches where I have already some knowledge (English, German), but any Germanic language from Gothic and Old English to German and anything in between plus Icelandic.

Romance - Spanish, Portuguese, Italian

Individual languages (some of which are related):

Turkish
Hebrew (biblical)
Koine Greek
Russian
Irish
Welsh
Gaelic
Serbian
Bulgarian

That'll be all for the moment....

cpnlsn88 on 10 November 2013

@Julie: If you do ever go back to Irish, it seems that there is no shortage of resources
available, judging by Teango's astonishingly long list, which showed up in the "active
threads" recently. (Don't think I'd noticed it before).
montmorency on 10 November 2013

@montmorency, thanks!
Julie on 10 November 2013

In no particular order:

French - I have six years of school French and not using it now honestly seems like a
bit of a waste.

Swahili - It would certainly broaden my horizons to study an African language, and
Swahili is a big one.

Farsi - One of my good friends is a Hazara Mongolian prince (can't make this up), and
he speaks Farsi with his family. Also, one of my closest friends is half-Iranian, and
that half of her family also speaks Farsi. The Baha'i religion is also pretty cool. So
yeah, I guess I just like a lot of Farsi-related things.

Turkish - There were a lot of Turkish international students at my school, and they
always seemed really interesting. I also like the way the language looks.

German - I think German sounds fantastic, and I'm also into German philosophy (Hesse,
Schopenhauer, etc.). Given my background in Dutch, I would also have a bit of a boost
in this one.

Spanish - Spanish seems like a natural choice given that I live in the U.S. and have
some knowledge of a Romance language.

Russian - Basically all of my fantasies about Russian involve me reading Dostoevsky or
Nabokov in the original on a train in the winter, perhaps framed as a fetching black
and white film still or something.

Danish - I love how Danish sounds and looks, and I would love to visit Denmark someday.

Mandarin - I'm more than 50% Chinese ethnically and feel partly drawn to the language
because of that, though I don't need it to communicate with family members. Plus
Mandarin business language of the future blah blah.

Czech - One of my former roommates was Czech, I love Prague, and the language looks and
sounds incredibly pretty.

Hungarian - This one mostly for page aesthetics again.

Latin - Mostly for Catullus and other sassy suchlike poets.
Hekje on 10 November 2013

kiswahili

I love Swahili so much! I spent a year travelling in Eastern and Southern Africa 15 years ago, and I still find
myself using Swahili words in day-to-day conversation - even if no one knows what I'm talking about.

I'm not sure that I'll ever study it. There are so many other languages that are more immediately useful to me,
and I don't have any firm plans to go back to Kenya or Tanzania.

But. But. But. Maybe someday.

I also loved Zulu and Xhosa - but those clicks seemed almost impossible to me!
Stelle on 10 November 2013

I'm overwhelmed with Japanese and Finnish. This feels to me like enough language for a lifetime, really. I have little wanderlust -- aside from the occasional desire to rescue my high school German from being totally forgotten.
cathrynm on 10 November 2013

LeadZeppelin wrote:

I must be the only person on this site who doesn't suffer from wanderlust. :)

We don't suffer, we enjoy it :-)

Although I wouldn't say I have it myself either.
Serpent on 10 November 2013

I seem not to have it either.
montmorency on 10 November 2013

Phew, it was really difficult to narrow the selection down to the languages I seriously consider to study some day, but here we go:

Hungarian: I have wanted to learn this language since I was a child. I have TY and will probably get Colloquial soon.

Ancient and Modern Greek: I have been to Greece once and dabbled in both varieties of the language before. I’m interested in Greek literature and philosophy and I think the language is very beautiful and difficult at the same time. I own several courses (Ancient Greek Alive, Reading Greek, Langenscheidt) and hope that I might get to studying it seriously soon.

Polish: It’s a language I have wanted to learn for years. I have been to Poland twice and I have several Polish friends. Also, I think it sounds very beautiful and awfully difficult to pronounce at the same time.

Czech: I have been to the Czech Republic once and wanted to learn the language ever since. Hopefully, I’ll get to it one day.

Farsi: I don’t know why, but I simply think it’s interesting and beautiful.

