Languish.org

Met a few true polyglots recently, fluent in 4-5 languages and fairly proficient in several more. Pretty impressive.
I'm wondering how Languish stacks up  :P

Count the scores for each language (including your native language), you get 0.5 point if only one of speaking/reading applies.

Quote
Language Proficiency Definitions

0 - No Practical Speaking/Reading Proficiency

1 - Elementary Proficiency
Speaking: Able to satisfy routine travel needs and minimum courtesy requirements.
Reading: Able to read isolated phrases and fragments of a text.

2 - Limited Working Proficiency
Speaking: Able to satisfy routine social demands and limited work requirements.
Reading: Able to read simple prose, in a form equivalent to typescript or printing, on subjects within a familiar context.

3 - Minimum Professional Proficiency
Speaking: Able to speak the language with sufficient structural accuracy and vocabulary to participate effectively in most formal and informal conversations on practical, social, and professional topics.
Reading: Able to read standard newspaper items addressed to the general reader, routine correspondence, reports, and technical materials in the individual's special field.

4 - Full Professional Proficiency
Speaking: Able to use the language fluently and accurately on all levels pertinent to professional needs.
Reading: Able to read all styles and forms of the language pertinent to professional needs.

5 - Native or Bilingual Proficiency
Speaking: Equivalent to that of an educated native speaker.
Reading: Equivalent to that of an educated native.

19, by my count.

Edit: Forgot about French ( :frog: ), make it 20, still in the same bracket.

Same, pretty much.

5: Dutch
4.5: English
3: German
2.5: Italian and French
1: Greek (unholy mix of ancient and modern)
0.5: Latin and Russian (despite attempts)
0: Arabic (not making a lot of progress here either)

Why is only speaking and reading of interest?

15.5

5: Dutch.
4.5: English.
3: French
2.5: German
1: Latin :p
0.5: Italian, Spanish, Danish, Swedish. But it takes plenty of effort and is mainly the result of these languages belonging to either germanic or latin language-family.

Someone has no language that they are a native speaker of?

Mine are:

5: Spanish & Galician.
4: English.
3: Italian.
2: Portuguese (I could BS a bit and raise it to 3, but I feel this is more honest).
1: French.

Quote from: garbon on June 23, 2016, 06:49:22 AM
Someone has no language that they are a native speaker of?

It says educated native  :P
But yes, it's the Jaron option.

Quote from: Crazy_Ivan80 on June 23, 2016, 06:46:07 AM
5: Dutch.
4.5: English.
3: French
2.5: German
1: Latin :p
0.5: Italian, Spanish, Danish, Swedish. But it takes plenty of effort and is mainly the result of these languages belonging to either germanic or latin language-family.

Oh I forgot Latin  :blush:

Spanish, Catalan : 5 each (Native languages)
English  : 4.5 (Actually use it more often than Spanish nowadays, awful accent though)
German : 1 (Took a year of classes)
French : 0.5 (French grandad)

I don't count a bunch of latin languages that I can read somewhat comfortably due to similarity to Spanish / Catalan. 

Depends on if you consider Cantonese and Mandarin to be separate.  In a shameless effort to boost my score, I'll consider them separate :P

Cantonese, traditional Chinese: 5
English: 3
Mandarin, simplified Chinese: 3
Janapense: 0.5

10, total.

5 English & French. Maybe I could do 1 in Spanish, Italian & German but I have never tested it.

English - 5
French - 3
Latin - 0.5

Since, you know, not many Latin conversations to be had outside of the Vatican. Salve amicis.

I could probably give myself points in all the other romance languages at this point, especially having grown up and lived in Tejas my whole life but I have never studied them or anything.

I realised I should have given myself 7.5 and not 6.5

5 - English
2 - Spanish
.5 - German
.1 - Hindi

Quote from: Monoriu on June 23, 2016, 08:08:08 AM
Depends on if you consider Cantonese and Mandarin to be separate.

They are different languages so why wouldn't you?

If I spoke fluent Scots I would certainly include it :P

Quote from: Valmy on June 23, 2016, 08:16:46 AM

Quote from: Monoriu on June 23, 2016, 08:08:08 AM
Depends on if you consider Cantonese and Mandarin to be separate.

