/lit/ - Literature

I'm learning German

bout a year into studying japanese, about 800 kanji down

>>4551944
Nice. What is your technique? I'm trying to learn Kanji.

>>4551985
learn the Kanji*

>>4551985
I use anki and do kanjidamage and core2k vocab concurrently.

Currently learning Swedish

German and French

If anyone knows good books or videos about it please let me know, it would help me a lot

I've been learning Norwegian for about 3 months now. I'm okay, some of the grammar is still a little too esoteric for me to fully grasp but I can read news simple articles and stuff like that. Most of the time I have to look up the meaning of a few words and then I add them to my flashcard deck so I'm slowly increasing my vocab that way along with using Memrise. I'm not learning it because I want to read but rather because I find the language beautiful. Swedish is too sing songy and Danish sounds like dildos but Norwegian is a pretty great middle ground.

I want to pick up another language though, maybe Chinese or Afrikaans, but I don't want to mess up my knowledge of Norwegian.

My mother tongue is Japanese and I'm learning or lernt English, Korean and Chinese.

I'm learning Latin. After that I might learn French. Or anything else.

>>4552004
>Memrise.

OP here, this is what I'm using for Mandarin.

My first day of learning Spanish yesterday.

Can't roll Rs bro.

>>4552012
Yeah memrise is pretty great. The only problem I have with it is when people don't add correct exceptions. Like with Norwegian you can say "Det er vinen til Jan" and "Det er Jan sin vin" which both mean "It's Jan's wine" but Memrise only accepts one of those two.

>>4552022

It's possible to add them yourself though isn't it?

>>4551938
>mfw parents where teaching me 3 (english, french, 4 years ago father started teaching me latin i quit it though) non - native languages since kindergarten
>mfw i speak 2 of them fluently which makes me trilingual
>mfw i dont have face

>>4552032
>i speak 2 of them fluently which makes me trilingual

good thing you're good with languages because your math is horrible

>>4552030
Not unless you created the course as far as I know.

>>4552034
>teaching me 3 non-native languages
>i speak 2 of them fluently
It's a shame you can't into reading comprehension.

>>4552032

It's French and Latin you're fluent in, right?

This is a language learning thread, not a brag thread.

If you have to pat yourself on the back after a couple days of studying a language, you're probably not going to learn that language.

I speak Spanish, Portuguese, Italian and can read french due to the lexical similarities.

>>4552036

edite merdam

>>4552037
I am not fluent in latin because i have said that i quit it. I am not bragging, I'm just happy that i had caring parents who opened a lot of gates for me. faggot

>>4551938
Slowly learning Te Reo.

>>4552052

Actually, it would be es merdam or ede merdam

>real latin fag here

>>4551938

Well that was almost a good thread for a while there OP.

>>4551991
How long do you study each day? Did you have to reduce the amount of time of an activity you enjoy, e.g. reading, to study the Kanji?

>>4552058

I know Latin and I would like to teach my kids when I have them. How did he teach you, how did he approach the difficult sections of grammar? What age was you?

I am really interested in this anon. What techniques did you enjoy/dislike?

I'm currently learning Akkadian. I just started reading the Codex Hammurabi, but I can't wait until I can begin reading poetry.

Is Dualingo a good app?

>>4552089
NO! I took a German course on there but it turned out to be French, they didn't title the course correctly. I went to Germany and looked like a real idiot talking to everybody in French

Is there any gadget come in handy to learn foreign language ?

>>4552134

Memrise.com

sup guys do any of you know any norwegian dictionaries w/ ipa transcription?

>>4552058
>tfw your parents never had an interest in you
>in fact, they opposed all of your interests
>never forced anything upon me, but also never let me do anything I wanted to do
>tfw now that I can do whatever I want, I do nothing because I don't know how to do things
jelly fag here, I wish my parents either made or let me do things like learn a language. They were actually opposed to me even taking a language class at all. Then we had a trip to france, and they wouldn't let me go even though I could pay for it myself

>>4552141
http://no.thefreedictionary.com/ is what I use. But honestly, unlike English, Norwegian pronunciation is pretty easy if you just learn the alphabet. Everything is spelled the way it sounds.

>>4551938
Spanish and Portuguese. I can get by in Spanish, brokenly. Still wrapping my brain around portugues

I've been learning Mandarin for years, not exactly efficiently, though. I know a few thousand characters, but I don't think I'm quite at the point where I can read most literature, though I have read some poetry, with the aid of dictionaries. I'm going to China in a couple of weeks to do some intense language study, so hopefully that helps me out.

