# What language(s) can you speak? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [December 4, 2005, 12:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-language-s-can-you-speak/333965 "2005-12-04T00:32:16Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Maeglin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/8baadc/32.png) [@Maeglin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maeglin)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2005, 3:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-language-s-can-you-speak/333965/41 "2005-12-06T03:03:02Z")
I speak Cat with a New York accent. ---
**Author:** ![Antigen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/848f3c/32.png) [@Antigen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Antigen)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2005, 3:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-language-s-can-you-speak/333965/42 "2005-12-06T03:30:43Z")
All I’ve got (besides English) is French. I feel so inadequate. I understand a little Spanish thanks to a class or two in high school, but barely enough to get by. When I manage to free up some extra time, I think I’d like to take on German. But before that, I have to try and teach my boyfriend some French, so he can believe me when I say my friends and I aren’t making fun of him in our “secret” language. ---
**Author:** ![Angua](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/8baadc/32.png) [@Angua](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Angua)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2005, 1:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-language-s-can-you-speak/333965/43 "2005-12-06T13:18:15Z")
> [@Johanna](#): > > **Angua** , I had a friend once whose ethnic origin was Kacchi. She explained to me that although her dialect is spoken in Gujarat, it isn’t really a dialect of Gujarati at all. I looked into it, and found that Kacchi is a dialect of Sindhi. Have you ever tried learning Sindhi? I hadn’t actually. I ought to give it a go one of these days. It doesn’t surprise me that Kacchi is closer to Sindhi than Gujarati – there are huge differences between the two, which, to my ear, sound linguistically different rather than dialectaly different, if that makes sense? Sort of like the difference between German and English, compared to the difference between ‘proper’ English, and regional English. ---
**Author:** ![Dorjan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dorjan/32/12440_2.png) [@Dorjan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dorjan)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2005, 4:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-language-s-can-you-speak/333965/44 "2005-12-06T16:40:59Z")
I speak fluent English and AAVE. I know a smattering of Cantonese, just enough to get by when helping out in my MIL’s kitchen. I took German in school for 7 years, but at this point I can barely speak it. I was once fluent in French and Farsi (as fluent as one can be at 5 years old anyway) but both were gradually forgotten. if you don’t use it, you lose it! ---
**Author:** ![Clothahump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/51bf81/32.png) [@Clothahump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Clothahump)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2005, 4:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-language-s-can-you-speak/333965/45 "2005-12-06T16:51:25Z")
Native English speaker. I took German in high school, got fluent enough in it that I advance-placed three semesters of German in college and took a fourth semester live that was a no-English-allowed class; made an A. I seriously considered majoring in it for a while. When I lived in Indonesia, I took a crash course in Indonesian and got fluent enough to haggle with folks in the marketplace and almost understand the evening news on TV. I speak very little Spanish, mainly phrases that I learned as a cop. ---
**Author:** ![Siddhartha\_Vicious](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/919ad9/32.png) [@Siddhartha\_Vicious](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siddhartha_Vicious)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2005, 5:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-language-s-can-you-speak/333965/46 "2005-12-06T17:40:50Z")
I dream in Italian, which is a shame because I don’t speak Italian. I know a (very) little Spanish. My wife teaches it. I took four years of French in High School, but I don’t remember a damned thing. ---
**Author:** ![Cat\_Jones](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/96bed5/32.png) [@Cat\_Jones](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cat_Jones)\ **Post date:** [December 6, 2005, 7:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-language-s-can-you-speak/333965/47 "2005-12-06T19:12:41Z")
Native English Pretty much fluent in **French** but with lots of lazy mistakes which neither I or anyone i’m speaking to can be bothered to correct. Written is less good but understanding is fine. **Italian** - has sadly deteriorated since I moved to France but can still communicate as well as I need to in social situations, can read but never having actually studied the language my written Italain would be riddled with inaccuracies. **Spanish** I guess is my next best, I muddle in some Italian words but have enough to survive quite easily travelling through Spanish speaking countries. I’m learning **Welsh** but am only at a very elementary level. I have plenty of nouns from childhood but forming phrases is hellish. Then I used to have good **Polish** comprehension skills with basic speaking from living there (girlie evenings with friends often consisted of their speaking Polish and my speaking English, it was quicker that way) - I could order in restaurants, buy food in the market, book tickets/hotel rooms, tell the time etc. but it’s been years since I’ve been in contact with Polish speakers or been surrounded by anything similar and there is very little left (in fact the last time I ‘used’ my Polish was mixing in random German words having a stab at communicating in Croatia a few years ago !). During a three month spell working in \*\*Estonia \*\*I managed to get the phrases I needed to buy food, order in restaurants book tickets etc. and I can still just about count to five, say hello, thank you and I could never forget the ubiquitous “ei ole” - was there in '94 😉 Having the will to communicate and using guesswork I can have a good go at understanding written and, to a much lesser extent, spoken Catalan and Portuguese for example. Living in Europe we’re lucky, we have a variety of languages at our fingertips and although speakers of the ‘majority’ languages are seldom fluent in a second language we usually know a few words or phrases in one or two of the others. ---
**Author:** ![Sublight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/439d5e/32.png) [@Sublight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sublight)\ **Post date:** [December 7, 2005, 6:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-language-s-can-you-speak/333965/48 "2005-12-07T06:55:41Z")
English - native Japanese - not fluent, but I read and speak enough to get by pretty well French - about the same as Japanese, but I’m really out of practice German - took a year of it in college and did atrociously ---
**Author:** ![sjc](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e5b9ba/32.png) [@sjc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sjc)\ **Post date:** [December 7, 2005, 7:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-language-s-can-you-speak/333965/49 "2005-12-07T07:29:52Z")
> [@Sevastopol](#): > > Count me in as a second who can speak Italian and English and is learning Estonian. Who would’ve guessed it? > > Plus some French. Te 'opite eesti keelt _ja_ itaalia keelt? Kus? USA’s? Ma 'opisin Washintoni "ulikoolis. Ma ei r"a"akinud eesti keelt palju aega. -sjc ---
**Author:** ![Cat\_Jones](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/96bed5/32.png) [@Cat\_Jones](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cat_Jones)\ **Post date:** [December 7, 2005, 8:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-language-s-can-you-speak/333965/50 "2005-12-07T08:02:39Z")
Proud to say I understand that ! (I think) ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [December 7, 2005, 9:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-language-s-can-you-speak/333965/51 "2005-12-07T09:41:41Z")
Native English speaker. Took 3 years of French in high school from a really good teacher and was able to read novels and even once could read some Italian since it was close enough. I’ve now forgotten most everything and if I try I end up using French sentence structure with Japanese words. Fluent Japanese. I can read and write at probably a high-schooler level. Though I can only “write” if we’re talking keying into a keyboard; handwriting I only know a maximum of 100 kanji well enough to pencil in. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-language-s-can-you-speak/333965.md?page=2)