They are different languages so why wouldn't you?

If I spoke fluent Scots I would certainly include it :P

Cantonese is a dialect :P

Quote from: Monoriu on June 23, 2016, 08:17:26 AM
Cantonese is a dialect :P

A weird one though. Sure it is written the same as Mandarin but they are almost completely unintelligible when spoken. At least that is my understanding.

Cantonese did give us the word 'Tea' instead of having to use 'Chai' which is a loathsome word.

Oh wait not that was Min Chinese, an obscure dialect spoken by a mere 80 million people :lol:

Ah Chinese.

5- english.

2 - japanese
Was 2, now 1 - swedish
I want to say 0 as i want nothing to do with that ugly thing but probably 2- french 

Quote from: Valmy on June 23, 2016, 08:25:27 AM

Quote from: Monoriu on June 23, 2016, 08:17:26 AM
Cantonese is a dialect :P

A weird one though. Sure it is written the same as Mandarin but they are almost completely unintelligible when spoken. At least that is my understanding.

Cantonese did give us the word 'Tea' instead of having to use 'Chai' which is a loathsome word.

Oh wait not that was Min Chinese, an obscure dialect spoken by a mere 80 million people :lol:

Ah Chinese.

Actually the written form of Cantonese is also different from standard Chinese. 

The Cantonese of "tea" is "cha". 

Quote from: Monoriu on June 23, 2016, 08:29:48 AM
Actually the written form of Cantonese is also different from standard Chinese. 

The Cantonese of "tea" is "cha". 

Yes I realized that was yet another Chinese dialect.

Quote from: Valmy on June 23, 2016, 08:32:16 AM

Quote from: Monoriu on June 23, 2016, 08:29:48 AM
Actually the written form of Cantonese is also different from standard Chinese. 

The Cantonese of "tea" is "cha". 

Yes I realized that was yet another Chinese dialect.

Yes.  Cantonese is in fact a group of dialects :nerd:

klingon: 1

I speak AMURICAN. :cool:

5 Inglés
5 Español
.5 Italiano?
.5 Francés?
.5 Portugués?


Is spanglish a language in itself?

5, Danish, English
3.5, Swedish, Norwegian
2, German, French, Russian, Spanish.

Quote from: lustindarkness on June 23, 2016, 09:34:37 AM
Is spanglish a language in itself?

given enough time it could be

5: German
4: English
1: Spanish, French

Total 11

6.5 maybe 7

5 English
Meh 1, maybe 1.5 for Spanish
.5 French  I took this in high school and college and can still read it relatively well, but no one speaks it down here
E:  Does (American) sign language count here?  Gimmie a 1ish there too if so  :)

5: Spanish,
4: English,
1.5: German.

Quote from: Crazy_Ivan80 on June 23, 2016, 11:48:37 AM

Quote from: lustindarkness on June 23, 2016, 09:34:37 AM
Is spanglish a language in itself?

given enough time it could be

If this poll is still open, it would change my 11.5 points to 16.5! :w00t:

English 5, French and Spanish 1.5, Korean .5

5 english, 1 spanish.

I keep waiting for the grumbler posts explaining to our non native english speakers why their english self assessments are too optimistic.  :P

Quote from: alfred russel on June 23, 2016, 12:59:22 PM
5 english, 1 spanish.

I keep waiting for the grumbler posts explaining to our non native english speakers why their english self assessments are too optimistic.  :P

Tyr is native, right? :P

i got 5

Quote from: MadBurgerMaker on June 23, 2016, 12:02:59 PM

E:  Does (American) sign language count here?  Gimmie a 1ish there too if so  :)

It should, since it has its own grammar and all.

I put myself in the 5.5-7 point bracket, but that might be a bit generous.  I can read and understand isolated phrases and fragments in French, German, Spanish, and Latin, but they are very isolated phrases and fragments.  Even with having taken a year of high school French, I probably can handle Spanish better.  My German is limited mostly to military terms, and I struggle to read much in it even then.

Quote from: garbon on June 23, 2016, 06:49:22 AM
Someone has no language that they are a native speaker of?