>>4552163
nice thanks man
i'm only familiar with french + english so orthography:pronunciation making sense will be interesting

>>4552138
Has anyone else tried this?.
How was it?, effective or better keep it up with the books?.

>>4552304
It's good for learning voab but not so much grammar. I used and still use it to learn new words in Norwegian and while I did pick up some grammar from noticing patterns I still ended up buying a book so I could learn grammar. But it's free so just give it a shot.

German, Japanese, Italian
I want to be fluent in Axis powers.

>>4552355
We /pol/ now.

>>4552014
just click the tip of your tounge against the tip of your mouth for a single r and keep doing it for rolling

>>4551938
Working through "Lingua Latina Per Se Illustrata" and loving it! I used to be big into Latin in high-school, even reading most of the Aeneid in the original. Sadly that was five years ago, and I became quite rusty at Latin.

By the way, if anyone wants to learn Latin, this website has a great method for doing so:
http://www.rci.rutgers.edu/~wcd/Latin.htm

Once I am finished with Per Se Illustrate I would love to move on to Greek and Sanskrit. Would love recommendations for those languages.

>>4552080
see
>>4552552

>>4552552
Check out the "Thrasymachus" books for something like "Per Se Illustrata" for Greek.

I know nothing about Sanskrit, I'm sorry.

>>4552556

This is no help to me since I already know Latin

Boku wa FORMER benkyou ga nihongo desu

I don't know how to say I 'used to' do something. I guess in Japanese it would be replacing desu (it is) with something, to get (it was), right?

I dunno why I put former there.

Whatever.

I want to learn French, because I really admire the simplicity and concentration of their post-renaissance style. It would also be useful in real life, I suppose, and also give me access to some obscure medieval fantasies about rose gardens and whatnot.

I want to learn Latin, but I'm not altogether sure why. Tacitus is worth reading. Maybe some of the imperial sophisticates. On the whole I feel like the language doesn't deserve the central position it has in Western Europe, but the fact remains that it has been the main route of transmission for Greek culture, and it would be a hell of a lot easier to learn than Greek due to the familiar vocal roots.

Greek is without question worth learning, but I don't know most of the roots and I can't say it would help me with modern languages the way latin would. I could easily learn Latin in conjunction with French, after all, so I'm conflicted: go with the easy classical language and French, or focus on French and Greek separately? Even then, I feel uneasy leaving Latin untouched, and yet I can't overburden myself.

Chinese and Japanese: I'm not conflicted about these. I'll learn just enough to translate some of the choicer short poems (Shijing etc) for my own delectation - long romances were never my thing. Don't much care about being able to pronounce mandarin, so I could always do it in conjuction with my japanese studies, using the japanese pronunciations. I have a good eye for the characters.

>>4551993
May I ask why? And what is your native language ?

Learning French.

>>4553537
"Used to "="izen wa ... Shite imashita"
I used to learn Japanese= izen Nihongo wo benkyou shite imashita.

Started learning Russian last week. Using Nicholas J. Brown's Penguin guide as a help, and I'm also getting a lot of help from a girl from Moscow on Skype. Learnt the alphabet in one evening and now learning some useful words, and practicing reading words.

>>4553558
>also getting a lot of help from a girl from Moscow on Skype
Дай ей Декарта.

>>4553562
Kek'd pretty hard.

Yeah, I like her a lot actually. She's the reason I began in the first place (also because I want to read Russian lit of course, which is my primay motivation). She travels a lot and so we will probably meet in Paris. Don't think she's interested in any D from me though.

>>4553547
>francophone classics major here

it's very unlikely you'll ever be able to read tacitus with fluency if you're teaching yourself latin. he has an incredibly succinct style, which is hard to render into any modern language i know of. in any case, at my uni, tacitus classes are for years 3 or 4-- i.e. for people with 4 to 8 years of Latin under their belt.
my recommendation, once you've got the basic grammar & vocab down, is to start read reading: seneca for prose (letters to lucilius); he has a very direct style that is easy for french- and english-speakers to understand; and in poetry, horace & catullus, simply because their poems are short & sweet and will give you access to the topoi of latin poetry.
afterwards you can move on to historians (caesar, livy, suetonius, sallust, tacitus--- in that order, imo), philosophy (cicero, more seneca, lucretius... maybe even augustine eventually), more complex poets (ovid, virgil, tibullus, propertius--- again in roughly that order (Propertius is very difficult)).

