11 Languages

[mikemacabre]

This is really cool.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-17107435

[micho]

Originally Posted by mikemacabre

This is really cool.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-17107435

¡Impresionante!

[Sancho Panther]

There are always going to be varying degrees of 'fluency'. If one is very articulate in their native tongue I simply cannot believe they're equally fluent in eleven other languages. 'Getting by' is one thing - total fluency another.

I can always make myself fully understood in Spanish using absolutely all the conjugations of the verbs I'm familiar with - but I'll never be as articulate in Spanish as I am in English. I suspect there some who are some who are capable of total articulacy in perhaps two or three (related) foreign languages but total, complete fluency in eleven - never. Unless you conversed regularly in all eleven you'd soon become 'rusty' (sorry mate, ha ha!); your brain simply isn't capable of retaining all that knowledge indefinitely. Most of us forget the occasional word in own language from time to time, anyway. No I'm not convinced!

[Don José]

Originally Posted by Sancho Panther

'Getting by' is one thing - total fluency another.

He was a victim of a false friend:

"... las letras de una canción son más memorables..."

Memorable (English): worth remembering or easily remembered.
Memorable (Spanish): worth remembering.

However, my congratulations to that student.

[Sancho Panther]

Originally Posted by Don José

He was a victim of a false friend:


Memorable (English): worth remembering or easily remembered.

Sorry to contradict Pepe, but I've never seen 'memorable' used to signify easy to remember.

[Rusty]

Originally Posted by Sancho Panther

... I've never seen 'memorable' used to signify easy to remember.

That's what the dictionaries that I consulted say - worth remembering or easily remembered.

In these sentences, memorable means 'easily remembered':

This word is memorable because it has fewer syllables.
The children find this word memorable because it imitates the sound made by the animal.

[Perikles]

I am reminded of an Oscar Wilde play, (I think it is the Woman of No Importance). Anyway, somebody says

"She could speak eight languages fluently, and say nothing interesting in any of them"

[Don José]

I probably consulted the same dictionary than Rusty, and also the RAE dictionary.

Sanchín, how dare you call me Pepe? ...

[JPablo]

Fenomenal.
El saber no ocupa lugar.
When I was a kid I remember some Guinness record by a Cardinal who spoke and wrote and read some ungodly number of languages, in the order of hundreds!!! (No kidding here). I met at least one guy who spoke about 20 languages rather fluently, and not only that, he was able to tell you at a distance of 30 or 40 yards "Oh, that family is Flemish" and address them in Flemish, like nobody's business... So, it's is possible... and more. I met guys who are fluently trilingual and "tetralingual" and some who speak more or less 5 or 6 languages...
I believe it was Richard Bach in Illusions the one who wrote "Justifica tus limitaciones y ciertamente las tendrás..."
So, if one don't buy on the "limitations" philosophies one can always learn...
At any rate, the accents of this student and the way he gets into the spirit of each is like they say in "Argentinean" "¡macanudo!"

[Sancho Panther]

Originally Posted by Don José

I probably consulted the same dictionary than Rusty, and also the RAE dictionary.

The same dictionary as Rusty.

[Don José]

Thanks. Now you can call me whatever you want.

[Sancho Panther]

You can call me whatever you want - but don't call me late for my dinner.