If you're mute, you can't get but 2.5 for any given language.

Quote from: dps on June 23, 2016, 03:41:32 PM
It should, since it has its own grammar and all.

Which one follows English syntax?  I know there are two.

Quote from: alfred russel on June 23, 2016, 12:59:22 PM
5 english, 1 spanish.

I keep waiting for the grumbler posts explaining to our non native english speakers why their english self assessments are too optimistic.  :P

Fine, I'll take it down to 4.5  :P

English: 5. Unless I'm tired or drunk.  :P
Mandarin: 2.5 - 3 on speaking, but only 2 for reading/writing. 学汉子最难。
German, Korean: 1 each. Maybe even 2 if I practiced it for a while.

So 9.5.

Quote from: HisMajestyBOB on June 23, 2016, 07:25:08 PM
English: 5. Unless I'm tired or drunk.  :P
Mandarin: 2.5 - 3 on speaking, but only 2 for reading/writing. 学汉子最难。
German, Korean: 1 each. Maybe even 2 if I practiced it for a while.

So 9.5.

It should be 字, not 子 :hug:

Win10's Chinese keyboard led me astray. -_-

9.

5 English
3 German
1 Spanish

French 5
Portuguese 5 (this includes the North Portuguese dialect of Galician Larch  :lol:)
English 4
Castilian 4
German 2.5
Latin 1.5/2

Other Romance languages like Italian or Catalan are at 1 minimum, passively. Not Romanian though, would take a little bit of effort.

So, between 20-25

Quote from: HisMajestyBOB on June 23, 2016, 07:25:08 PM
English: 5. Unless I'm tired or drunk.  :P
Mandarin: 2.5 - 3 on speaking, but only 2 for reading/writing. 学汉子最难。
German, Korean: 1 each. Maybe even 2 if I practiced it for a while.

So 9.5.

Writing is not a factor.

Quote from: Duque de Bragança on June 24, 2016, 12:35:16 AMPortuguese 5 (this includes the North Portuguese dialect of Galician Larch  :lol:)

Yeah right.  :P

An Italian colleague of mine speaks Italian, German, English, Spanish, French and Romanian pretty much flawless and can speak some Polish and Russian.

Latins cheat <_<

I wish there was more recognition for now diadvantaged us english speakers are

Quote from: Tyr on June 25, 2016, 01:32:15 PM
Latins cheat <_<

I wish there was more recognition for now diadvantaged us english speakers are

I think we all recognise your diadvantage. :console:

Quote from: Tyr on June 25, 2016, 01:32:15 PM
Latins cheat <_<

I wish there was more recognition for now diadvantaged us english speakers are

Give me a fucking break. Disadvantaged? My ass.

Quote from: The Larch on June 25, 2016, 05:56:10 PM
Give me a fucking break. Disadvantaged? My ass.

The argument is not totally without merit.  Y'all can fall out of bed and learn 3 or 4 other Romance languages.

Quote from: Admiral Yi on June 25, 2016, 06:05:03 PM

Quote from: The Larch on June 25, 2016, 05:56:10 PM
Give me a fucking break. Disadvantaged? My ass.

The argument is not totally without merit.  Y'all can fall out of bed and learn 3 or 4 other Romance languages.

As if English is a special snowflake language with no other similar ones around.

Quote from: The Larch on June 25, 2016, 06:13:33 PM
As if English is a special snowflake language with no other similar ones around.

What are you thinking of, German?  Certainly not as close to English as the Romance languages are to each other.

Quote from: Admiral Yi on June 25, 2016, 06:35:10 PM

Quote from: The Larch on June 25, 2016, 06:13:33 PM
As if English is a special snowflake language with no other similar ones around.

What are you thinking of, German?  Certainly not as close to English as the Romance languages are to each other.

German, Dutch, the various scandies. Make the effort, it's not as if we learn other romance languages just by blinking.

0.5 point for schoolboy french.

4.5 points proficiency in gibberish. 

Quote from: Admiral Yi on June 23, 2016, 03:46:50 PM
Which one follows English syntax?  I know there are two.

