nkaujntses

The film is called Gran Torino! It's a fantastic movie!

Yes. "Gran Torino" is a film with a storyline with Hmong people and Hmong actors. Like all Hollywood films, there were some misconceptions and generalizations, but it is an enjoyable movie.

"If you lie with dogs, you will get up with fleas."

I have heard two meanings. The first one is if you hang out with a certain crowd, others will believe you are like them. The second is a warning: If you do dangerous things, don't be surprised of the consequences.

Chaos: Many mispronounce it as how it looks when it's supposed to be pronounced as "kay-oss."

Colonel: Growing up, I've always mispronounce it as "colonial." "But that's how it's spelled!" I would argue. The correct way to say it is "kernel."

My father spoke 6 languages: Hmong, English, Laotian, Thai, Mandarin, and French. He is ethnically Hmong, so that is his native language and what he spoke the most. He learned Mandarin from speaking with his grandfather whose father migrated from Southern China. He was born and lived in Laos until the after the Vietnam War, so of course he learned Laotian. He learned French because there was a lot of French influence with the Hmong villages in Laos after the first Indochina War (We still carry French coins on some of our traditional clothing). He learned Thai while he was in the Hmong refugee camp in Thailand. And of course, he learned English after we immigrated to the US.

I believe is is possible to learn. To retain the languages learned is something else. You have to use it on a daily basis or you'll lose it. My father is rusty in his French and Mandarin. He is currently living in Laos, so he speaks it the best out of all the languages he has learned.

Nyob zoo, sawv daws! Hello everyone! I currently live in California, USA. I am fluent in Hmong and English, with Hmong being my native language.

What is Hmong (as that is a question I get a lot)? Hmong, also known as Miao, is a Chinese ethnic minority. The Hmong outside of China prefer to identify themselves as Hmong rather than Miao. For me personally, I don't mind either way. There are many subgroups of the Miao ethnicity with many languages as well.

The Hmong language is also known as Chuanqiandian. As stated, there are many branches of the Hmong language with many dialects. I am only familiar with Western Hmong language and the Romanized Popular Alphabet Hmong written language (RPA Hmong). The Western Hmong language has 2 dialects: White Hmong (Hmoob Dawb) and Green Hmong (Hmong Ntsuab/Hmoob Lees). I am a White Hmong speaker, reader, and writer. I can understand 50% of Green Hmong.

I have always had a fascination and interest in language. I took French 4 years in high school with the hopes of taking a trip to France after high school. That never happened, but I loved every minute of French class. I do plan on revisiting the French language one of these days. This forum looks like it may be great help.

Thank you for reading!

Dear nkaujntses

First of all, welcome to linguaholic.com! I am very excited about having a native hmong speaker here in the forums! I know very little about the hmong language(s) and I would love to learn more about it. If you could start a thread and write about your own language (for instance you could talk about the history, number of native speakers, grammar, writing script, topology, and so on) that would be incredible. Later on, I can also create a new sub forum for hmong languages if there is some interest for it! I'm very eager to learn more about it! :grin:

Thank you for the welcome. I'm no expert on the Hmong language, so I may disappoint you in my knowledge. But I will do so.

I think it is common in American English to put the comma there, but not in British English.

Also, you may need a comma if the sentence is ambiguous.

For example: "I bought a bag of crisps, salt and vinegar at the store." Does that mean you bought a bag of salt & vinegar flavoured crisps, or did you buy a bag of crisps, along with salt and vinegar?

Adding a comma instantly tells us that in addition to the crisps, you also bought salt and vinegar: "I bought a bag of crisps, salt, and vinegar."

Also see the Wikipedia article about the serial comma.

I was taught to use the Oxford comma or serial comma. I do know that even though it's normal to use the serial comma in standard writing in America, American journalists never use it. Like Daedalus stated, it can be ambiguous sometimes. That's why I prefer to use the serial comma so there's no misunderstanding in my writing.

I live in California, USA and cursive is still being taught in the school district I live in. Starting from kindergarten, the students learn the D'Nealian style of handwriting. The D'Nealian print is easier for students to transition into cursive. They start the transition at the end of first grade and beginning of second grade.

Cursive is such beautiful writing. I am not sure why it's starting to phase out. I write in cursive most of the time. My print is not as pretty as my cursive writing.

My family and I immigrated to the US when I was almost 3 years old. Hmong is my native language. In the US, my parents didn't speak a word of English, so I started learning English when I started preschool. It was hard.

I remember we had an activity in class where the students took off our shoes and put in the middle of the class. Then, one by one, each student would go into the pile of shoes and put on their shoes. As I'm watching my classmates take their shoes one by one, I saw a girl take my sneakers and put them on. I though, "Oh, my! She took my shoes! What am I going to do?" When my turn came, I just stood there. The teacher asked me what was wrong. I didn't know what to say! I pointed to my shoes on the feet of my classmate. My teachers asked if those were mine. I nodded. She asked the girl to take them off and get her own shoes. I was so relieved!

Getting off topic a bit there. I took French for 4 years in high school. It has been a while since I've used it, but I believe I've retained a bit of French.

Because English is not my native language, I have a slight accent when I speak English. My accent is more evident when my brain isn't working well, such as early morning or when I'm hungry or tired. But if I concentrate, I can erase my accent to sound just like an American newscaster.

I was wondering if this has happened to anyone else... I was born in Sweden and lived there till I was 7 and I obviously was fluent, I knew how to read, etc. but then we moved to the U.S. and my parents stopped speaking Swedish because we didn't know any English.

Fast forward to the future and I'm totally fluent in English and Swedish remains this thing that I can understand randomly (but not in a fluency level), but really can't put together more than a few sentences.

My oldest child spoke only Hmong from birth to when she started kindergarten. She didn't speak a sentence of English. Many people told me that I had to speak English to her because she wouldn't do well in school. Not true. After about a month of school, she spoke English so well and refused to speak English. It has been a year and she has stopped speaking Hmong completely. She does understand me when I speak Hmong to her. And sometimes she even repeats what I say in English, so I know she is fully aware of the Hmong language. She just doesn't speak it. When I ask her, she says that she's not comfortable talking in Hmong.

I believe that if you do not use the language, you will lose it. And losing one's primary language is faster in children than adults. For me, although I am fluent in Hmong, if I don't speak it for a while (we live in a community where we do not run into Hmong individuals a lot) I get rusty. The more I speak, read, or write it, the better I am at it. Online is a great place to practice.