Swahili: It’s exotic and I don’t know any African languages. Don’t know if that’s reason enough for really studying it one day.

Georgian: I think the Mkhedruli script looks very beautiful and the language is supposed to be very difficult for Western Europeans. I know nothing about Georgia, but it would be interesting to learn more about its culture.

Korean: Once I have learned Japanese (ha ha!), I will move on to Korean. I love the Hangeul alphabet.

Old English: I have tried several materials for it, but I have never studied it seriously, so it is still on my to-do list.

Sanskrit: I’m interested in Indian culture and philosophy. The grammar of Sanskrit is famous for its complexity, so I’d like to give it a try some day.

Welsh: I have dabbled in it once, but I chose not to study it seriously. I might get back to it one day. I have a Colloquial course.

Mandarin: I have dabbled in it, but I haven’t got very far. Maybe, I’ll give it another try when my Japanese is better. I own Colloquial Chinese.
Josquin on 10 November 2013

On my radar (including things that have for one reason or another been abandoned in the past but may well come back) in groups that make sense to me:

Afrikaans, Sesotho, Xhosa: I spent some time in South Africa, and picked up a bit of each. One day, maybe.

Russian: I got by fairly well on several trips to Russia, but at this point it has withered away from disuse. I'd like to read literature in it one day.

Portuguese, Catalan: Because Romance languages. The culture is nice, also.

Arabic, Persian: I recently basically gave up on Arabic. Persian has been on my hit list for years now. I'm especially intersted in literary works here as well.

Cherokee: (possibly) a heritage language

Hungarian, Romanian: My father-in-law is a Siebenbürger Sachse, so yeah. Romanian is currently partially understandable.

Old English: No good reason, really.

Swedish: Also no good reason, I just find myself eyeballing it lately

Japanese: Again, after years of languishing my ability is about nil. I was pretty poor at it in any case, but my listening was not bad. After Korean and Mandarin, I will probably do it (Mandarin doesn't show up on this list because there's a commitment there, it's more than "on the radar")

I'm pretty open to other languages pushing their way in, as well. Realistically, some of these will never happen; I could never maintain all that anyway.
Belardur on 10 November 2013

Sometimes it changes daily.
I find a lot of languages and cultures interesting, which sparks my interests in learning languages. So I read about languages and watch documentary's about different cultures. But I personally need more internal motivation to be able to actually study them, and keep at it. For example, knowing people that speak them, or travels, or heritage/family stuff. Languages like that for me are Polish, Russian, and Spanish. I'm not actively studying all of them right now, but they are definitely on my radar! I also have learning materials in these.
Languages which I'm strongly interested in but I'm not sure if I'll ever learn them are Japanese, Persian, and lately Mandarin as well. I'm not a "fast" learner (let's just say I'm slow!), and I can't study a lot of languages at the same time. So they are shoved down the priority list. Hopefully some day I'll be able to learn these. :-)
Languages in which I have definite interest, but less than the above, are Swedish or Norwegian, Hungarian, and like some others in this thread I would like to learn an African language, to open myself to more of African culture and life. Not sure which language yet though.
Also sometimes improving my English props up on my radar, but I can't seem to find motivation to work at it. I use it passively mostly.

miertje on 10 November 2013

I'll throw my lot in:

Norwegian: As my 'hit list' entry on my profile reads, "I think I'm in love".
This will very likely be the next language I study from scratch. The tonal system makes
it sound incredible. For the moment though German serves to satisfy my wanderlust in
the Germanic family.

Spanish: The sheer amount of native speakers as well as the travel opportunities
it opens up make this one a must for me, but when?!

Welsh: I started studying this during the summer but left it to one side fairly
quickly in favor of more time with German. 'Twould be a shame not to learn the
neighbours' language!

Polish: A huge population of Poles reside in Ireland. They're lovely people, as
is their language.

Old Irish: Given that I have Irish under my belt and am currently working on her
sister Gaelic, it's only a matter of time before I investigate their mother! It would
be great to be able to read Lebor Gabála Érenn in the original language.

Icelandic: A beautiful country, a beautiful language. Very ancient sounding.
Added bonus of being able to read Old Norse Sagas (or so I'm told).

