Dharma Wheel

What languages do you know/study?


I took 1 semester of classical Tibetan and have recently picked it up again. I've started studying Chinese (Mandarin). I also speak Czech and some Spanish.

Lotwell

I claim to know one language...english...


Much to my consternation, many dispute that claim It is so sad.

I also "claim" to know English

But am starting to study Mandarin as well.

Kindest wishes, Dave

German, English and I just started learning Classical Tibetan in earnest.

Kirt

English, French, Italian, Russian (bit rusty though), working on Latin & after 1 year of Japanese, picking that up again & maybe Mandarin. If I'd stuck to Japanese I'd be fluent now, arg. Keep at it.
gassho
Rory

Slovenian, English, Serbo-Croatian. Slowly (very) studying Classical Tibetan.

English, German, little French, Dutch, studied Literary Tibetan for a couple years in Uni as well as Hindi and a semester of Sanskrit and even a semester of Tamil (beautiful script, so much more flowing than devanagari). I also learned to read U-mad script. That was cool. Couldn't do that anymore though. It is amazing how fast we lose our abilities when we don't use them. Of course, we can also get them back pretty fast. I can still read Devanagari script though I won't know what it says. With a dictionary, I can translate a little Tibetan. My colloquial Tibetan sucked as I have trouble learning by ear. Visual learning is much easier to me.

My native language is English, but I speak very poor Mandarin fluently.

I had a dab of classical Tibetan, and spoken Tibetan. Mostly European languages: Russian, Spanish, French, Norwegian, Serbo-Croatian, German (rusty on the last 3). Mandarin, but I always forget the script soon after I learn it. I'm not visual, I'm aural, and learn through my ears. Mandarin's good with Tibetan, though. I notice a lot of Chinese words and phrases in Tibetan. The Tibetan grammar, though, comes from the Altaic languages, so some background in Turkic or Mongol can be helpful there. The Sinitic/Altaic split in Tibetan language is fascinating, similar to the Nomad (Altaic) and sedentary (Sinitic) divide in the people themselves.

I know English and Chinese. With Chinese I can speak Mandarin and Cantonese, with the latter my native dialect.

My readings in Buddhism are almost exclusively Chinese, so I may struggle with writing Buddhist terminology in English.

Even being able to read and write in modern Chinese, I have not had formal education in classical Chinese. Therefore reading certain sutra in Chinese, particularly those written in really old Chinese, may not be always be straightforward for me. However, they are still easier than reading classical texts in Confucianism, Taoism and the I-Ching.

Fluent in Russian, Spanish, Romanian. A bit rusty, but able to do research in French, German, Serbo-Croatian. Conversant in Norwegian. I studied 3 years of Mandarin, and am considering reviving that, in part to be able to read Buddhist texts in Chinese. I've also taught elementary university courses in Navajo. Studied spoken and literary Tibetan for a semester, but that was long ago. Am considering buying a Tibetan textbook w/CD package (available from Snow Lion) to get back into Tibetan.

Mother language is English
I was quite good at Turkish
Some French
Bits and bobs in various other.

Graham

English is my mother tongue.
We speak Finnish at home.
Better at understanding than speaking German and French.
Fair knowledge of Papua New Guinea Tokpisin.

As for "Buddhist languages":
a year of Chinese at university almost did me in.
learning Pali is a perpetual summer project. Someday I hope to make it past lesson 3.

English is my first language. I speak some Filipino, not fluent yet. I understand a little Illocano but would really like to learn Japanese at some point.

Gassho,
Seishin.

English is my mother language. I am currently learning to speak Hangug-ui [Korean].