Of course, reading golden-age latin poetry can feel overly-antiquarian sometimes, so if you're looking for an enjoyable story and simple style, Terence and Apuleius are by far your best friends.

>>4553614
Thank you. The order of reading suggestions look like they'll be particularly helpful.

>>4553558
I'm trying to learn from that downloadable harvard course without answer sheets. Haven't done anything for a good month now though, any general tips from Ms Moscow?

For everybody learning French.

http://www.learnfrenchbypodcast.com

I like it a lot and they have different level and it's all very good. They say that you need to pay credits but you can just download everything for free but some work sheets.

>>4553635

Nothing beyond what you'll usually hear: practice everything, a lot, and consistently. I'd recommend signing up for some language learning site and try to find someone to help you. She doesn't give me any tips per se but her help is invaluable.

>>4551938
Improving English and learning Swedish.

>>4553798
Why are you learning Swedish, this is the second person and I can't understand why.

I'm in a mood for learning a new language..
Portuguese is my native, but i'm fluent in Spanish and English
What's next /lit/?

i speak german, english and some basic spanish. signed up for some mandarin classes, will start in march.

>>4552050
>If you have to pat yourself on the back
>Brags about knowing three languages from the same language branch

>>4552552
Fuck yeah, that shit is awesome. Really helpful. I laughed a lot in the chapter of the slaves stealing the coins.

Hello my first langage is not english and i need a little bit help please.
In the song "Express Yourself" from Chrales Wright, there is a verse that goes like this:

"It's not what you look like, when you're doin' what you're doin'
It's what you're doin' when you're doin' what you look like you're doin'!"

I d'ont understand it, can somebody explain please?
Thank you!

>>4553815
Basically, I like how it sounds.
And I noticed that I love in particular the accent of the south, Scania.

It's a bit tonal, which has some charm (to me), and I also like the scandinavian history.
btw, If you know one of the 3 scandinavian languages -Swedish, Norwegian, Danish- you can understand the other two.

>>4553940
European languages? Asian?

>>4553975
Supposedly speakers of Norwegian find it easier to understand speakers of the other two better than the inverse.

>>4554016
what?

>>4554019
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Germanic#Mutual_intelligibility

>The mutual intelligibility between the Continental Scandinavian languages is asymmetrical. Various studies have shown Norwegian-speakers to be the best in Scandinavia at understanding other languages within the language group.

>>4553975
Well I'm Swedish, but the accent of southern Sweden ( Scania ) is disliked by most people because of how it sounds. Personally I say that the nicer accents are Varmländska and some from northern Sweden.

It's not like you will automatically know Norwegian and Danish but you might understand a little or a lot. And it won't be very hard to learn them if you try.

Not trying to talk you out of studying what you want. But I personally just wished I had grown up with another language because it's just a waste to know such a small language.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R1nPM7GrX9g Accent

Am I the only one that finds Scandinavian languages so similar to english that it's like not learning a language at all? It's almost like all I'm doing is learning a very thick Wisconsin accent and a few weird letters.

>>4554081
Could you post some examples of this very thick Wisconsin accent? As a Scandinavian I'm curious how that would sound to us.

>>4554050
Norrland here. Skellefteå.

Stockholm resident nowadays, though.

True about Scanian; sure, they have diphtongs, and I would guess English speakers would appreciate that, but they have a very... Controversial status when it comes to the rest of the country

>>4554094
It's also Minnesoda, both areas have a large historically Swedish population.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OymMl734Ews

>>4554016
I know, but I don't like Norwegian as much as Swedish.

>>4554050
Yeah, I've been told that. A guy from Scania told me that people from the capital 'moaned' a lot when talking. I haven't heard Varmalädska, I'll try to find some.

I know, I didn't mean you'll know the others, but they'd be easier to understand than for example, Spanish and Italian.

>>4554113
>Controversial status
Why?

I've been trying to learn french for like 4-5 months now. It is growing into a passion.
I can start understanding a few words in every sentence when watching a French film (btw Im a huge fan of french cinema)

My language bucketlist is the following

French
Latin
German
Mandarin

and maybe fully learn Bengali so I can read Bengali literature (I'm originated from Bangladesh so yeah, my Bengali however is extremely poor)

Language learning is pretty great, I can feel my brain getting a lot more stronger when it comes to memorising as well.

And french girls are pretty

>>4554081
English has been heavily influenced by medieval Scandinavian languages because of Vikings, but what you're saying is as wrong as a Swede when they want to learn German because the languages are so similar.

