On languages and their meaning

[valtitude]

Here's the follow-up of the debate about languages - started in the Paris Residency thread.

So, here we were:

i'm from belgium and you may know that we have three official languages here : french, dutch and german. the german community is so small that they don't bother about language problems: they speak french or german.

Yes, I may know that there are 3 official languages in my own country.
What I don't pretend to know, though, is how the german-speaking community feels towards the situation of their language. Are they really left any choice, other than, to switch to french?

dutch people use to speak good french. but they don't want to anymore.

Who said that?
In conversations, they are often the first to switch to french when talking to speakers of french. They generally love to show they can speak french - maybe better than us french-speakers speak dutch.
You're confusing cultural and political matters there. I see which politician you're thinking of, but he has almost nothing to do with the use of french in flanders.

the french part is still soooo annoyed to learn that "ugly-and-useless-language" that is dutch.

That's true. For many people at least (teenagers are especially reluctant to learn dutch at school), and it's a shame I agree. Maar het is mijn geval niet.

french people prefer english "as it's much more useful".

I don't think that's the only reason. They also find it more beautiful and easier to learn. They aren't mad at british or american people, too ...

it leads the country to that third-class communication, where there are already two independent countries in one big empty shell called belgium.

Do you really believe this comes from french-speakers prefering english to dutch?

so for you, as soon as english is supposed to be "the" language, the whole world should be fluent or at least make facilities to our so generous and tasty english-speaking neighbours? what about erasing all the foreign currencies so the whole world would use the dollar? much more easier for americans when they want to travel the world, right?

Nice sample of typical anti-american discourse.

English is easy to learn and use, it is the language of computers, the language of markets, the language of scientific articles, the language of 75% of celebrities. It's not my fault. It's a very beautiful language as well, people like it and it's not my fault either. Italian sounds more beautiful than german to the ears of many people, what can I do?

let's enjoy getting on a french website and use a google translator! let's enjoy surfing on korean websites and having no clue about what's going on! come on, it's curiosity!

No one said that "avosbillets" had to erase its french pages. Some people are not curious about languages, some others don't have time to be curious. An english page is necessary when selling the tickets of an international venue.

they don't have good teachers in france? well, get a good teacher from wherever you are and learn french!

Le français est ma langue maternelle. Et je l'adore. As I love english, nederlands en misschien ook italiano e espanol.

And then I'll end up with my favourite remark of you:

Your post-colonialist way of viewing things is quite funny, especially from a björk fan

This was mean.
But well ... I know for myself ... how much I love originality, freedom of mind, cultural specificities and tastes.
Those rolling "rrr"'s before every "T"'s, that voice singing in that language I don't understand but which still calms me down, that sense of humility coming from the cold and the raw.

So I won't let you do that to me!

[benjicoq]

No one said that "avosbillets" had to erase its french pages. Some people are not curious about languages, some others don't have time to be curious. An english page is necessary when selling the tickets of an international venue..

Well , what is an "international venue " anyway?
Le zenith is not an international venue , it's a French venue ... Who books acts that are sometimes not French but that's not the point
If I follow you , any venue is international since anyone from anywhere could want to see every possible concert

[valtitude]

LOL, come on Benjicoq ...

We all know Madonna is going to attract more people from outside France than Shym.
Or Lady Gaga than Emilie Simon.
Or James Blunt than Grégoire.

Don't act "mauvaise foi" LOL!

[Magnetar]

the french part is still soooo annoyed to learn that "ugly-and-useless-language" that is dutch.

No offense to my German 4um friends, but don't ever tell me Dutch is an ugly language compared to German!

[benjicoq]

LOL, come on Benjicoq ...

We all know Madonna is going to attract more people from outside France than Shym.
Or Lady Gaga than Emilie Simon.
Or James Blunt than Grégoire.

Don't act "mauvaise foi" LOL!

well, you used the term "venue" which means "lieu" in french. And i could not get why le zenith was more "international" than any other venue in france... You meant to use the word "act", maybe?


Though I still don't agree with you on "people from abroad may come, the website MUST be bilingual" (it's great when it's the case though). And i have no idea how french is perceived abroad as a language

----

I find german more beautiful to hear than dutch though (and more than a lot of european languages : italian, spanish, those are hurting my ears)

[faber]

I find german more beautiful to hear than dutch though (and more than a lot of european languages : italian, spanish, those are hurting my ears)

[wereduck]

And i have no idea how french is perceived abroad as a language

It's pretty high on the list of international languages imo. In the English speaking world, it can be first or second to Spanish, but it's seen as a valuable skill even more in other countries from what I've seen.