Hmmm...it's times like these that I'm grateful I don't have much money or I'd likely
plunder amazon for resources for ALL the above! Right, best go and study some French
and German, Liam. One step at a time and all that!

liammcg on 10 November 2013

Spanish
-because it's a world language and a funny one at that

Mandarin
-because it's a world language and I'd gladly trade agglutination with analytic for a while

Hungarian
-because it's so cool and a related language to my native one, cases booyah

Turkish
-because hell yeah, agglutination!

Dutch, Faroese, Afrikaans, Danish, all that good stuff.

I'll have to recheck my radar in about ten years or something but as of now these will do.
Henkkles on 10 November 2013

I just want to be able to read all languages in Europe (including the dead ones) and to be able to understand, write and speak as many as possible of them - plus a couple of exotic languages. I want to keep my wishes simple and realistic...

Right now I only have plans concerning a couple of old languages within the Germanic family (Old English, Old Saxon, Old Hight German and Gothic), and within the(pre)Romance family I just want to become better at Latin - the other Italic languages are too poorly documented to catch my interest, and I can't see any compelling reason to learn to speak Aromanian or any of the Romantsch languages.

Within the Hellenic languages I definitely have a project in mind concerning the row of Ancient Greeks (from Homeric over Attic Greek to Koiné), but only passively. Albanian is scheduled and I already have collected some relevant books. Within the Slavic languages I'm lagging behind schedule with spoken Russian, but I should be able to learn to read and write a few Slavic languages within the next couple of years - and maybe even learn to speak them, because I can actually get programs in Polish and several Southern Slavic languages from my cable TV provider, unlike Russian - it is just a money question (and I hate the thought that I should pay for something which is free on Astra).

I have no specific plans concerning the Baltic languages (Latvian and Lithuan), but they are waiting silently within the circle where I pick my upcoming projects - maybe a quick peek sometime in the future.

The problem with Hungarian and Finnish is just to choose which one to study first - but I doubt that it will happen i 2014. Estonian would also be fun, but not the small Ugrian languages. And then there is the weird loner Basque, where I already have collected some relevant study materials - but just not the time to study them.

Outside Europe I have my radar set on Bahasa Melayu and maybe also Tagalog, and then I have had a penchant for Georgian since my visits there - for some reason Armenian doesn't attract my to the same degree. But I haven't got time to learn any of these right now. And the rest of the 6-7000 languages in the world might be interesting to know at a theoretical level, but I doubt that I ever will find time to learn any of them. Except maybe...
Iversen on 10 November 2013

I'd love to know the major Middle Eastern languages:

Hebrew (modern)
Arabic (Levantine, specifically)
Persian/Farsi
Turkish

Most people don't realize what an *amazing* place the Middle East is. Having lived there
a couple years, I miss it a lot. The best food. Nice people. To conquer the languages of
this region would be my dream.
AML on 11 November 2013

I've at least touched on every language I ever plan on learning, except for maybe the older versions of them. My complete list would be:

German, Icelandic, Irish, Hungarian, Old English, Old Icelandic/Old Norse, Old Irish.

I guess there are a couple I may take a look at in the somewhat distant future, like maybe another more common North Germanic language such as Norwegian or Swedish. I also "borrowed" an older Teach Yourself Serbo-Croat book from my paternal grandmother (her father's parents were from Montenegro) but haven't really looked at it at all. Overall though, I'm not as interested in languages in general as many people on here seem to be, only in these particular languages.

Of course there's no telling how different that list will be in five or ten years...
Largactyl on 11 November 2013

Apart from all the obvious ones, the most non-useful languages I hope to one day have time to dabble in are Occitan, Catalan and Piedmontese. Yes, when I'm old and my brain is defunct, I could retire to the Mediterranean and blissfully sunbathe while confusing romance vocabularies for my last decade.
chokofingrz on 11 November 2013

Since I'm able to remember, I always wanted to speak eight specific languages, namely:
Spanish, English, German, French, Catalan, Italian, Russian and Portuguese. However in
time it has been made clear that I couldn't stick with just these ones. I intend to start
with Dutch/Norwegian/Swedish next year, and I suppose if my life keeps changing I will
continue to add new languages to the list.
This is all probably because I see languages as my love for a country and I'm not the
kind of person that loves only one thing/person.
That said, I see myself falling in love with any European language, especially the
Romance and Germanic ones.
oziohume on 11 November 2013

I will be retiring and moving to Spain soon though I've been telling myself this since 2007 (but in 2007 the destination was Italy)!