The grammar between (I'm Swede, so let's go with that) Swedish and English is actually quite different, with some of the Swedish rules still being intellectually defined, as the grammar is based more on cognitive cues than an apparent system. This makes fluent Swedish one of the most difficult western languages to master - a foreigner basically needs to learn every word's grammar individually.

>>4554118
This. Lakes, snow, lilting accents, obsession with weird fish and cheese, nice people who give no fucks; it's Scandinavia without the passport.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p9ZUDShDHtw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EF1V8HFfpTE
If it weren't for the subtitles in the second one, I would have thought it was the great lakes region.

>>4551940
me too

>>4554125
Because their accent is quite reminiscent of Danish, so while the rest of the Swedish dialects, despite HUGE regional differences in intonation, still follow a pretty predictable line (Stockholm accent is plain, a little highborn; Värmländska is cute, 'farmery' and reminds a little of Norwegian; the Norrland (northland) accents, my own, are rather harsh and monotonous in comparison to the others, has some contact with finnish etc), the Scania is quite different, with heavy use of throaty 'r'-sounds, diphtongs, and not really using their tongue for much else than moving the vowels around; they stand out like a sore thumb in that respect, and well, it annoys a lot of people, basically.

Also, "fuck Denmark" is the quiet sentiment of many Swedes; either honestly or as a joke, in the same way that the Danes view us as a bunch of rules-crazy wimps, we view them as 'continentals' - apart from the cold, hard, north, and with all the implications of The Continent you could imagine from a Swede expressing it that way.

Then again I know that Scandinavia would rather stand with Scandinavia than anyone else, so most Swedes would take a Dane before a Frenchman any day of the week.
>>4554118
I just realized that "dontchaknow" is basically the Swedish "vettu" - "vet du?"; not as popular nowadays.

>>4554164
He's actually VERY Scandinavian; I see your point, haha.

Me being from Norrland means that for us, well, most of Scandinavia is Down South, aswell.

>>4554191
These people put the Eddas in perspective and I accept it all as fact because of it.

Ice giants?
>Yes, we killed them. The winter is long and boring.
Sailing the Atlantic in a rowboat?
>There were no more ice giants.
How do you live in such an inhospitable place?
>Lagom är bäst

So I'm learning French and listing and speaking is going fairly well. But I rarely read because I don't have anything to read or any idea where I should start.

Any good books hardcore or e-book suggestions?
Can be for students or just some children book ( real simple ). So if anybody could share I'd be very happy.

>>4554354
Camus will be somewhat easy to read while still being "patrician". I took 3 years of french in highschool only, it's now 6 years later and I was able to open "Les Justes" to a random page and understand a lot of the writing.

Dumas will be a much more difficult read, language wise, but still be entertaining

>>4551938
A question I have: Would people from Taiwan understand me if I knew Mandarin?
And if yes, how would you recommend I started?

>>4552552

Thanks for this

I'm studying Japanese. I've been studying it for about 7 years, but on my own and/or never too seriously, and only now I'm doing it properly.

I also just started learning Indonesian, which is quite simple in the grand scheme of things.

My problem is that I'm currently living in Germany, and although I studied German for a couple of years in Uni, I forgot almost all of it and now I'm too lazy to relearn it —especially since I'll only be here till may. Also I feel that the more time I spend studying German, the less time I'll have for Japanese/Indonesian. Thoughts..?

>>4554176
I see, it's interesting, thanks anon.

>>4553971
I probably will not articulate this very well, but roughly:
Whatever you appear to be doing when you are doing something is less important than the actual action itself.
Meaning that actions speak louder than words or appearances

>>4552082
mah nigga. Are you studying at uni?

>>4551998
German and French too, and requesting the same.

>>4554564
What do you prefer to study?
Though I think if you're living in Germany I think it'd be better to improve German

>>4552180
What are your problems with Portuguese?

>>4554809
If you're interested you may take a look to the videos of 'Reflets' for French and Hauptstraße 117. My teachers used both in their classes.

>>4554564
>>4554832
Yeah living in the country could be a great chance to improve your language skills, although I guess it won't help you much if you don't really have much interest in studying it.

>>4554832
I prefer Japanese, obviously. But I feel it's a waste not to make the most out of my stay in Germany, while at the same time I feel it'd go nowhere since I'll only be here three months more...so I'm conflicted.

>>4554531
>Would people from Taiwan understand me if I knew Mandarin?
Yes, at least in the north. More difficult in the south but I imagine you could do alright.

>how would you recommend I started?
Get your ass to China. Start using the Chinesepod website.