British Sign Language, I assume.  ASL is based on the French one.  From what little I was taught about it (also took ASL in college for a couple electives heh), BSL is pretty different.

Quote from: Maladict on June 23, 2016, 06:03:33 AM
Met a few true polyglots recently, fluent in 4-5 languages and fairly proficient in several more. Pretty impressive.
I'm wondering how Languish stacks up  :P

Count the scores for each language (including your native language), you get 0.5 point if only one of speaking/reading applies.

Quote
Language Proficiency Definitions

0 - No Practical Speaking/Reading Proficiency

1 - Elementary Proficiency
Speaking: Able to satisfy routine travel needs and minimum courtesy requirements.
Reading: Able to read isolated phrases and fragments of a text.

2 - Limited Working Proficiency
Speaking: Able to satisfy routine social demands and limited work requirements.
Reading: Able to read simple prose, in a form equivalent to typescript or printing, on subjects within a familiar context.

3 - Minimum Professional Proficiency
Speaking: Able to speak the language with sufficient structural accuracy and vocabulary to participate effectively in most formal and informal conversations on practical, social, and professional topics.
Reading: Able to read standard newspaper items addressed to the general reader, routine correspondence, reports, and technical materials in the individual's special field.

4 - Full Professional Proficiency
Speaking: Able to use the language fluently and accurately on all levels pertinent to professional needs.
Reading: Able to read all styles and forms of the language pertinent to professional needs.

5 - Native or Bilingual Proficiency
Speaking: Equivalent to that of an educated native speaker.
Reading: Equivalent to that of an educated native.

9.  I can speak French, and my english level is ok for my job.  Don't know how I'd fare if I had to explain a health problem to a US doctor from Jamaican origin though.  Would most likely not be able to communicate in some non standards english dialects, like specific regional British or Australian accent.

I've forgotten most of my latin, so I did not even count it.  I can manage to understand some languages with the help of Google Translate and Wikipedia.

Quote from: viper37 on June 25, 2016, 09:15:28 PM
Would most likely not be able to communicate in some non standards english dialects

That's true even for some of us who are native speakers of what might be viewed as "mainstream" British or American dialects, at least as far a verbal communications go.

Let me see now :

English
Scottish
Irish
American
Canadian
South African
Australian
Kiwi

At least 40 points  :yeah:

Quote from: Richard Hakluyt on June 26, 2016, 03:30:56 AM
Let me see now :

English
Scottish
Irish
American
Canadian
South African
Australian
Kiwi

At least 40 points  :yeah:

I was going to add Danish dialects too, but then realised I would probably only get a few points total from bornholmsk, nordenfjordsk, sønderjysk, etc. :(

There are (dumb) people who  genuinely say Scots is another language :hmm:

Other than that though, yup. What Yi said.
Frisian is the closest to english but not worth learning.
Next.... toss up between Dutch and swedish/norwegian. Both of which are kind of pointless to learn since people from there all speak english. And all of which have a hell of a lot of Germanic vocabulary that we don't.

I met a Frenchman in Portugal many years ago, he spoke Portuguese quite well and I asked him how long he had been studying it..............two weeks  :cool:

He had a degree in medieval languages, worked in Germany and had this incredible list of languages that he knew, including Latin and Ancient Greek. He said that getting the basics sorted in another Romance language took him very little time, with his knowledge of how languages change he could often guess a word and get it right etc etc

He was showing off of course, but I was duly impressed.

Danish is easy, Tyr.

(https://languish.org/forums/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fa.bt.bmcdn.dk%2Fmedia%2Fcache%2Fresolve%2Fimage_1240%2Fimage%2F85%2F858759%2F12709042-facebook_n3.jpeg&hash=681c57c30e6b93a757e5e4051576fd313ce716b1)

Quote from: Tyr on June 26, 2016, 03:42:32 AM
There are (dumb) people who  genuinely say Scots is another language :hmm:

I think you could argue Scots is another language. It's also a dead language and what some Scottish people are now pretending is Scots bears no resemblance to the old makars, it's just a dialect.

Probably around 9. 5 for English, 2-2.5 for Spanish (my reading is better), 1.5-2 for French (reading again).

