vielsprachig. (insert languages here)

viel·spra·chig /viélsprachig/ Adjektiv 2. viele Sprachen beherrschend, sprechend

[vielsprachig]

I'm so insecure and intimidated by Japanese. I can't seem to let go of my fears.

I'm scared of Kanji. That I won't be able to write, to read, to remember. Scared of making too many mistakes.

But what's the worst that could happen?

I've received so many unnecessary comments in the past. Belittling ones. I wish I could just let go.

[polyglot-linguist]

Unique and out of the box language learning resources you probably haven’t heard of!

• Lyrics Training - Lyric fill in game

• Radio Garden - Listen to the radio anywhere in the world

• Language Reactor - Browser extension to learn with Netflix, YouTube, etc

• BaBaDum - Fun vocab games

• Linguno - Listening, vocab, and conjugation exercises, plus 10 daily crosswords in each language

• Bilinguis - Read a small selection of classic, older books in a bilingual side-by-side style. Some have audio reading as well!

• Lyrik Line - Read and listen to poetry in your target language!! Huge selection

• Top 40 Charts - Top 40 music hits in countries around the world.

• Kiosko - Daily newspaper covers all over the world. Clicking on one takes you to the news website to read more

• Lexicity - For all of you ancient language obsessed people!! Amazing and thorough resource for many ancient languages

-> Click on the link below to get links to all those sites + more information about them!

10 Unique Language Resources You Likely DONT Know⋆ Plurilingualism

These are 10 language learning resources that you have likely never heard of. Covering everything from audio to books to ancient languages.

[granolagaeilgeoir]

What do you mean I don't have time to learn all the languages

[vielsprachig]

[nyahongo]

みんな、こんにちは！

In the process of taking digital notes from the lessons in Genki 1, I discovered two really useful tools in Microsoft Word for Japanese:

Phonetic Guide - allows you to display furigana above kanji

Enclose Characters - allows you to enclose highlighted text in a variety of shapes and styles

I use both of these tools extensively when I’m taking my notes. I wanted to share them with everyone too! I included screenshots of how to find these tools and add them to the Word ribbon, as well as what their menus look like.

A few tips:

If you want an enclosed character to be a certain color or font style, you need to change that first (i.e. before you enclose the character in a shape).

Depending on the Asian font you choose or use (I have downloaded many Japanese fonts from various websites), the furigana may be chopped off at the top. This is because Word has default line spacing for Asian typography. If your font of choice makes the furigana appear chopped off at the top, you’ll need to fiddle with the line spacing. I suggest: “Exactly” (for line spacing, instead of Single or Multiple) and 12-16 pt font-sized spacing.

If you type notes in Japanese often (like I do), you might want to make a document template that includes your desired settings for Asian typography. To do this, you’ll want to either create a new style or modify an existing one. I modified the Normal style, as shown in the screenshot. You can either save the modified style as its own style (to reuse in future documents), or choose to use the style only in the current document.

I hope this helps! If you have any questions, feel free to ask!

[seherstudies]

Directional Words in Japanese: こ、そ、あ、ど

Summary of Cure Dolly’s “Lesson 20:  "Sore/Sono/Sonna/Sou" etc. how directional words REALLY work!“

Like in English too, you use different words to express if something is near you or far away. In Japanese we have the こ/そ/あ row. This all is from the speakers perspective.

こ: near me (think of こころ = heart) そ: near you あ: away from both conversation partners (you have to shout aaa to be heard over there)

ここ/そこ/あそこ/どこ: marks a place somewhere

ここはどこ？ - is a common way to say "Where am I?” in Japanese (Lit. Where is this place?)

これ/それ/あれ/どれ ：marks where a thing is; the れ is related to ある, which expresses that something exists and it usually works for any thing, abstract or physical.

この/その/あの/どの ： act as “adjectives” and are used as descriptors of nouns (and only nouns) ; related to the の particle aka the classifier article

この：this- something described as near me その：that - something described as near you あの：that- something described as over there どの：how- described

こんな/そんな/あんな/どんな ： act as real adjectives, they are decriptive of a quality of something. Remember na-adjectives? This row is related to na-adjectives hence the descriptive character of it. Which one you use is often conceptual, either on how how far away the thing is away from a present perspective, or personal distance.