>>4552149
If you want me to make you feel better, aside from teaching me all the cool stuff my mum was schizophrenic psycho and dad suffered from alcoholism

>>4552077
I've never gone over 2 hours before, but I average around 80 minutes. It's cut into reading a bit.

My French is decent enough. I'm reading this one, albeit at a snail's pace. On the side I'm trying my hand at translating shit, which is tricky, but interesting.

I also started Russian recently and it's cool as hell.

>>4554937
German and English are cousins, it won't be that un-worthwhile anon

What resources are out there for learning Russian? I have a friend in Moscow who says he could easily swing me a job as long as I got conversational in it but I can't seem to find anything for it like I can for other languages.

>>4555181

I mean online, BTW.

>>4554937
If you can go hardcore do both. Study and improve German and then as a reward, Japanese lessons.
That way you'd do both with 50-50 approx and still be motivated

>>4554805
Self-taught at the moment, but I'll be taking a class in it next year.

I'm currently choosing between learning French and Russian. I'd like to go to the appropriate country to learn the language, but I'm having a hard time deciding - which is the greater literary language? I speak Swedish (native language), English and German, if it matters.

>>4555184
There's a set of Princeton course materials that are supposed to be quite good (no link I'm afraid)

>>4552050

You know, studying a language is a very gradual and probably difficult process for most people, and trying to maintain some sort of positivity from get-go is just smart. 'Patting yourself on the back' is just a way to make the process easier and more fun.

You sound like a complete ass, and also this >>4553961.
Fucking dumbass.

>>4554906
I'm pretty used to Spanish and how it works and is pronounced. Portuguese is just so close, yet so different that it gets a bit confusing. That and the pronunciation of things.

>>4556748
My first thought would be to go for Russian, just because I can't stand French.
But both will be enjoyable.
What's your prefered type of books?

>>4557011
Strindberg points me towards Naturalism, and therefore French. Gorkij points me towards Realism, and therefore Russian. I also like Kafka, and what little of Gogol I have read. I guess my taste could be summarized as Romantic poetry, Realist and Naturalist prose.

I'm somewhat surprised by the quantity of french learners in the thread. Being french, I think it's pretty cool other people actually take an interest in this culture outside of french universities.
I've been doing some research and plan on starting german (anki, duolinguo, memrise, podcasts and literature/audiobooks) before this summer.

Since I have a little bit of time on my hands, perhaps I can help a few motivated anons. I can advise on literature/basic penpaling/accent.
I guess the only thing I need in exchange would be some basic conversation, my english oral skills are getting less and less practice these days. Since /lit/ is pretty much the only board I support, fuck it, my skype is:
ericfinest1

I'm learning German and am semi-fluent.
Anyone wants to exchange emails in German every few days? I can talk about stuff loike books and philosophy. Also I like physical training and am somewhat /fit/ (if it means anything).
Fakemail in the email spot

>>4553963
Aww fucking spoilers dude, I hadn't found out what happened to the nummi centum yet.

>>4556748

French will be infinitely easier for you.

>>4557510
That and russians have no media to consume in the interim between being retarded and having fluency with dense literature and philosophy. Trashy comics and movies full of smoking and titties are about the only thing that makes the process bearable.

Learning Danish in Denmark.

Hvorfor kan vi ikke være venner, Norge og Sverige? ;-;

>>4557562
För att ni låter såhär för oss.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L_3qD5j_lUQ&t=5m21s

>>4557593
M-Men, jeg elsker jer.

>>4557604
Vad tycker du är enklast? Läsa svenska eller höra?

Läsa Danska tycker jag ofta funkar bra men har större problem när ni pratar.

>>4557368
Nice initiative.
finding people ready to maintain a proper correspondence can sometimes be difficult.

I'm learning German. I want to learn as many Germanic languages as I can so that I can substitute words of Germanic origin for French and Latin loan words. My goal is to speak a purely Germanic form of English at some point in the future.

>>4552149
>tfw my dad would read shakespeare to me as a child and encouraged me to learn several languages but never taught me to shave or tie my shoes or anything like that

Still better though. Neglectful intelectual father figures are the best father figures.

>>4557679
Much like not using chinese loanwords in japanese, you sound rustic and uncultured as fuck, but then I'm trying the same thing.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anglish

>>4557679

>My goal is to speak a purely Germanic form of English at some point in the future.

then why not speak german, you illiterate swine.

>>4552149
I feel you man.. I feel you hard.
Nothing was ever expected of me. I truly feel worthless. No artistic talents, no scientific mind, no business aspirations.