[Magnetar]

I find german more beautiful to hear than dutch though (and more than a lot of european languages : italian, spanish, those are hurting my ears)

Then you are an exception, because it's well known that French, Italian and Spanish are the softer, more romantic languages in Western Europe and German is a hard/harsh language. Again, no offense to anyone, it's just the way it's broadly perceived.

[benjicoq]

spanish sounds very harsh to me.
german , spoken by people with moderate accent, sounds soft to me... French can be horrible when spoken by people from certain regions of France

[Huurre]

Dutch and Danish sound very quirky to me: Dutch sounds angry and aggressive and Danish is like mumbling. But it's good that there are so many languages.

[faber]

every language seems horrible when spoken by horrible people

luckily, we're all perfect and beautiful in this forum

(on the other hand, as far as i'm aware : italian and french are the romantic/snobby ones, spanish is the sexy one and german is the harsh one! i prefer german over french though, but i love both )

[Huurre]

I LOVE French.

[valtitude]

the french part is still soooo annoyed to learn that "ugly-and-useless-language" that is dutch.

No offense to my German 4um friends, but don't ever tell me Dutch is an ugly language compared to German!

I prefer German than Dutch
It sounds more legendary to me. Some german accents are sweeter in sound than dutch (from the netherlands) and flemish (from belgium).

[valtitude]

well, you used the term "venue" which means "lieu" in french. And i could not get why le zenith was more "international" than any other venue in france... You meant to use the word "act", maybe?


Though I still don't agree with you on "people from abroad may come, the website MUST be bilingual" (it's great when it's the case though). And i have no idea how french is perceived abroad as a language

----

I find german more beautiful to hear than dutch though (and more than a lot of european languages : italian, spanish, those are hurting my ears)

Yeah Benjicoq, I confused "venue" and "act" indeed. Hum!

When I said "it must be bilingual", I meant: "there's no other way possible" more than "it's an obligation". How french is perceived abroad has nothing to do with that, has it? The fact is that English is more commonly known than French over the world. On Björk's fb page, people react in english, too. It's just a language people use whenever they feel like the space in which they communicate is gonna be multicultural and multilingual. It's become a reflex. As a consequence, I'll stick to the idea that the pre-sale page should have been bilingual french (because the Zenith is french) - english (for all non-french-speakers' comfort, and because it's impossible to translate in all their individual languages).

On italian and spanish, oh, this is quite rare to hear/read.
But it's true that spanish sounds a bit fragmented and "tough".

But italian, ... I love it. It sounds very melodic to me.

Hurting your ears, maybe because those languages tend to be spoken loud, too?

[valtitude]

spanish sounds very harsh to me.
german , spoken by people with moderate accent, sounds soft to me... French can be horrible when spoken by people from certain regions of France

The perception of an accent as 'beautiful' or 'horrible' is very subjective and intricate. I don't really know where you come from and where do you live, and which accents you are talking about ...

But I have a friend from Marseille, another from Millau (sorry if wrong spelling), and another from Grenoble, and they all think the accent from Paris is horrible and harsh to hear. I personnally love those accents from the south of France, that from the Cevennes being my favourite. It is very sweet and melodic.

Then, it's all a question of associations. For us belgian people, and maybe for people from northern France, southern accents mean holidays, grasshopers, Van Gogh and lavender. I bet it's not the same from a parisian point of view. People from Marseille I believe to be a bit jealous of Paris. They are actually upset that their city, which is the 2nd city of France, is negatively seen from the outside. Marseille is beautiful indeed, but it's ruined by its bad reputation - and possibly by other famous, more glamour places on the Riviera .

Well, it's not really fair indeed ... Episodes of "Faites entrer l'accusé" mostly take place in another region of France: Alsace! (which I love too, btw).

Mhh ... Then of course, when people you love have an accent, you are prone to love that accent too.

[Burnface]

My favourite foreign language is probably English. I really love upper-class-posh accents (even though I find them tricky to understand), southern US accents and that stupid lovely valleyspeak. And aussie accent...

I find French very soft, like Portuguese. And I agree on German sounding a bit harsh (yet beautiful).

