Hedonologist

Hi there, and welcome to Linguaholic.

Spanish is indeed an elegant language, and should be a nice relatively simple start (although by no means an easy feat). I hope you find what you need here to help you with your endeavor.

Does anyone here have access to or own the Cambridge Latin Course? I personally have found it to be one of the best available. It is very rich in vocabulary and does a good job of simulating immersion using dialogues throughout. The one downside I would have to say is that it is a bit light on grammar to start with, but seeing as that can often be off putting for newbies that might not be such a bad thing.

I use a multitude of sources, I have the teach yourself series but I found that to be too grammar intensive, and very light on vocabulary. I have the 'Cambridge Latin Course' which I've found to be very helpful, it also does a great deal of explaining ancient roman culture at the time as well.

Greek was the only alphabet I've learned that I did in under a day, I suppose having already learned Cyrillic I was sort of cheating there. Greek is probably the closest to the Latin alphabet we use in most European languages so it makes sense to be the easiest to learn.

They usueally give the common english words used in Hindi phrasebooks also.

I don't actually own any Hindi phrasebooks but I was hoping that this would be the case. It certainly makes sense for a language known for it's high use of code-switching. On the other hand if I use too many English words, they may simple assume I am not proficient, it's a difficult conundrum.

Well I have a cop[y of the OED, but for practical purposes I use Collins. I use it for all my foreign languages and I find it just as good for English too. Compact and concise. Most editions have a good grammar in too.

I would say drill vocab, some basic grammar then look in a dutch newspaper. There is so much familiarity that it shouldn't be too hard to get a basic grasp very early on. Immersion from the start will probably help you more than anything else.

Has anyone else noticed that in so many courses for Hebrew and Arabic there seems to be a familiar structure. I've noticed that the word for House 'bait', which is the same in both languages is usually the first noun taught.

I know they are both Semitic languages so maybe that has something to do with it.

Are there any certificates one can take in the UK at a beginners/intermediate level?

I am not fluent in advanced German, but I am comfortable at conversational level and was wondering if there are any certifications I can take to demonstrate this? I am aware of some professional certifications but these are only for near native level speakers.

I'm a big fan of anime   I actually follow a lot anime series right now, I love the ones that come with subs; I completely dislike the dubbed ones!  Believe it or not, I've been able to learn A LOT japanese words thanks to watching anime regularly (at least the pronunciation - and that's a good start!).  And even if you don't learn a lot japanese thanks to anime, at least you had a good time watching it (I do every time!).

What do you guys think?  Do you think watching anime is a good way to learn some japanese words? Do you ever watch anime?

Absolutely. Watching foreign media is why so many people can speak English. Obviously there is also an economic reason to do so, but the reason that fluency is so widespread is because of such high levels of immersion.

I barely have a grasp on Hiragana and I'm not looking forward to diving into Katakana, however, I know at the end of the day it's just spending the time to practice them. Flashcards work wonders!

I've always found that personally flashcards only work with me for vocabulary. The only way I can get to grips with alphabets is by using them and transliterating them bit by bit. Of course if you've memorized them all then it can help but it's just not enough for fluency with me.

Nice idea! Maybe you could do a common one and a less common one, as I've already studied Chinese for a short while I was already acquainted with those two characters. I'm looking forward to more though.

A few days ago, in my classical chinese class, our teacher introduced a chinese character with 64 strokes:

It is actually one character, however it consists of four times the element dragon. The character is pronounced zhe2 (second tone) and it meant talkative, garrulous in ancient times.

If that's 1 character I'm assuming them you would have to write each 'component' at a quarter of it's normal size, is that even practical?

I really like the Newcastle accent

Newcastle is also my favourite accent.

Liverpool is my least favourite, Birmingham 2nd least favourite.

When i try to learn other writing systems (Greek, Arabic for example), I will often try to write normal sentences in English, but using the foreign alphabet. This isn't possible with hiragana though as the syllables are only useful for Japanese. Does anyone else learn alphabets the same way as me, and is having trouble with hiragana because of it?

Out of pure interest, and other reasons, although I assumed in 10-15 years it will give me a bonus for work as well. I've simply been interested in it for years, and if I learn it I will be able to gain access to information sources I wouldn't have before. As well as communicate with more Chinese people.

Often when native English speakers attempt to use a learnt language with a native speaker, the native speaker will revert to English. Germans have a reputation for preferring to use English fluently, rather than broken German, but I've not found this to be the case with me personally.

Do you have any experience with this?

Is it easier to learn characters and remember them with a higher degree of recall if you learn the 214 radicals of by heart first? I am planning to do this (if nothing else I will have gained 214 characters so why not) am am wondering how useful it will be overall.

4 and 5 are certainly true, and in my opinion the most important. It can take a lot of effort on your part to actually do it, but if you never do then you will never attain a high degree of fluency, if any at all! Pretty much all of those are good though. I must admit I have been a bit slacking with the tones.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Chinese-Steps-Student-Book-Vol/dp/1907838104

There is the amazon link tot he exact book I'm referring to. However, if you live in the UK you can purchase it from some of the larger waterstones stores.

It certainly gives you a good enough gist of the text to be able to understand what is being written, I think that's all you can ask of it really. Of course there will be errors but for a free service I think it's very good.

As someone who's dutch is better than my German, I can often get confused, especially as I am learning German now. The verbs can get especially confusing as there are many similarities. If you use both often enough it shouldn't be a problem, but it can get confusing for beginners.

It's unfair to blame English speakers for being monolingual as there is so much less exposure to other languages. British people can almost universally use American English, and none of us have ever made an effort to learn it, but merely by osmosis from media we have picked it up.

It takes much less effort for non-native to learn English as there is so much natural immersion.

Need to = Must

Must have = Need

therefore if you can substitute the word with must have, you should use need, and if you can substitute with need to, you should use must.

I would say it's good to have a grasp on both. Most British people can use both interchangeably, but Americans tend to be not so proficient in British English. Although that's mostly because we have more American TV then they do British.