Asperger's and learning foreign languages

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Hi everyone,

A lot of Aspies seem to be strong in mathematics (at least according to the interwebs and various books I've read). I was never exactly bad at math, but I never had it as a special interest. For me languages are much more interesting. I'm only fluent in Danish and English, but semi-fluent in Swedish, Norwegian, French, German and Arabic. Currently learning Spanish and Greek (beginner to intermediate) and interested in a few other languages.

So are there any language nerds on here besides me, and do you think "languages" is a widespread special interest?

I sort of suck at (especially) speaking other languages.

I am into linguistics, however.

I have heard it said that Danish, Norwegian, and Swedish are mutually intelligible, almost like they are dialects of each other. That Danish, Norwegian, and Swedish are only separate languages for political reasons.

What is your take on that idea?

Yep....and don't forget how the Cantonese "dialect" of Chinese is vastly different from the "Mandarin" dialect.

Old English adopted many Scandinavian usages, and the English kingdom made use of many Scandinavian names for places.

I find Old English (and even, to some extent, Middle English), to be more like German than Modern English.

Love languages. Can't do math to save my life.

Always been fascinated by languages and desperately want to learn another aside from my one but find it so hard. The only language I have tried is french and have failed a number of times (went to college evening class, did a CD thing, did a Web thing)

What is our tip for learning a language? How best can I do it? I would like to try Spanish.

My math skills are terrible, so I'll learn a language any day.

Even though my mother is native to Central America, my Spanish is terrible, so I'll utilize other sources to improve my Spanish. I also want to improve my ASL skills along with learning Japanese.

I am not interested in languages but I know an aspie in my community who it. In fact, he had a brain scan done recently and they found that the part of the brain that deals with language learning is operating like that of a 1 year old even though he is almost 30.

That means he might be a language-learning genius....

I love languages. To me they seem like another form of math.

Learning languages (especially German) is my special interest. Luckily I also seem to have a knack for it, and am employed teaching English as a Second language. Can't imagine doing anything else!

Ever read Born On A Blue Day?

I love languages and linguistics, although I haven't really pursued them as a special interest. I'm thinking of digging deeper into comparative historical linguistics and learning about the relationships between language.

Spent a few years studying classical and koine Greek and modern German, but that was a long time ago. I'm interested in studying the following languages:

Cornish
Tocharian
Sanskrit
Farsi
Icelandic
Old English
Basque

Am fascinated by historical linguistics. How languages evolve and are related to one another. And give clues to ancient migrations and the like.

I've always been extremely interested in the technicalities of how languages work, but am too self-conscious to be any good at actually speaking foreign languages. That's probably why I specialized in Latin and Ancient Greek. When I came top in a French exam at school, the teacher commented in my report book "Excellent result. I wonder if he realizes that French can be spoken too?" Sarcastic bastard, never did rate that teacher, lol.