Spanish is not sexy at all. In fact, it's a bit harsh too.

Italian sounds like lies to me, like they're telling me everything's OK and I'm awesome and cool and hot but it's just sweet talk or something.

I'm not calling you a liar, faber!

[faber]

Italian sounds like lies to me, like they're telling me everything's OK and I'm awesome and cool and hot but it's just sweet talk or something.

I'm not calling you a liar, faber!

AHHAHAHAHAHHAHA i think i got your point ...

Well i like my language...even if sometimes i reckon it's not comprehensible

[Wolf1203]

German beeing a harsh language?

Generally I would agree...BUT

Or is it the austrian accent that makes it more gentle

[benjicoq]

hahah, austrian accent generaly does NOT make german sound gentler, it's quite the opposite, actually . but yeah, german can be soft, when spoken with little accent
People think french as a soft language, but when sponken with northern accent, or eastern accent (pas de calais, moselle ), it sounds a lot harscher

[mandrake]

People usually misjudge the harshness or softness of a language, they don't really know yet.

E.g. most Germans think, that Russian is quite harsh (and when mocking the accent doing it wrong). Actually, by softening consonants and the lack of aspiration of consonants, Russian is probably a softer language than German.

[spookie]

every language seems horrible when spoken by horrible people

[MartinSlovakia]

spanish sounds very harsh to me.
german , spoken by people with moderate accent, sounds soft to me... French can be horrible when spoken by people from certain regions of France

In Slovakia, the most popular foreign language is without any doubt English followed by German. You just have to learn some language if you do not want to be forever stuck inside the borders of our little state. Then there is Spanish and French but only very little, there are only few colleges in those languages.
I have learnt English, Spanish and I know something from German too. I think every language has its high points and low points. For example, English seems somehow banal to me already (no offence, but it is really everywhere!). Still, it is totally necessary know it if you do not want to stay forever in one place.

And Spanish is beautiful, wonderful, listen here what a soft language:


And German can be soft too, it depends on who is speaking, look here, my favourite romantic scene of all the time with extraordinary, orgasmatic pronunciation: (Ich weiss, DU BIST DAS, oh....)


Still, the most beautiful language is this, here is where my heart lives (I would really like to know how it sounds like to foreigners):

[Apex]

Interesting thread.

I haven´t thought of it ever, to be honest.

Finnish is a beautiful yet complicated language to me. I like the rolling "r", the seemingly often use of "k" and "t"
It somehow sounds like a machine gun to me Rrrratatatatat Kikikikiki

There are 2 german accents I highly dislike: bayrisch and sächsisch (bavarian&saxon)! They even sound like a foreign language.
I´ve grown up in Lower Saxony Northwest Germany and we speak like it´s written and teached to foreigners. So it´s what you learn in shool.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lower_Saxony#History

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hildesheim

All in all, every language (not accent) has it´s own charme.

[Proddukd]

German sounds like a bunch of farmers talking.
Not saying that Dutch is such a great language though, but to me [since I'm Dutch] it sounds way better. Can't stand to hear people talk with an accent on television, especially the one I use.

Another language that feels like a razor blade on my nads other than French is Polish. I'm taking Polish classes, but dear f, it's such an annoying language to learn, impossible sound combinations and other things that break my balls.

What really is an amazing language is Japanese [also taking Japanese classes], it's so easy so learn, easy grammar, no impossible combinations, only a few vowels and consonants. If anyone wanted to learn a language but didn't know which one; Japanese.

Also, English isn't really that easy to learn, but if you learn a language at a young age, it's always easier.
There are several Germanic languages with vowels that sound a lot like others.
Thinking of learning Spanish one day , not really that hard either, just like Japanese, only a few vowels and consonants. Plus now that I'm used to Polish and Japanese, it can't be that much tougher.

I'm really not a person who likes the really popular languages like French and German or Italian. Would love to learn Icelandic one day. I also might teach some languages to kids in a few years [maybe in Cancún].

[mandrake]

German sounds like a bunch of farmers talking.

ha ha, proddukd, it's of course exactly the other way around. in all honesty however, no One refers to this low-german dialect of real German as a "language". it's more like "throat cancer" (same with "Swiss German")

[Moderator]

it has been brought to my attention that users might take offense by the way you (and i mean the general audience here) express your opinion in this thread.

examples:

" French can be horrible when spoken by people from certain regions of France"

"italian, spanish, those are hurting my ears"

"spanish sounds very harsh to me"

"Dutch sounds angry and aggressive and Danish is like mumbling"

"German sounds like a bunch of farmers talking."