>>4557510
Well yeah, but I don't mind working hard when it comes to learning languages. I do, however, have great respect for the difficulties of learning Russian.

>>4557523
What about living in Petersburg or Moscow and hanging out with Russians?

>>4557562
Vi är vänner. Bara bondlurkar säger annat.

>>4557632
Om du använder versal annat än i början av en mening eller ett egennamn är jag tvungen att be dig att aldrig mer använda en dator.

>>4552149
>it's all mommy and daddy's fault wahh!!!

you act like you never went to school, aka the place where people literally instruct you on how to teach yourself new concepts. they also exposed you to different fields you could teach yourself in (science, math, music, etc.). it's not your parents fault that you sincerely had no interest in being an intellectual until you realized it was beneficial.

>>4558260

Jag har forsokt att lara mig svenska for en ar, men jag tror jag ar fortfarande inte god.

I'm an argie trying to learn some nordic language, but still shaky as fuck, hope that made some sense. Always get pa and att mixed up, and don't get me started on you guys and your en/ett. Also ignore the lack of swedish vowels, can't be arsed to find them right now.

>>4558284
You'll be fine. We almost always understand what people are saying if we put some effort into it. Read some, talk some, give it some time.

>>4552552
>Once I am finished with Per Se Illustrate I would love to move on to Greek and Sanskrit. Would love recommendations for those languages.

Athenaze for Greek. Preferably the Italian version. But Lingua Latina is unbeatable.

>>4552665
>"Thrasymachus"

Sounds interesting

>>4553963
In the book it says that Medus is a bad slave. But I always tell my students that Medus might be a bad slave, but he is a better man for stealing that money and run away. Because who wants to be a proper slave anyway?

Kinda dissapointed that he spent almost all of it to buy some jewelry for his girlfriend though.

>>4557368
added

Being lucky growing up in a trilingual country I know Dutch, English and French quite well. Though I would have difficulty expressing my self fully in French.

I can read Latin and German with a dictionary. I would like to brush up these last two languages.

I am not really interested in learning more languages. I'm quite happy with a good translation. And learning languages is too much effort. I tried Japanese once in a weeaboo fase and I pretty much forgot all of it.

Bump

>tfw learning Mongolian

I majored in German in undergrad but a few years later feel as I've I've forgotten most of it, to be honest.

>>4557737
Because I'm not German, you cunt.

>>4557679
Wouldn't it be better to just learn Old English?

Any conlanger /lit/izens?

DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS DONGS NIGGER BONER UP THE BUTT

>>4557679

That's pretty autistic. If you succeed you will be treated like a God in /int/

>>4551938
私は日本語を勉強します.
なぜなら、 ビジュアルノベルは文学だよ.

>>4558284
"Jag har försökt lära mig svenska i ett år, men jag tror fortfarande inte att jag är bra"

The ending is weird though.

>>4560042
Det är för att han menar "tycker" och inte "tror".

>>4557427
I might send you a mail sometime soon - I need to brush up on my German.

>>4560175
Det var tidigt på morgonen.
Nej jag vet inte, var ju patetiskt att jag inte tänkte så långt.

Minä oppin suomia yliopistossa mutta minä puhun vähän.

I hope this is correct, I´ve learned some finnish but it´s not easy and I forgot a lot of it till now, also I´ve never learned how to use the past so my sentence implies that I´m leaning it currently.

Also I´ve learned english :^)

>>4552123
if this actually happened, you literally couldn't be more autistic

but made me laugh

>>4560372
You only made a very small error.
"opin suomea" is correct
Also, "vähän" implies "a little", better in this context would be "vain vähän", which means "not much"
Just splitting hairs here

>>4560372
That's really good. Like >>4560489 said, those are minuscule errors. Finns just love to help you correct your mistakes, it's a way we show love so don't be discouraged by it.

Just saying in case there are people here who doesn't know.

http://www.interpals.net/

Even if there are a lot of fake profiles and shit going on, you can actually find people to help you with languages here.

>>4558277
>school
>teaching you that

Get a load of this pleb

>>4561087
this site has been hijacked by its own user base.
It has turned into a massive dating site filled with minors, sex predators and I can assure you NO ONE talks about languages.

Estoy estudiando espanol.

>>4561190
I do.
I've helped other users a little and they have done the same with me.
Though I am still looking for a grammar nazi.

Don't post pictures of yourself and message people about languages, some will answer and will help you.

>>4561249
¿Cuánto tiempo llevas?