Quote from: Sheilbh on July 02, 2016, 08:23:40 AM

Quote from: Tyr on June 26, 2016, 03:42:32 AM
There are (dumb) people who  genuinely say Scots is another language :hmm:

I think you could argue Scots is another language. It's also a dead language and what some Scottish people are now pretending is Scots bears no resemblance to the old makars, it's just a dialect.

Probably around 9. 5 for English, 2-2.5 for Spanish (my reading is better), 1.5-2 for French (reading again).

Actually, there is both Scots, which is an English dialect, and Scots Gaelic which is a separate languish closely related to Irish (and which isn't exactly dead AFAIK, but certainly isn't very widely used0.

Yeah Gaelic isn't dead. Hopefully it's coming back. when I lived in the Highlands my little brother attended a Gaelic medium playschool which my parents were very involved in.

But you're right it's not widely used. The SNP are sort of allowing more Gaelic medium education - which is novel as they used to be fiercely opposed to it - but it's got a long way to go to recover.

I was speaking about this recently with an Irish friend who speaks Irish properly and is connected by family to the sort of Irish language intelligentsia (her aunt and uncle ran an Irish publishing house, grandparents involved in Irish language league etc). It's really interesting that in Ireland Irish is compulsory but rarely used and the Gaeltacht is getting weaker and smaller; in Wales there are still entire communities that speak Welsh as their primary language, I knew someone at uni from west Wales who didn't start learning English until he was eight. That's happened in Wales despite the fact that Welsh was at the turn of the 20th century in a far worse situation than Irish. She was wondering how you get that level of enthusiasm and penetration of a language as she'd like to see it happen in Ireland and I'd love to see Gaelic make a similar revival in Scotland.

I believe that Manx and Cornish have also seen revivals which is really exciting.

Quote from: Sheilbh on July 02, 2016, 08:23:40 AM

Quote from: Tyr on June 26, 2016, 03:42:32 AM
There are (dumb) people who  genuinely say Scots is another language :hmm:

I think you could argue Scots is another language. It's also a dead language and what some Scottish people are now pretending is Scots bears no resemblance to the old makars, it's just a dialect.

Probably around 9. 5 for English, 2-2.5 for Spanish (my reading is better), 1.5-2 for French (reading again).

I think Scots is different enough to be it's own language.  As has been said Frisian is suppose to be close.  As someone who doesn't know German, sometimes you can figure out sentences.  I don't think it would be to difficult for for an anglophone to learn.

Quote from: Razgovory on July 02, 2016, 12:02:59 PM

Quote from: Sheilbh on July 02, 2016, 08:23:40 AM

Quote from: Tyr on June 26, 2016, 03:42:32 AM
There are (dumb) people who  genuinely say Scots is another language :hmm:

I think you could argue Scots is another language. It's also a dead language and what some Scottish people are now pretending is Scots bears no resemblance to the old makars, it's just a dialect.

Probably around 9. 5 for English, 2-2.5 for Spanish (my reading is better), 1.5-2 for French (reading again).

I think Scots is different enough to be it's own language.  As has been said Frisian is suppose to be close.  As someone who doesn't know German, sometimes you can figure out sentences.  I don't think it would be to difficult for for an anglophone to learn.

I agree. But I don't think it's a living language. Have a look at this Scots website:
http://www.gov.scot/Topics/ArtsCultureSport/arts/ScotsLanguage

But, no-one talks like that. It's reconstructed from actual Scots - the language of Burns, Dunbar and the other makars. But it's like the Northern versions of Middle English (the Gawain and the Green Knight etc), it merged and was drowned by English. What remains are dialects of English with greater or lesser shadows of Scots/Middle English in them.

Just started reading Ernesto Sabato in Spanish and it's going very smoothly so far - I demand an extra point :w00t: :showoff:

Quote from: The Larch on June 25, 2016, 07:03:23 PM
German, Dutch, the various scandies. Make the effort, it's not as if we learn other romance languages just by blinking.

Sure we share some vocabulary with German, but its grammar is completely bizarre to us. And we actually share more vocabulary with French. I found French pretty easy to learn but Italians went from zero to fluent in a few weeks. I mean that was nuts. No English speaker could do that with any useful language. I mean yeah we have Scots and Frisian but those are not exactly major world languages like Spanish and French.

