*Tau*’s Comments (group member since Jun 25, 2022)

*Tau*’s comments from the Language Learners and Polyglots group.

Berengaria wrote: "Perhaps we have a love for the languages we've learned, or at least a preference for them over our native language(s). Their phrasing and structure may perhaps seem more vivid because we did not grow up with them. They aren't "commonplace" but something delightfully different."

Very interesting food for thought, Berengaria!
Just like the rest of your reaction.
It's totally true that some things in Dutch/German are difficult to explain to people who speak another language (I've lots of French speaking colleagues who ask me questions like the ones you mentioned).
Thanks for your extensive responses! Much appreciated 😉

Berengaria wrote: "I don't really mean the linked together words as much as the tiny differences in meaning that the prefixes can give. Yes, English has phrasal verbs as well, but not nearly with the same literal exactitude of German."

That's a very interesting remark, Berengaria!
Will take a further look into this subject 😉

Peter wrote: "Well done *Tau*. I am struggling at the moment with my Dutch reading (my mother tongue is German), though the similiarities between the languages really help a lot. I found great comfort in the fact that Dutch also counts numbers backwords like "vijfentwintig" (fünfundzwanzig, five and twenty) which most foreigners find odd."

Thanks, Peter!
If you ever have any question concerning Dutch, you're always welcome to contact me (here of via a PM) 😉

Peter wrote: "I would not be so critical about English, though, Berengaria. There are many short words which are very concise, but yes, obviously German has the famous/infamous capability of creating new words, simply by concatenating existings words like the "Hottentottenmutterattentäter", which can be found in some textbooks. And English has the advantage of diriving its words from two language families at the same time Germanic (Anglo-saxon) and Roman (Norman)."

Same here, Peter.
English is in fact my favourite language (despite not being my mother tongue) 😉

Waw, does a similar word exist in German too? Didn't know that!
In Dutch it's "hottentottententententoonstelling" (which definitely means something else than the German version, but is apparently the longest existing Dutch word) 😄

This really reminds me of Opperlans (Dutch) and Oulipo (French), which are gatherings of writers who like to play with their own language 😄

English and French (Roman) have indeed a lot in common.
That's why I sometimes have difficulties to write correctly, because words are só similar!
F.e.: 'example' (Eng) versus 'exemple' (Fr), 'text' (Eng) versus 'texte' (Fr), ...

Berengaria wrote: "German is simply a richer, more expressive language, I think."

Apparently, we'll have to agree to disagree on this one, Berengaria 😉

Despite speaking Dutch and French myself, I don't think one of these languages is really 'beautiful' or more expressive than another language.

English though has so many nuanced terminology for words and expressions that even don't exist in these languages.
I don't pretend that it's never the other way round. Just try to translate 'de jarige' (in English: 'the birthday boy/girl' - in French it's even worse though: 'celui/celle qui fête son anniversaire').
And I also think that there's a difference between British and American English in that matter.
But in general I often favour the English language overall.

Berengaria wrote: "Also, the Anglo-Saxon countries don't have a long nor strong history of translation. It's been only in the last two decades that Anglo publishers have "discovered" non-English literature. (What, there are world bestsellers that we can't sell because they're not in English? Quick! Get it in English!)

This means there are far fewer good literary translators into English than you'd expect. The market simply hasn't been around long enough to achieve an overall high standard. It really depends. "

I think you've got a very strong point there!

Berengaria wrote: "Congrats though on trying German for the first time! Hope you enjoy the novel, too."

For me, that's already a big step.
But glad to finally read this story that's been on my book shelves for several years now!
Still enjoying. Although I'm only 15 pages far 😉

Paul wrote: "In short, language and culture are intextricably interwoven."

And in long? 😋
No seriously, I know that's the case.
But even in the same language there can be a whole range of differences between writers/translators 😉

Yesterday I finally started reading my first German book ever 😄
My knowledge of this language isn't good enough to understand everything I read, although I'm often able to derive the meaning from the context or by comparing to Dutch words.
But to make sure I get all the nuances right, I'm reading both the original book Gut gegen Nordwind and the English translation Love Virtually alongside each other.
What's really coming in handy is that the book consists entirely of e-mails written by the two protagonists. So after every mail or so, I read the translation.
At the moment, I'm only 5 pages far. But my first impression is that lots of nuances are lost in translation, which causes the dialogue to be less vigorous in English than it is in German.

Don't know if it'll be possible to add following book to the Goodreads database, as I don't find any ISBN number: https://www.kobo.com/za/en/ebook/bitt...