>>20444518

"go to interpals" they said, "you'll talk about languages".

Seriously nobody takes this site seriously. Does anyone know a real penpal site?

>>4561573
Sólo un año. Soy principiante. Y tu?

>>4561899
Soy de España, así que es mi lengua materna.
¿Puedo preguntar por qué?

Can anyone recommend me some online resources for learning Dutch?

>>4561916
>>4561899
Quiero decir por qué elegiste Castellano

>>4562010
Erm. Not really. I can advice you not to go to the Netherlands, though. People will just speak broken english to you as soon as you try to speak in Dutch with them.

I'd be interested in learning a language but I'm not sure what language(s) would be useful to know. I'm an Amerifat and there was never any emphasis placed on learning anything other than English.

>>4562136
Spanish.

>>4562136

Depends wholly on your interests. If it's purely for a recreational, literary purposes French, German or Latin would be the most common choices.

>>4562136

Chinese.

>>4559889
おまえわは馬鹿か。

>>4562085
>implying our english is broken

J'étudie le francais maintenant parce-que j'étudiera à l'école polytechnique dans Lausanne pour un ans après l'été. Hm, je pense que je l'ai déjà écrit en /lit/.
Revenons à nos moutons, je lis un autobiographie d'un pilot de chasse de la Deuxième Guerre Mondiale qui a bataillé pour les anglais et, à la fin de la guerre, pour le francais. Je le trouve très difficile, il y a beaucoup de phrases que je ne comprends pas, et bien sûr, beaucoup de mots que je n'ai jamais vu. Quelquefois je cherche tous les deux mots dans la dictionnaire et parfois j'ai passé dix minutes pour lire un seul page.
Pour être franc, si je pourrai comprendre ce qu'ils disent dans les lectures en Suisse je serais content. Avant de partir pour la suisse je dois apprends beaucoup plus de vocabulaire.

>>4562069
No entiendo. Qué es Castellano?

>>4552006
>Learning or lernt
I presume English is in the former category

>>4562558
Son el mismo idioma, en España solemos llamarlo Castellano y en el extranjero lo llaman Español, pero ambos significan lo mismo.

I am learning the language of the squat. Very challenging.

Honestly anyone learning a second European language shouldn't even call themselves bilingual. That is the easiest shit ever, try an asian language or something.

>>4559889
>>4562217
You guys should get back to studying because this is just embarrassing.

>>4563900
Yes all of Europe have the same origin for language like French and Finish even the names start with the same letters.

I learnt German at school and have signed up for the advanced course at uni beginning in a fortnight.

I feel as if I remember nothing of the language, oh god what have I done /lit/?

>>4563900
Finnish is practically Korean/Mongolian, supposedly.

>>4564460
No.

>>4564472
yes

>>4563900
Sure, Dutch and Italian are pretty similar.
Slavic, Germanic, Romance languages are all in europe.
Finnish hasn't got an european origin even when it's in Europe.

Another thing is to compare Norwegian with Danish and Swedish. Which are mutually intelligible.

>>4564524
>compare Norwegian with Danish and Swedish. Which are mutually intelligible

Not with the way the Danes pronounce Danish, they aren't.

>>4562136
I'm >>4556748 and I suggest you learn German. It's not called "the language of ideas" for nothing. But then again, French and Russian might be great choices too.

If you want something a little more "exotic", go for Persian.

I'm currently learning French and Arabic. If I ever get done with them I'll try my hand at Russian and Japanese as well. I also like Swahili a lot but I'd NEVER get to use it.

>>4564534
>the language of ideas
Could you elaborate?

>>4564530
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s-mOy8VUEBk

>>4564567
I agree with this. Sounds fascinating.

Does anyone know of an extension for Chrome that can translate words I select? I have the definition extension which works for that, but with the annoying side effect that if the word exists in some really obscure context or as an acronym in English it'll only show the definition for that. I had one that did this but it also made ads appear on certain pages and I haven't been able to find another one that wouldn't just translate a whole page when I wanted, which isn't helpful when I'm trying to practice and just come across a single word I don't know.

>>4564567
>>4564576
It's a slogan made up by the Goethe Institute. Many of the most influential works of the Western world have been written in German, and Germany is still an important nation of innovations and culture, although they've lost much of the influence they once had. I chose German over French when I was twelve, and I've never had a reason to regret it, other than not being able to read Zola in French, whereas a good friend of mine who chose French at one point lamented this decision non stop for thirty minutes (he's a choir singer and many of the songs his choirs sing are written in German. He also encounters Germans way more often than he does the French, but this is true for all Swedes).