こんな：like this そんな：like that あんな：like that どんな：like what?

こんなに、そんなに、あんなに：describe adjectives and verbs

こう/そう/ああ/どう：describe a manner of being or doing; similiar to the な group but for actions

Eg そうです - it is that way (the way you have said) These are often used in the construction like どうすればいい？- What should I do? (Lit. What way I will act will be good?)

These are also often in combination with いう：こういう、そういう, etc. and are used for abstract things like conditions, circumstances, think in what way do we describe this condition. eg. どういうこと？： What is going here? (What description of thing is this that’s happening here?)

[vielsprachig]

I think the hardest part is to actively use the languages I (want to) learn on a frequent basis.

[tealingual]

How can you be all about Treating Languages With Respect™ but constantly mock different languages? It’s the hypocrisy for me. 

[vielsprachig]

Quite interesting, I started to cherish and appreciate my mother tongue more and more throughout the years of learning different languages.

It's not that I didn't like it, or don't appreciate other languages today, it's... different.

[vielsprachig]

Yr holl ddyddiau’n gwylio trwy’r ffenestri, Yr holl flynyddoedd, tu fas yn edrych mewn, Yr holl amser, do’n i ddim yn gwybod Pa mor ddall ro’n i. Dyma fi, dan amrantau’r ser, Dyma fi, yn sydyn, dw i’n gweld. Sefyll ‘ma, daw’r syniad da, Dyma lle dylaf fod. A dwi’n gweld y golau pur, Ac mae fel mae’r niwl ‘di codi, A dwi’n gweld y golau pur, Ac mae fel yr awyr iach, Ac mae’n dwym, yn wir, yn glir, Ac mae’r byd ‘di newid rhywsut... Ac yn syth mae popeth yn wahanol, Nawr y gwelaf di. Yr holl ddyddiau’n dilyn breuddwydion, Yr holl flynyddoedd, yn methu symud ‘mlaen, Yr holl amser, do’n i ddim yn gweld Sut yr oedd pethau. Dyma hi, dan amrantau’r ser, Dyma hi, yn sydyn, dw i’n gweld. Gyda hi, mae’n glir i mi, Dyma lle dylaf fod. A dw i’n gweld y golau pur, Ac mae fel mae’r niwl ‘di codi, A dw i’n gweld y golau pur, Ac mae fel yr awyr iach, Ac mae’n dwym, yn wir, yn glir, Ac mae’r byd ‘di newid rhywsut... Ac yn syth mae popeth yn wahanol, Nawr y gwelaf di, Nawr y gwelaf di.

[vielsprachig]

(via https://open.spotify.com/track/21gZkBW4NSItza1PQnq44T?si=8NzNEHQEQsSKUjrQbQlmZg)

Ik vraag mij af Brengt deze schim mij de dood vannacht...

[vielsprachig]

Finished all my exams, now I’ll hopefully study more languages. Welsh is still my number one priority, even in the last couple of months I did at least some duolingo lessons every single day. I’m still planning to spend more time on Dutch and Japanese. But I’ll see how it goes, I won’t stress myself out. 🐲

[sheepfroggy]

Welsh language games!

Gaming is super helpful for immersion, and since Welsh doesn’t have a lot of game translations available, the games with a translation can often be difficult to find. Here’s the games that I know of with Welsh translations available!

Minecraft - the translation is only available for the PC versions of Minecraft

Dicey Dungeons - this translation is available on all versions of the game (including the Nintendo Switch edition)

Destructivator 2 - sadly, I’ve got no clue what happened to number 1 but I do know number 2 is available on steam and has a Welsh translation available too

Master Reboot - this is available on Steam and does have a Welsh translation there :)

If anybody knows any other games to add to the list, please let me know

[deactivate-deactivate-deactivate]

2021-01-23: Welsh Word A Day

Penwythnos: Weekend

[ID: A photograph of orange carnations on a black background. A white rectangle is overlaid in the center containing the words "Penwythnos" and "Weekend" written in brick red and black respectively. "Welsh Word A Day" is written in the upper right in light yellow. END ID]

[vielsprachig]

[vielsprachig]

Could have been better. Could have been worse. 🤗

[lagom-languages-deactivated2022]

Why I Don’t Want to Become a Polyglot

…and Why I Only Learn One Language at a Time

Disclaimer: These are my personal thoughts. If learning multiple languages at once makes you happy, go for it. Everyone has a right to spend their free time how they like.

