How many languages do you speak, read or write?

[Danielle Kristina]

I only speak English, but I did learn Morse Code though my Code is rusty.  Once I graduate and get out of school I'd like to rebuild my CW (Morse Code) skills.

[Jin]

English and Sailor.

[LexieDragon]

Out Of practice for most  (read unused languages fade away until you start using them again) but (excluding programming languages):

English (native)
Spanish (s/r/w)
Latin (r/w)
French (r)
Italian (r)

If you include programming the list is rather long.

[DawnOday]

I can read any language except from Asia. It is understanding the message that I fail at.  

[Julia1996]

My grandparents speak German, English and French. My dad speaks those 3 as well. My mom speaks English and Danish. And my brother is pretty fluent in German. So you would think I knew at least one other language besides English but no. I'm a total dunce with languages other than English. My grandparents did try to teach me German but I just never picked it up. One reason is because I don't like German. I'm sorry but German is an ugly language. You could say " I love you" in German and it sounds like " I WILL KILL YOU"!  Even though it's technically English I totally think I should get credit for knowing Australian. It's kind of a second language. When I first started dating Tristan I didn't know what he was saying half the time. Once when we were watching TV he asked me if I had any biscuits. I told him no, but if he really wanted biscuits I could make some. I had no clue what he wanted was cookies.  And once his mom was talking about someone sending pictures of her "bub" and how cute it was.  Who could know Aussies call babies "bubs" .  Potato chips are "crisps". "Beauty" means excellent or good. Testicles are "oysters". And he calls other guys "mate". I guess mate is the aussie equivalent of "dude" .  And do you know he had the nerve to tell me he didn't know what I was talking about sometimes when we first started dating! Me! He's the one who talks funny. I speak normal English thank you.

[sarah1972]

One reason is because I don't like German. I'm sorry but German is an ugly language. You could say " I love you" in German and it sounds like " I WILL KILL YOU"! 

Hahaha... try "Fussbodenschleifmaschinenverleih" or "Kraft­fahr­zeughaft­pflicht­ver­si­che­rung" (36 characters) or "Telekommunikationsüberwachungsverordnung". A lot of these words happen when the government tries to find a term for a new law... like "Rindfleischetikettierungsüberwachungsaufgabenübertragungsgesetz".

For us more relevant is the "Transexuellengesetz" which regulates things like name and gender maker change.

Anyways, compared to these words "Ich Liebe Dich" sounds almost pretty ;D;D

[MaryT]

... You could say " I love you" in German and it sounds like " I WILL KILL YOU"!  ...

A little unfair, perhaps?  You must admit that "danke schön" sounds rather nice, especially in the song. 

I think that German has had a bum rap for a long time now.  I remember listening to a colleague who had seen some war movie or documentary and was talking about German soldiers goose-stepping while marching and how aggressive it was.  I think that he was influenced by George Orwell, who wrote "It is simply an affirmation of naked power; contained in it, quite consciously and intentionally, is the vision of a boot crashing down on a face."  I remembered a scene in The World at War in which German soldiers marched to the tune Erika, so I pointed out that the goose-step was just a slow march and that the soldiers my colleague had been watching were probably singing about pretty flowers, not about crushing faces.

Not that I am immune from the prejudice.  Many years ago in what is now northern Namibia, I was on a camping trip in which the guide, his wife and my fellow travellers were all German speaking.  When they realised that I sometimes knew what they were talking about, they decided I should improve my German further.  When I was struggling, a woman suggested the words I was looking for.  I nodded and thanked her.  Then she loudly said "SAY IT!" and I nervously did.  I thought "My God, they really do have ways and means of making you talk."  I then had a suspicion, though, so I asked "Bist du ein professor?" (Are you a teacher? [In my bad German])  She smiled benignly and admitted that she was.

Then again, as the bachelor says in Faust, "When one is polite in German, one lies." 

I'm ashamed at how few languages I speak even to a useful extent, considering that I have lived on three continents.  Schoolteachers tried to teach me Arabic and French and I have been on courses to study German and Latin.  I spent time studying Zulu, Tsonga and Herero.  Before camping trips in East Africa I studied Swahili and Amharic.  In spite of all that, the only languages that I spoke quite well were English, Afrikaans and Fanagalo, as at one period I used them in my daily life.

My excuse is that I am English speaking, so the choice of a second language is not as obvious as it is for other nationalities.  English is the most popular second language in the world.  The French speak French and English, the Germans speak German and English and the English speak English and English.

[LexieDragon]

My grandparents speak German, English and French. My dad speaks those 3 as well. My mom speaks English and Danish. And my brother is pretty fluent in German. So you would think I knew at least one other language besides English but no. I'm a total dunce with languages other than English. My grandparents did try to teach me German but I just never picked it up. One reason is because I don't like German. I'm sorry but German is an ugly language. You could say " I love you" in German and it sounds like " I WILL KILL YOU"!  Even though it's technically English I totally think I should get credit for knowing Australian. It's kind of a second language. When I first started dating Tristan I didn't know what he was saying half the time. Once when we were watching TV he asked me if I had any biscuits. I told him no, but if he really wanted biscuits I could make some. I had no clue what he wanted was cookies.  And once his mom was talking about someone sending pictures of her "bub" and how cute it was.  Who could know Aussies call babies "bubs" .  Potato chips are "crisps". "Beauty" means excellent or good. Testicles are "oysters". And he calls other guys "mate". I guess mate is the aussie equivalent of "dude" .  And do you know he had the nerve to tell me he didn't know what I was talking about sometimes when we first started dating! Me! He's the one who talks funny. I speak normal English thank you.