"Another language that feels like a razor blade on my nads other than French is Polish"

while i personally do not take offense by any of these phrases,
i feel obligated to ask you to consider anyone who might feel attacked by this in your future posts.

thank you.

[Proddukd]

it has been brought to my attention that users might take offense by the way you (and i mean the general audience here) express your opinion in this thread.

examples:

" French can be horrible when spoken by people from certain regions of France"

"italian, spanish, those are hurting my ears"

"spanish sounds very harsh to me"

"Dutch sounds angry and aggressive and Danish is like mumbling"

"German sounds like a bunch of farmers talking."

"Another language that feels like a razor blade on my nads other than French is Polish"

while i personally do not take offense by any of these phrases,
i feel obligated to ask you to consider anyone who might feel attacked by this in your future posts.

thank you.

People usually feel offended after something they said felt offended to someone else.
In this other forum I'm on, you can seriously call each other names and say their moms are ****, and afterwards, you're still friends. While if someone says something without the intention to offend anyone [because they didn't say "I find"], someone feels offended and there's this big thing being created around it... While if we stopped caring so much and react like we were offended [I feel offended sometimes, but that doesn't mean I say that], then there isn't such a big deal. If the first person doesn't feel [or say] offended, then the next person doesn't have to react to that. Or, don't take it too personally, especially when someone obviously gives their opinion.
I sometimes really feel like I'm surrounded by some kids on here, and that makes me act like one too. [This probably offends people, because that's exacry what I'm talking about]

[Proddukd]

And because people are offended so easily, you feel like you should censor everything you say. I just had to censor something because someone might be offended, while on the other forum, people wouldn't even care.
Here you can't say fu, while on the other forum, we say it all the time.

[specky]

^^
pardon my ignorance, which other forum do you mean?

[MartinSlovakia]

And because people are offended so easily, you feel like you should censor everything you say. I just had to censor something because someone might be offended, while on the other forum, people wouldn't even care.
Here you can't say fu, while on the other forum, we say it all the time.

Well, I think Björk fans are more sensible than fans of other artists, it makes sense; we love her music also for its great sensibility

[Burnface]

I'm much more into her epic-almost-cute-ness than any sensi-ble-tive stuff...



But that doesn't mean I like rude posts thrown at my face, and this doesn't mean that I don't like people expressing their opinions using alternative vocabulary either. I call my best friends "b*tch" all the time and I still love them. Of course a 4um is different, we don't know one another so using words like "b*tch" could end up having a bad reaction from the "b*tch" 4umer.

My posts don't make sense, I should have stopped writing back when I was a level user.

[Proddukd]

^^
pardon my ignorance, which other forum do you mean?

WATMM

[Proddukd]

And because people are offended so easily, you feel like you should censor everything you say. I just had to censor something because someone might be offended, while on the other forum, people wouldn't even care.
Here you can't say fu, while on the other forum, we say it all the time.

Well, I think Björk fans are more sensible than fans of other artists, it makes sense; we love her music also for its great sensibility

It doesn't make sense, actually. I like her lyrics and her music too, sometimes "for its great sensibility", but that doesn't mean I'm always like that, doesn't mean I don't also have a side in me that is the complete opposite.
And just because other people take things too seriously and too personally and get offended so easily, I shouldn't have to censor myself just so other people don't nag about it.

[MartinSlovakia]

And because people are offended so easily, you feel like you should censor everything you say. I just had to censor something because someone might be offended, while on the other forum, people wouldn't even care.
Here you can't say fu, while on the other forum, we say it all the time.

Well, I think Björk fans are more sensible than fans of other artists, it makes sense; we love her music also for its great sensibility

It doesn't make sense, actually. I like her lyrics and her music too, sometimes "for its great sensibility", but that doesn't mean I'm always like that, doesn't mean I don't also have a side in me that is the complete opposite.
And just because other people take things too seriously and too personally and get offended so easily, I shouldn't have to censor myself just so other people don't nag about it.

you are right. you do not have to do anything, you do not have to even try. but do not be sad then after 5 years when you'll wake up all love-less