Disclaimer #2: I do intend to learn multiple languages throughout my lifetime, not just one. What I mean by “not wanting to become a polyglot” is that I don’t want to just learn languages for the sake of learning a language; for the sake of being able to say I can speak 5 languages or something. I only want to learn a language if I truly adore it, not just so that it can be a number.

1. I spent an entire year preparing round-the-clock for my C1 German exam. It made me realise just how dedicated you have to be to a language in order to learn it to C1 level. I wanted to start learning Serbian at the time, but I physically couldn’t.

2. You can’t just abandon a language once you reach your goal. In order to maintain that level, you still need to be dedicating regular time to it. This means with each new language I pick up, it will become harder to maintain those I’ve already mastered, and I will have less time to put towards the new language. This also means I can’t just force myself to work extremely hard on a language I’m only semi-passionate about until I reach C1 level, and then abandon it. It doesn’t work like that. In my experience, you need to be extremely passionate about this language, all the time, for the rest of your life.

3. To reiterate points one and two: To reach and maintain an advanced level, it is not enough to simply like a language. You need to love it with all your heart and soul. German was the language of my ancestors. Some died shortly before I was born, some when I was very young. Learning their language made me feel so close to them; it helped me remember them. German is also a widely spoken language, with many great TV shows to watch, many movies, a lot of music and YouTubers. I have always been incredibly interested in modern German history. Despite having so many reasons to love and use German, I still often found it hard to stay motivated in German and have the dedication required to pass and maintain C1.

4. If you learn multiple languages at once, you will not just progress slower in both, but the total amount of time it takes you to master both languages will be lengthened greatly. Here is the video from Matt vs Japan I was talking about on another post. In it, he gives the example that if French takes 2 years to learn, and German takes 2 years to learn, learning them both simultaneously won’t take 4 years, it might take 5-7 years. This, to me, is extremely demotivating. I see a lot of langblrs setting yearly goals of going up one or two CEFR levels in a year. This is generally pretty achievable, depending on the language and your schedule. But then they apply this to three or four languages! I always see them disappointed at the end of the year, because of course this never happens. They rarely even go up one CEFR level in each of the languages they’re learning, because they’re spreading themselves so thin.

5. There’s nothing boring about learning one language at a time - actually, it’s a beautiful and admirable thing! Watching Matt vs Japan in various interviews on Youtube made me remember how passionate I was about German when I first started learning it, and I want to go back to that. I want German to be a part of me! Not just some random thing I do now and then. It’s fun to dedicate yourself to something, and in my opinion, it shows a deep amount of respect to native speakers of that language, their culture, their history. 

6. If I can’t tolerate, or find it too boring, to only focus on one TL for several years, that to me is a sign that I probably don’t love it enough (see points 1-3).

7. My values are different than those presented often in langblr/polyglot culture. It’s tempting to see someone who is learning 7 languages at once, and think they are impressive, but after realising this person is A0-A2 in most of those languages, and maybe B1 in two more languages, I’m no longer impressed nor jealous. I would rather truly experience the German language and culture in a deeply meaningful way, than just be able to order food and buy souvenirs in 10 different languages/countries. 

8. I have multiple decades ahead of me to learn languages. Let’s be honest, most of us reading this post will be in our teens, 20s, or maybe 30s. There’s no rush. I’m so excited to keep maintaining my German, spend the next two or three years completely immersed in Serbian and having that language become a part of me, and after that, spend another 5+ years dedicated to Japanese. When I look back on my German, it will remind me most of the time transitioning from my teens to my early 20s, when I discovered who I was! When I look back on my Serbian, it will remind me of settling into my young adulthood. I’ll probably be having babies around the time I learn Japanese, so it will probably remind me of that beautiful time in my life, when I look back on it.

Here are some YouTubers who are extremely dedicated to their TLs who inspire me to take on the same mindset. I’ll try to link a video where they specifically showcase why it’s great to learn one language at a time:

Matt vs Japan

Oriental Pearl

Days of French ‘n’ Swedish

Blondie in China

JJsays