Yeah, I mean we're a Germanic language but without gender or cases so it's not like we can easily pick up German or even Dutch.

I have never found English that useful to learn German myself. Helps with the meaning of some words, but the grammar is too different.

I found my long dormant knowledge of Latin much more useful, regarding the use of cases and some of the word positioning. I guess that's the Indo-European remnant.

German had two chances to be relevant and took neither. I'm happy I took German in school but it's not like I use it a lot.

Quote from: Sheilbh on July 02, 2016, 02:37:47 PM
Yeah, I mean we're a Germanic language but without gender or cases so it's not like we can easily pick up German or even Dutch.

I think cases are more of a stumbling block. Gender is just memorization.

And that is just the nouns. The verb tenses are hard enough  :ph34r:

Quote from: The Brain on July 02, 2016, 02:55:13 PM
German had two chances to be relevant and took neither. I'm happy I took German in school but it's not like I use it a lot.

Cannot blame them when the rest of the world united to stop them.  :(

Quote from: celedhring on July 02, 2016, 02:51:31 PM
I have never found English that useful to learn German myself. Helps with the meaning of some words, but the grammar is too different.

I found my long dormant knowledge of Latin much more useful, regarding the use of cases and some of the word positioning. I guess that's the Indo-European remnant.

English has lost most inflections;  it's almost an outlier among Indo-European languages in that regard.  I think that's probably the main stumbling block for native English speakers trying to learn other languages--some of the inflections, such as gender for common nouns we barely even have the concept of anymore.  Native speakers of other languages find that strange, but I think their main problems with learning English are spelling and the huge size of our vocabulary.

Quote from: Sheilbh on July 02, 2016, 01:12:10 PM
[quote a
I agree. But I don't think it's a living language. Have a look at this Scots website:
http://www.gov.scot/Topics/ArtsCultureSport/arts/ScotsLanguage

But, no-one talks like that. It's reconstructed from actual Scots - the language of Burns, Dunbar and the other makars. But it's like the Northern versions of Middle English (the Gawain and the Green Knight etc), it merged and was drowned by English. What remains are dialects of English with greater or lesser shadows of Scots/Middle English in them.

Just started reading Ernesto Sabato in Spanish and it's going very smoothly so far - I demand an extra point :w00t: :showoff:

The problem with Scots as a language is that way too many people compare it to standard English and use its difference to that as proof for being a different language.... Completely ignoring the north and how historically a heavy northern dialect speaker and a heavy Scottish dialect speaker would have had a far easier time with each other than a southerner.
True the same could be said of some Scandinavian dialects but still....

QuoteI was speaking about this recently with an Irish friend who speaks Irish properly and is connected by family to the sort of Irish language intelligentsia (her aunt and uncle ran an Irish publishing house, grandparents involved in Irish language league etc). It's really interesting that in Ireland Irish is compulsory but rarely used and the Gaeltacht is getting weaker and smaller; in Wales there are still entire communities that speak Welsh as their primary language, I knew someone at uni from west Wales who didn't start learning English until he was eight. That's happened in Wales despite the fact that Welsh was at the turn of the 20th century in a far worse situation than Irish. She was wondering how you get that level of enthusiasm and penetration of a language as she'd like to see it happen in Ireland and I'd love to see Gaelic make a similar revival in Scotland.

From what I hear Irish as a first language is doing badly- all that damn EU money building roads and turning Ireland into a first world country did have its downsides in shrinking the place and make gaeltacht kids see the opportunity open to them just an hour or two away.
Wales and northern Scotland being depressed areas is probably helping to keep the language alive.

Though Irish as a second language is apparently really getting stronger these days. The schools are doing a much better job of teaching it. Lots of Irish people I know love having it as a secret language to piss off Brits.

Quote from: dps on July 03, 2016, 01:53:05 PM
but I think their main problems with learning English are spelling and the huge size of our vocabulary.

the different pronounciation of the same syllabes.  that is the hardest part in speaking english.  It's easier to write than French, but a lot harder to speak.