But I read it and really enjoyed reading in Afrikaans for the first time in my life!
It was fun and I'm certainly going to read the other novellas in this series too 😄
Actually it seemed like I read some kind of Dutch dialect written down on paper. Once I got used to it, it was remarkably easy to understand everything even though I can't speak the language.

Berengaria wrote: "Cool! I had to look up Bajan as I'd never heard of that dialect before. Great that you were able to find something written in it!"

Me neither, before I read this book a few weeks ago.
I can really recommend it btw!
In Time of Need by Shakirah Bourne
My review will follow (yes, I know, a major backlog) 😉

Berengaria wrote: "I've tried to have a Dutch - Afrikaans written exchange with a South African, and it didn't work so well."

When I read a sneek peak of a book written in Afrikaans, the first thing I thought was: "When I read this silently it seems like Chinese to me, but when I read it aloud it's as if someone is speaking in a heavy dialect and I suddenly understand a whole lot more." 😄

Berengaria wrote: "It's like Yiddish, I suspect. If you know good German, you can understand about 60% of "pure" Yiddish with no problems."

Hadn't heard that before. Interesting!

Berengaria wrote: "What is the book from Costa Rica? "

En Una Silla de Ruedas by Carmen Lyra.
Apparently she was the first prominent female Costa Rican author and she wrote this book before the age of 20.

'Reading around the world' really changes my reading behaviour and expands my knowledge enormously.

And then there's this inspiring group that motivates me to give other languages a try.
My initial goal was to read 1 book in Portuguese and 1 in German.
But I think I'm going to broaden my scope:
- 1 book in Bajan (already read that one)
- 1 book in Afrikaans
- 1 book in Spanish

Afrikaans is quite similar to Dutch, so that must be doable.
I think it'll be somwehat comparable to Bajan versus English. As I found that a very nice reading experience, I'm sure I'll love this too. Looking forward to it!

Although I don't really know Spanish, my knowledge of Portuguese and French helps me to understand a lot of words. And to be sure I understand (almost) everything, I'll also use Google Translate to check.
The reason why I want to read in this language, is my 'reading around the world'-challenge. Some of the countries don't seem to have books that are translated in English, Dutch or French.
There's a book from Costa Rica that I want to read now, so I bought the Spanish version. With less than 200 pages it's not too long and I'm totally going for it 😄

Berengaria wrote: "I started this group because I'd been doing a similar challenge just for me. It'd been so helpful, so I thought it might be nice to have an interactive group and encourage others to spend more time with their languages."

That was a very good idea of you, Berengaria!

Some of my books are already waiting waaaay too long here.
So I decided to pick one and to begin today (why wait any longer?) 😉
My first Portuguese book is a bilingual one: Contes et chroniques d'expression portugaise : Edition bilingue français-portugais
On the left there's the original story in Portuguese and on the right page there's a French translation. That way I don't have to take a look at the dictionary every time there's a word or expression I don't know.
I'm in no hurry to finish it, as I always read several (read: too much) books at the same time. But if I read at least one page a day, it wil be a good immersion in the language 😉

Berengaria wrote: "I already read novels in German, Dutch, Swedish, French, Spanish and Italian, besides my native English. I'm working on adding Icelandic and Welsh, but am not good enough in those yet for anything other than easy readers.

(And trying to find easy readers or any basic reading material in Icelandic is harder than learning the language, I'm convinced!)"

Wow, that's impressive!
Both the number of languages as the fact that you're trying to read Icelandic. Not easy. Just like Irish Gaelic. Although one of the hardest languages to learn imho is Hungarian. I don't remember a single word of it. It just doesn't show any resemblance to other languages. Take a look at the days of the week for example: hétfő, kedd, szerda, csütörtök, péntek, szombat, vasárnap.

Berengaria wrote: "The only real one I'll have left after I get Icelandic is Afrikaans. That's why I'm strengthening my Dutch now. Getting ready for the Big Boer Challenge! 😅 "

Never read something in Afrikaans, although I think it must be rather easy for me as Dutch is my mother tongue.
And as you speak German fluently, I'm convinced that it must be doable for you too!
Really looking forward to read about your reading experience.
Do you already have a book in mind?
You made me totally enthusiastic to read a book in Afrikaans for the South Africa-entry in my 'reading around the world'-challenge! 😄

Berengaria wrote: "Cool that you were able to get 6 years of Latin! I had 1 year in school (all they offered) and taught myself up to A2 with the fantastic Cambridge Latin Course for self-learners.

You're absolutely right, having a good Latin vocab helps not only with the Romance langs, but also with academic English. Can't tell you how many more obscure English words I understand now that I have decent Italian/beginner Latin!"

Yes, I consider myself very lucky that those lessons were given.
Even though it's a 'dead' language, the knowledge of it really helps to understand so many other things like medical language, ...