I think dialects are fine. Well played.

[MaryT]

... And he calls other guys "mate". I guess mate is the aussie equivalent of "dude" . ...

I think that Americans must have used "mate" to mean "friend" or "dude" at one time.  After all, there is the song that goes
"It's simply great mate waiting on the levee
Waiting for the Robert E. Lee".

I gather that like Cockneys, Australians use quite a lot of rhyming slang.  For example, does Tristan ever call people "China" instead of "mate"?

[Corax]

I know:
German
English
Latin

I study:
Norwegian

I understand and can read:
Dutch
Yiddish
I never learned either though. It's just due to their similarity and linguistic relation to my native language that I can understand those.

[Corax]

My grandparents did try to teach me German but I just never picked it up. One reason is because I don't like German. I'm sorry but German is an ugly language. You could say " I love you" in German and it sounds like " I WILL KILL YOU"!

To be frank that is solely your opinion not an objective fact as you formulated it as and opinions are like arseholes, everyone got them.
Additonally judging from the fact that you admitted to not know anything about the German language, don't understand it, don't speak it, and hence have no clue whatsoever about the subject you are talking about I would call this an uninformed and ignorant opinion on top of that.

From my perception the German language to those who not only know it but occupy themselves deeper in it reveals that it is a truly rich and beautiful language. As a writer out of passion who writes in German and English I can say that the German language is perfect to express oneself, to paint detailed pictures and built worlds with words as the language itself is really specific and detail oriented and offers plenty of different ways to say one thing. It's also really sophisticated if one knows how to use it properly. It's the perfect language for writers and although I am not a fan of poetry in general for poets as well as it has something that is unique to it and that one doesn't just find in any other random language and many people who too like to write see it the same way I do no matter which second or third language or native tongue they had. 

I would give you the benefit of the doubt about the 'I love you sounds like I kill you in German' thing as that's normally a joke about the language sounding hard and harsh to foreigners from some nations and not used as an argument to 'prove' the language is supposedly ugly.
I really like that my native language sounds strong and powerful though, that some words have a certain sharpness to them  and that it doesn't sound soft, weak and breakable, who would want that anyway? I am not a fan of softness; it's not attractive to me personally at all. Why would I want to sound like I had drunken some fabric softener? So the supposed harshness of the language is actually something I deem positive about it as well as about the accent I have when I speak English which is a language I too appreciate. The English language is great although I have heard some people butchering it in a really unappealing way (and by that I don't mean simple mistakes in grammar and orthography).

Even though it's technically English I totally think I should get credit for knowing Australian. It's kind of a second language. When I first started dating Tristan I didn't know what he was saying half the time. Once when we were watching TV he asked me if I had any biscuits. I told him no, but if he really wanted biscuits I could make some. I had no clue what he wanted was cookies.  And once his mom was talking about someone sending pictures of her "bub" and how cute it was.  Who could know Aussies call babies "bubs" .  Potato chips are "crisps". "Beauty" means excellent or good. Testicles are "oysters". And he calls other guys "mate". I guess mate is the aussie equivalent of "dude" .  And do you know he had the nerve to tell me he didn't know what I was talking about sometimes when we first started dating! Me! He's the one who talks funny. I speak normal English thank you.

Had I known cheating with dialects was a thing I could have made myself seem like a frigging language genius. As our small country that is only about the size of Texas has estimated maybe about 20 different dialects or something and I can understand them all. As well as I can understand Austrian German and Swiss German. And I also am able to understand more than one dialect in English too.
I know that in Latin there is a slight difference between church Latin and the original but I only know the original anyway.

I use the term "mate" in the same way sometimes by the way and I never saw anything strange about it but I am not American and neither a native English speaker so....

[Julia1996]

I think that Americans must have used "mate" to mean "friend" or "dude" at one time.  After all, there is the song that goes
"It's simply great mate waiting on the levee
Waiting for the Robert E. Lee".

I gather that like Cockneys, Australians use quite a lot of rhyming slang.  For example, does Tristan ever call people "China" instead of "mate"?

I've never heard him call anyone China. But he uses plenty of other Aussie slang.  He calls his penis his "donger".  Getting an erection is " cracking a fat". He calls boogers "bush oysters". He calls vomit "chunder". I could write a book of the Aussie slang and expressions he uses.

[Kylo]

I absolutely love the German language in its written form, but I understand people who say it sounds guttural and aggressive and "unbeautiful". It certainly doesn't flow to the extent French and Spanish do and is filled with a lot of staccato sounds.

English too, since they're related.

I wish I knew more German, as I enjoy hanging around in Switzerland and Austria.

[HappyMoni]

At one time I could speak New Yorkese, but if you don't use it, you lose it. I can do a little sign language, but not much. I don't do New York sign language as it tended to cause problems when I was driving.

[Kylo]

Any relation to Italian hand gestures by any chance? lol