>>4564559
Am I the only one who thinks Swahili is reminiscent of Japanese?

>>4554354
I started with Le Petit Prince, had to look up maybe three words per page. I translated it into English and then into French again to get a feel of the language.
Le Petit Nicholas is a much easier children's book.

>>4554354
Don't waste your time like >>4564712 did, looking up multiple words per page as you read. This is the 21st century. You have options. Download Anki and spent a few months just learning vocabulary using some of the shared decks. You can literally do 2000+ words a month, and you only need 10-12000 words for 99% text coverage.

>>4564728
>learn your vocab by reading and seeing the words in the proper context
>memorize words with flashcards, the most mind numbingly tedious task in existence
Hard choice

>>4564728
Well my progress was kinda slow on Anki, turns out I learn faster with the words in context. Anki was great for Chinese though, where it's hard to start reading straightaway.

What language did you use Anki for?

>>4564738
>>learn your vocab by reading and seeing the words in the proper context

Please. This only works once you have a relatively advanced knowledge of the language. If you are at the look-up-multiple-words-per-page-of-children's-book stage, then all you are doing is the equivalent of sounding out gibberish in your head.

>>4564748
French.

Been learning Spanish for over 2 years.

>>4564728
I had terrible results using Anki for vocab.

I honestly think writing a page daily in the language you are learning and translating passages to and from the language are much better (albiet harder) exercises.

>>4552552
>By the way, if anyone wants to learn Latin, this website has a great method for doing so:
>http://www.rci.rutgers.edu/~wcd/Latin.htm


thats an awesome site
the thing is i speak serbian, in which the form of the noun also carries its function in the sentence
thus learning latin for me was really easy

>>4564771
Well, could be... it seems I'm in the minority when it comes to my experience with Anki. Of course, it doesn't make sense to begin learning a language by memorizing vocabulary out of context, but once you are the stage where you are reading books, I really think that setting aside a few months to just power through vocab is extremely useful.

>>4563891
tan sólo lleva un año estudiando, no uses una frase tan compleja

basically castellano=español

>>4564728
That anon mentioned he could listen and speak so I assume he has some basic grammar and vocab.
Also, most of the words I looked up were quite guessable, I just wanted to be certain, since I'd be translating later.

>>4564530
>>4564568
kek
It's not first time I see it.

http://www.pagef30.com/2008/08/why-norwegian-is-easiest-language-for.html

>>4564738
>memorize words with flashcards, the most mind numbingly tedious task in existence
Nope

Flashcards is one of the best systems to learn.

>>4564904

>>Fig. A. an understanding of spoken language
>Norwegians understand 88% of the spoken swedish language
> understand 73% of the spoken danish language

>Swedes understand 48% of the spoken norwegian language
>understand 23% of the spoken danish language

>Danes understand 69% of the spoken norwegian language
>understand 43% of the spoken swedish language
>>Fig. B. An understanding of the written language
>Norwegians understand 89% of the written swedish language
>understand 93% of the written danish language

>Swedes understand 86% of the written norwegian language
>understand 69% of the written danish language

>Danes understand 89% of the written norwegian language
>understand 69% of the written swedish language.

>>4564918
It's effective, but godawfully fucking boring. Rather have fun when I'm not doing actual uni stuff

>>4564939
Why isn't there a source, from the blog it's just taken from a forum.

>>4564976
>but godawfully fucking boring
I enjoy it. You have to find something that works for you.

>>4564976
>learning sux, u should just have some fun instzead xD

Believe it or not, accomplishing something, especialyl when it is something you set out to do by yourself, is satisfying.

>>4557679
What would this even look like? French is like a third of English, right?

>>4565005
WOW MAYBE YOU OUGHT TO ACCOMPLISH KNOWING HOW TO SPELL "ESPECIALLY" FIRST, YOU NERD CUNT.

>>4564939
http://www.pagef30.com/2009/03/norwegians-understand-other.html

>>4565013
Nice one m8.

>>4565000
>I enjoy it. You have to find something that works for you.
Okay, obviously it's a preference thing. I absolutely fucking hate it.
>>4565005
>le greentext with xD
And I'd rather have fun along the way, I'll save my efficiency for university. Like reading a book I want to read rather than sitting down and forcing myself to memorize a bunch of words. Vocab comes naturally if you're exposed to the language anyhow.

>>4559889
>>4562217

アホ達は黙るべきだよ

>>4565180
>いむぷりいんぐ