What languages do you know?
English and Signed English (S.E.E.)
I'm also fairly good at reading Spanish and Italian, but can't understand much when spoken due to my marginal hearing.
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"Small talk is for small minds."
ND score 125/200, NT score 93/200
English (native) , Japanese (somewhere between upper intermediate/lower advanced) but I'm poor at judging my own abilities. Going by JLPT levels, I'm nearly at the N1 level.
Kanji knowledge appears to be my strongest skill followed by reading comprehension and grammar. I'm a bit weaker at listening because there are so many homonyms in Japanese and I have issues if I can't see the kanji. I have minor issues with homonyms even in English.
Speaking, I'm abysmal at because I'm self-taught and live in an area where there are no opportunities to speak Japanese. Of course the real reason is because I've got extreme social anxiety among other things, so I'd be too embarrassed to speak even if there were chances. I'm too timid to even try to use Skype. If writing it counts for anything, I can communicate in writing and express myself adequately. I've got a few native speaker friends online.
Kanji knowledge appears to be my strongest skill followed by reading comprehension and grammar. I'm a bit weaker at listening because there are so many homonyms in Japanese and I have issues if I can't see the kanji. I have minor issues with homonyms even in English.
Speaking, I'm abysmal at because I'm self-taught and live in an area where there are no opportunities to speak Japanese. Of course the real reason is because I've got extreme social anxiety among other things, so I'd be too embarrassed to speak even if there were chances. I'm too timid to even try to use Skype. If writing it counts for anything, I can communicate in writing and express myself adequately. I've got a few native speaker friends online.
Seriously ! ! You gotta be more then just an N1, I'm barely N1 you're probably an N3 or something
Kanji knowledge appears to be my strongest skill followed by reading comprehension and grammar. I'm a bit weaker at listening because there are so many homonyms in Japanese and I have issues if I can't see the kanji. I have minor issues with homonyms even in English.
Speaking, I'm abysmal at because I'm self-taught and live in an area where there are no opportunities to speak Japanese. Of course the real reason is because I've got extreme social anxiety among other things, so I'd be too embarrassed to speak even if there were chances. I'm too timid to even try to use Skype. If writing it counts for anything, I can communicate in writing and express myself adequately. I've got a few native speaker friends online.
Seriously ! ! You gotta be more then just an N1, I'm barely N1 you're probably an N3 or something
Oh... the Japanese proficiency level ranking is a bit funny, I suppose, as it's in reverse. (^.^; It goes from N5 to N1 with N5 being the lowest and N1 being the highest.
However, being at the N1 level doesn't necessarily equal fluency, as there's a lot of vocabulary that's not included. Much of the vocabulary in the JLPT levels is centered around business, and terms that are likely to appear in a newspaper, so it still leaves one with gaps in vocabulary including some of the basic words that even native children know. Basically, what I mean is that N1 isn't native level proficiency.
I've gained most of my vocabulary from video games rather than focusing on the JLPT vocabulary, some of which I've found to be boring (笑) but for the sake of completion, I've made myself buckle down and study the N2 and N1 vocab lists over the past year.
I have a fairly decent passive vocabulary now, but I still need to work a lot to make the passive into active. And I have a minor language processing issue, I believe, which causes me to briefly mix up homonyms regardless of context and if I'm distracted or under stress, or the volume is too low I basically revert to N5 level understanding!! So, regardless of my actual knowledge I'm pretty sure I'd fail the test, anyway, haha.
Spanish is my native language (born and lived in Argentina until I was 8 ). I've lived here long enough that I speak English fluently and without an accent. I also still speak Spanish fluently since I'm always talking in it with my mom, plus reading and writing to keep myself from forgetting it.
I took German for 3 years in high school, and Latin for 3 years in middle school. I remember very little about Latin except for how Vs are supposed to be pronounced. German I remember a lot more, even went on a 2 week exchange to Austria for my German 2 class and got to learn some fun distinctions between German dialects. I have always had an amazing knack for quickly learning and memorizing words/vocabulary, but actual grammar and stringing coherent sentences is where I got snagged. I currently have Duolingo for German since I do want to pick it up again, I'm finding that grammar is a bit easier to understand now as an adult for some reason.
I can also understand about 90% of written Portuguese, and about 70% of spoken Portuguese (It is so, SO similar to Spanish it's not even funny, seriously any other Spanish speakers on here, consider picking it up! With dedicated study you can probably be fluent in about a year). I will say this only counts for Brazilian Portuguese, the Portugal version is harder for me to understand. And yeah I also have Duolingo for Brazilian Portuguese, plus my mom recently finished her course on it so I'll be hitting those books, hoping to be at least at an intermediate level within a year I also would love to learn Japanese, but that's kind of last on my list right now since compared to German and Portuguese I don't know as much. I've managed to memorize hiragana and katakana but it isn't good for much when you know little vocab lol!
Turkish, English, Japanese, Czech
I don't consider myself fluent even in my mother tongue which is Turkish. (I have subtle talking difficulties)
I can speak English, nearly as well as I can speak Turkish, however I do have an accent (not a Turkish one though).
I learned Japanese for 4 months with a tutor (finished upper intermediate level). And self studied N1-N2 level books for over a year when I was around 15. Today I have rusty skills in Kanji and speaking. But I'm confident when it comes to listening, reading and writing. I can pronounce Japanese pretty easily and correctly as it's a syllabic language like Turkish.
I'm currently learning Czech and I consider myself an upper intermediate level. I have problems speaking (mostly due to anxiety) but I can pronounce the words well. I can read, write and understand spoken language quite well too.
German was a compulsory class at high school. I can understand some German words when I read or hear but I never liked the language (the teacher) so I was not willing to actually learn it. I kind of regret it today.
One day I will learn Finnish.
What excites me about languages is certainly the grammar -though in case of Japanese also the characters. I don't care if I can't speak it so well. I just want to get to know everything behind the rules, associate, appreciate and put the pieces of puzzle together. It's just so satisfying.