Somewhat like Iversen I'd like to be able to hold day to day conversations in all the languages of Europe (B1 or higher say): officially the EU use Bulgarian, Croatian, Czech, Danish, Dutch, English, Estonian, Finnish, French, German, Greek, Hungarian, Irish, Italian, Latvian, Lithuanian, Maltese, Polish, Portuguese, Romanian, Slovak, Slovene, Spanish and Swedish plus I'd like to add Arabic & Russian
maydayayday on 11 November 2013

Serpent wrote:

As for my list...

Napoletan if you consider it a separate language

I'd love to hear that. Can't think anything weirdest than a russian speaking "napoletan"

:D
Donaldshimoda on 12 November 2013

Asking a bunch of language learners what is on their hit list...this thread may go on forever.
newyorkeric on 12 November 2013

Iversen wrote:

Ah, I wonder what it is like to be Iversen instead of being a mere mortal slogging through a language or two...
newyorkeric on 12 November 2013

Step no. 1: decide with yourself that it is possible.

Step no. 2: begin somewhere (instead of just wondering)

Step no. 3: goto step 2

Iversen on 12 November 2013

Step no. 4: if all else fails, try selective cloning of your favourite polyglot(s)
Mooby on 12 November 2013

These are the languages that I would very much like to add to the ones I already know or are currently studying, if ever I got the time:

Armenian: I became interested in this language when I had a four-day job trip to Armenia a few years ago. It appears to be quite "alien" although a Indo-European language, and its unique alphabet holds a fascination in itself, like a code waiting to be cracked.

Croatian/Serbian: Doing Russian has given me a taste for Slavic languages, and having been several times to the Balkans this is the Slavic language that I would like to embark upon first when I have a decent level in Russian.

Arabic: I learnt the alphabet and did a few lessons from an old Linguaphone course many years ago, but I have forgotten almost everything. Arabic culture interests me.

Hebrew: As with Arabic, I learnt the alphabet and some basic sentences at one point, but very little sticks, although I can still recognise some letters.

Romanian: I did study some Romanian at university, but then dropped it, so while I still can understand some, it is at a very low level. Romanian interests me since it is a Romance language but with many particularities that are unique to it.

Finnish: I consider the Finnish to be culturally close to its Nordic neighbours, but the language is definitely not close. I like how Finnish sounds, and its grammatical intricacies would be an interesting challenge to take up.

Japanese: This is the only East Asian language I would seriously consider learning, as Japan is the Asian country that has the strongest appeal to me with regard to its history and culture.

Hindi: My three-week trip to Rajasthan about ten years ago was one of the most fascinating and interesting experiences in my life. I'd love to return being able to speak with people there in their native tongue.

Ogrim on 12 November 2013

Given what's just happened in the Philippines and the fact i'm a trained teacher, I would like to be able to speak to a child in Tagalog and comfort them in
the professional teacher manner - listening to them and being helpful.
languagenerd09 on 13 November 2013

languagenerd09 wrote:

I don't know if Tagalog would help you much. Tagalog is only useful in certain areas of the Philippines. The epicenter of the destruction was on the island of Visayas, where the main language used is one of the Visayan languages, like Waray-Waray or Cebuano. Still, http://www.unicefusa.org/ - UNICEF , and the http://www.redcross.org/ - Red Cross need donations. Even a little help can go a long way (sorry if this is off topic, I just want to encourage people to help with this tragedy.)
leroc on 13 November 2013

Turkish: For travel and because I'm interested in the culture and language.

Hungarian: Travel.

Cantonese: Because it's awesome and I'd love to be able to understand Wong Kar-Wai
movies (and many others) without subs.

Tamil or Malayalam: So I can go to southernmost India and not have to stick to English.

Portuguese: I'd like to go to Brazil someday.

Spanish: Plenty of speakers and travel opportunities.

This list is a bit more realistic as it doesn't include all of my curiosities and
languages I'd possibly dabble with.
Tenebrarum on 13 November 2013

I thought of a few responses to Solfrid Cristina's original question about what languages are on my radar.