Berengaria wrote: "Sportyrod wrote: "I haven't finished my language goal yet"

I thought you'd read a "Flirting in Bahasa Indonesian" for that goal around March, if memory serves? I remember teasing you about it. 😁"

And was it effective, Sportyrod? 😋

Sportyrod wrote: "Welcome *Tau*!!! This sounds like the right group for you. So many languages you have dabbled in. Impressive."

Thank you, Sportyrod 😉
Well, it's not really impressive when you know that lots of Belgians speak several languages. We have 3 official languages (Dutch, French and German) and at school everyone learns English. Some scholars are even lucky to be able to choose Spanish or another language (sadly enough, that wasn't the case when I was young).

Sportyrod wrote: "I prefer to choose books where the author is from the same country but sometimes I see a ‘hard to find’ place and just grab the book. Feel free to raid my books for ideas. I have about 40 countries left."

If you've got difficulties to find books for some countries, don't hesitate to tell me.
I already discovered some interesting books for most (albeit not all) of them. It's fun to go on a 'treasure hunt' like this 😄

Berengaria wrote: "Hoi Tau! Wat leuk dat je bij ons bent gekomen. 👋"

Dankjewel, Berengaria 😄
Het ziet er hier een fijne groep uit!

Berengaria wrote: "We have several native German speakers here, and I'm a fluent (if not native) speaker of German. So if you have any questions, or there is a phrase you can't find a translation for, don't hesitate to post your question here. "

Thank you, I'll keep it in mind 😉

Berengaria wrote: "A number of the participants here are already finished with their challenges (like Sportyrod), but don't let that stop you from stopping by and letting us know how you're getting on! "

Actually, this is an ongoing challenge that I set myself 😉
Just like reading more in French, as I don't often choose books in this language. Probably that's because I don't know a lot of French writers and I prefer to read books in their original language as important nuances are often lost in translation (and thus read more in English).

Oh, I also forgot to tell that I'm reading around the world too.
A few months ago I was totally inspired by the TED-talk of Ann Morgan and decided to broaden my horizon by trying to read (at least) one book of every country in the world.
This is also an ongoing challenge, as I want to change my reading habits permanently and discover as many lesser known titles as possible.
The only requirement for the books I pick for that challenge is that the story has to take place in the country of origin of the author. Because only then you immerse yourself totally in another environment/culture.
Already found some real gems and it turns out to be an interesting way to learn new languages as well. Recently I finished the Barbadian book In Time of Need by Shakirah Bourne and most of the stories were written in Bajan, an English-based creole language that I'd never heard/read before. Loved both the stories and the authenticity of the language in which they were written!

Hello everyone!

Just discovered this group thanks to Sportyrod 😉

To quickly introduce myself I think it's best to copy my profile text:

Reading the following word cloud will allow
To discover more about the person behind *Tau*

The number of items isn't chosen randomly, you know
If you count them up and do it right, tadaaa … my age* will show ;-)

* art (journaling) * beautiful colours * Belgium *blanket * blogging * board games * bubbles * bucket list * calm * challenges * collector * creative * culture * dark chocolate * discover * e-books * English * fantasy * fiction * Français * hsp * humour * hygge * inspiration * list maker * movies * my word of the year 2022: habits * nature * Nederlands * non-fiction * paper books * photography * pizza * Português * series * short stories * single (malt) * strawberries * travel * water * wine * woman *

*And yes, it's the answer to everything 😄


So, I'm from Belgium and I was raised bilingually in Dutch and French.
Still using these languages daily, both at work and at home.
But in the meantime English (which I learned at school since the age of 13) became my favourite language, as it provides more nuances. That's also why I read mostly in this language.

A few years ago I went to evening class to learn (European) Portuguese. But as I don't practice it often anymore, a lot of my of knowledge seems to evaporate. That's why I want to read at least 1 book (and hopefully many more) in Portuguese this year.

At school I also had a few lessons of German. Even though German resembles Dutch, there are quite some differences and thus it would be a good exercice to read at least 1 book in German too this year. There's already one waiting on my shelves since quite some time: the epistolary novel Gut gegen Nordwind by Daniel Glattauer. Although I'll probably buy the English e-book version (Love Virtually) too to compare and see if I understood everything 😄

My knowledge of Latin (6 years at school), French and Portuguese helps me to understand a lot of other Roman languages like Spanish and Italian.
Furthermore I always like to learn a few basic words/sentences of the languages of the countries to which I travel. That's why I have a very summary knowledge of different languages. But certainly not enough to read entire books.

Sportyrod wrote: "By complete coincidence I bought a book that is half in Spanish."

Now I'm curious to know which book that is 😄