Wednesday, 09 December 2009
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What language(s) do you speak at home?
It's easy to be fluent in languages, but staying fluent can be the problem. I'm so accustomed to speaking English that even when I'm spoken to in Spanish, my other native language, if the person can speak English, I'll automatically speak it.
When I went to Barcelona, I was forced to speak a lot of Spanish. I'd encounter locals that didn't even speak one word of English. When I came back, it felt weird speaking English and took a few days to get used to it.
Now, I want to make sure I speak it fluently so I don't forget any of it.
Do you speak more than one language at home? If so, do you practice it a lot?
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Comments (94)
I speak Dutch and Sranan Tongo at home.
Sranan Tongo is more the unofficial language of my country. Easy to learn and everyone understands it. Not everyone speaks and understands Dutch that well here. When at home, most people speak Dutch or the language of their race (could be Chinese, Javanese, Hindi or Arabic) and Sranan Tongo.
I speak Pennsylvania Dutch and German and English and a little bit of Hebrew and Arabic.
I used to only speak Pennsylvania Dutch all the time at home growing up. But when I got married my husband does not speak it.
Now I mainly just stick to English.
Ebonics.
Danish
We only speak English at home,
italian
English, but my boyfriend and I have been practicing speaking Japanese together.
I was just in Barcelona too and practiced my Spanish though more Catalan was spoken.
Let's see English at work and social life. With my parents mix Toisan but more Cantonese, I am studying Korean (once a week go to classes). With my Mandarin/Japanese/Spanish I try to watch shows/listen to music--truthfully not that often now. But right now mainly I watch more Korean shows and listen to KPOP.
I do have friends when I do catch up with them I can practice my Korean, Mandarin and Japanese with. Right now no one to practice Spanish with to maintain it.
English and Cantonese :)
I speak English at home. However, I know basic Japanese and sometimes speak in it without realizing that I let a Japanese word slip. I know bits of a lot of other languages like Spanish, French, Czech, Russian etc. As I child I wrote a code that I am fluent in and when I get frustrated I use it. I also wrote my own language as a child, but it needs much more work. Out of all of these, outside of English, my strongest ones are Japanese and my code.
*PS I always wondered what it would be like to grow up in a home that was bilingual +--
Dutch.
I always speak French with my sister at home, but English on the rare occasions I talk to my parents.
We speak German at home, especially around the holidays with the extended family.
At home, we speak English, Cantonese, Shanghainese, and, very rarely, Mandarin. Sometimes my sister and I converse in Spanish to exclude the rest of the family from the conversation. I also know French and a bit of Korean and Russian.
Arabic. But I am only fluent in English and French.
I speak English at my dads house but Spanish at my moms.
But I speak more English overall. I speak Spanish at my moms house because its her first language and so that the house keeper wont feel left out. But with my sister, friends, and other families members I speak English.I speak mostly Portuguese at home, but sometimes we force ourselves to speak German.
spanglish lol.
I speak Cantonese, French and English... Cantonese
to my parents and generally English to my brother and friends. I am forced to speak french at work and in public places. Of
course...I am more at ease with English above all. My French is slowly slipping away.. haha
We often use Creole or French among family (usually French to the older folks who think of Creole as somehow low class), and English everywhere else.
mostly spanish at home with my mom but english only with my dad, english at school work, when I find someone else who speaks fluent spanish I'd rather talk to them in spanish.
German and Japanese at home, due to my father being German and my stepmom being Japanese, but we also mainly stick to English. However, I can only read a bit of German, as my favored language is turning into Russian.
Nope, just English.
Armenian at home. Dutch outside of the house (school, work) and English whenever talking to my cousins (they live in L.A., I live in Holland) or whenever I'm on Xanga. I also understand French.
Dutch is the language I'm best at. I hate the fact my Armenian vocabulary isn't that extended. Sometimes I have a hard time expressing how I feel in Armenian, even though it's my native language.
Chinese dialect Fujianese at home. English anywhere else. I dunno I find it easy to go from one language to the other in one setting. like if one person could only speak English n then another could only speak Fujianese, I dun find it difficult switching in between.
but maybe you're right that if you're set in place where its one language for a while n when you go back to the other language, it could be a little weird.
my uncle used to be able to speak Malay but after living in the U.S. n speaking Canto n English for a long time, he finds it difficult to remember some words in Malay.