My first response was "Ummm.... All of them, of course!"

Well, if I answer seriously I would need to mention I am considering changing my major from psychology to philosophy (don't ask why, it will take too long to explain) and therefore the languages I may learn in the future might look something like the following list

Group I: Most Practical languages. I use the word practical based on availability of resources for learning using English as a base.

French and German - I'm only lumping these lanuages together because my sudden interest in philosophy has made me want to read books by Kant, Rousseau, Nietzsche, Descartes etc. and I don't trust the English translations. I really like how French sounds, I already know some Spanish and Italian and I believe my main concern at start would be pronunciation. I like to think I can read French, but I really understand very little of what I try to read.

I have learned a bit of Afrikaans and Swedish and dabbled with Dutch but virtually ignored German. Isn't that weird? I have tried to read German too, but I usually have stop after a few paragraphs bacause I have very limited vocabulary knowledge and no experience with German spelling so I'm sure I miss many cognates that would otherwise be quite obvious.

Mandarin - I don't know any words in this language but I love how it sounds and it's fun to practice pronouncing tonal languages. I'm left-handed so I don't know if I'd ever be able to draw Chinese characters properly but maybe I'd like to try this sometime.

Portuguese - I recognize a few words from Spanish, it sounds like a combination of French and Spanish when spoken and I love the Romance languages.

Russian - I used to be freaked out about learning to read Cyrillic, but it doesn't look that hard. I know nothing about Russian vocabulary, spelling rules or grammar.

I've mostly chosen to learn languages that are somewhat on the margins of language learning (I'll be honest, most people only learn Afrikaans or Finnish because they are living with a native speaker or have immigrated to South Africa or Finland respectively) and this means that once I get past the absolute beginner stage of learning I have to spend a lot of time searching for resources I can use and I sometimes have to accept whatever I can find. This will not be a problem with these languages and it would be a nice change to be able to choose from a wide variety of resources.

Group II: Less practical languages. Using the basically the same criteria as for the first group.

Irish - This one really should be on my hit list, I don't know why I haven't added it yet. My family background is partly Celtic and the few times I've heard this language spoken I feel drawn to it.

Georgian - This is, or was, a cult language on this forum a few years ago. I already have a few books and other resources for learning it. Maybe this one will be next instead of Portuguese.

Czech and/or Slovak - If I'm too lazy to seriously learn to read Cyrillic, these will be the next Slavonic languages I learn. Yes, I really am planning to eventually learn both languages.

Danish and Norwegian - I try reading Danish and Norwegian every once in a while. I notice a few places where I think they differ from Swedish but the most noticable differences for me are pronunciation of Danish the use of the supine form in Swedish. I'm unsure if I will ever learn both, but I can't choose between them either.

Sanskrit, Tamil, Marathi and other languages of India - Why not, there's loads of literature in these languages.
mick33 on 13 November 2013

Quechua: The largest indigenous language of the New World but under great stress. This is actually not on my radar screen anymore because the craft has now landed. My roommate speaks and teaches Quechua (see the New York Quechua Initiative--the website can be found by Google) and when a language turns up at your doorstep (or you turn up at its doorstep!), what can you do but learn it? Just started.

Manx Gaelic: I have a new-found appreciation of what they are doing with the language. The Manx-medium primary school on the island seems to be a first-class operation, for example. (There's a YouTube video about it.) Not as easy to learn for someone who knows Irish as it might seem. Every language has to be learned in its own right.

Occitan: As you can see from Manx, one approach I have is expanding from languages I know to closely related ones. From Spanish, I have already explored Portuguese and am learning Catalan regularly (I love it). My interest was also piqued by an extended-family link to the Val d'Aran in Spain. It has been very hard to find Occitan materials, other than Assimil and Wikipedia, and for the Aranese dialect I've found only one YouTube video (at the Wikitongues channel).

As for other languages, I don't know. I notice that Catalan, Basque, Kazakh and Esperanto are doing well on Wikipedia. I always wanted to learn Mongolian and Uzbek. I've participated in editing the style and English portions of textbooks or dictionnaries for learning Yoruba, Shona, Turkish and Mongolian. Each was a lost opportunity because, after going through each book several times, lots of vocabulary and grammar were starting to stick. Javanese may be the least learned language for its size. I keep eying Norwegian, Danish and Swedish.
JoeMcC on 13 November 2013

The easy answer would of course be "nearly every possible language", because there is something fascinating about them all. I think if I was given the chance to study any language, I would be interested even if I had not thought of putting it on my radar before.

But... let's see which ones come to mind automatically:

Italian: Probably the first that comes to mind nowadays, as it's the mother tongue of a friend who's currently learning Norwegian and would probably love to be a language exchange partner if I can actually... you know, get properly started with learning?

Estonian: I bought a book for this before my first trip to Tallinn many years ago. Sometimes I read in it for fun, but I've never actually made any serious attempt at learning it.

Turkish: Was perhaps more relevant to my interests a little while ago, when I was hoping to get into Turkish football a bit more. Still interesting due to the fact that I have some beautiful music in it and because I find it a fun language to listen to. Oh, and can you already tell that I'd like to make a serious attempt with a non-indoeuropean language at some point?

Japanese: A country and culture that has always somewhat interested me, and therefore also a language that is fascinating.

Basque: Just earlier today I was looking at Basque learning materials online and considering buying something as an early Christmas present for myself. I guess that must count as having the language on the radar to some extent, at least?

Ukrainian: Like Turkish, this is less relevant to my interests now than before. However, I bought a book for it years ago, so of course the language still counts as interesting.

Hebrew: The alphabet is just so endlessly cool. Also, some of my favorite music is in this language and I love how it sounds. So far, the only thing I can do is sing along to some of my favorite songs, though... one day I'd like to learn more than that.

Irish: I travelled to Ireland for the first time earlier this year, and of course I exploded in joy when I found a bunch of language-learning materials in a bookstore. So far I've only looked at them for fun, though.
Zimena on 14 November 2013

The greatest thorn in my side is undoubtedly Ancient Greek. See, it says here on my HTLAL profile that I do 'speak it', but I never ever 'speak' Ancient Greek. Yes, I've read the Iliad, the Odyssey and countless philosophical works (I should change my username to plato_roar), written texts and had them corrected, done many textbooks and grammar exercises, but I still wouldn't be confident in speaking it if, say, some ancient Greek time-travelled and wanted to have lunch with me.

Languages I swear I'm going to improve:

1) Russian. This is going very well so far. I'm being motivated mostly out of spite because one of my ex-boyfriends told me I'd never get it up to native standard and then attempted to say something insulting in Russian. Well, Я чуть не умер со смеху, услышав это. Я решил рискнуть и принял его вызов. Anyway, I have the New Penguin, FSI, Ruslan, a few Dima Bilan albums (don't judge, he's hot) and now I am taking advantage of a Lingualift free trial!

2) Latin. This is...not going so well. I have Cambridge Latin, Wheelock, and some other one which I haven't even started with. I have a Latin reader as well, and lots of poetry, mostly satirical in nature. It interests me, but for some reason I just can't move forward. Maybe it's the kind of material I'm using, maybe it's the lack of audio material, or maybe Latin is just dry. I can write paragraphs which are mostly correct, read anything, but it's just not being enjoyable.

3) Arabic. I can't find any good material for this. Can someone recommend something free which isn't FSI or some online course which relies too heavily on stock phrases and translation? I am really interested in the culture for this but the writing system is just killing me!

4) Hungarian. After watching Szomoru Vasarnap (accents omitted), I have become hooked to the beauty of the language. Seriously, if this scene doesn't make you want to learn Hungarian, I don't know what will.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jOqiolytFw4

Something is so delicate and yet firm and unyielding about the language that makes it sound so classical and yet so trendy. I especially love the words that end with 'ot', because they melt like candy on the tongue. Hungarian is cloying in a good way. Simply beautiful.

5) Afrikaans. Not really something I'm interested in, just that I got the Teach Yourself in a pub which I was totally not supposed to be in and I shut the owner up by buying his second-hand books. Well, I'm not complaining...

Still looking for penpals by the way, if anyone is interested in the above languages or any of the others I speak, PM me.
catullus_roar on 15 November 2013