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[Ancre]

I'm not sure it's that odd. Aren't the turkish descendants of nomadic warriors who conquered asia minor and became muslim and settled down ? I think their language is also closely related (if not the same) to the Tatar tribes in Siberia, and some of the ex-urss countries like Kazakhstan, who are located between China and Europe. I think China have some turkish speaking indigenous minorities within their borders.

And I have to listen to welsh now. Breton sounds awesome as well ! Too bad this one is going to be dead in fifty years.

[Tabbyman]

Honestly? I like Russian. I don't know why. I can't understand any of it, but it sounds cool.

Same, but I'm starting to try to learn it. Downloaded a torrent full of Russian learning stuff and I've been listening to Russian music for a while.

Learning the letters and the sounds they're supposed to stand for helps a lot in figuring out the sounds you're hearing though. Even the russian equivalents to our sounds are usually pronounced differently. The sounds make a lot more sense once you can read the letters.

I'm not very far along though.

English and French annoy me partly because I was forced to learn them, and partly because they both have rules and exceptions up the wazoo (I suppose most other languages do too). And French has sounds that I find particularly difficult to position my mouth for.

Since then I've found it amusing to hear a French girl speak on and on about ANYTHING. Who cares what... I'm not going to understand any of it despite my forced (and ineffectual) education in the language. But the way the voice flows along, it's particularly enjoyable to just listen.

I was brought up with English though so I have no idea what it sounds like as a foreign language. I've heard it's even "cool" to speak some amount of English in some places in the world.

[Askot Bokbondeler]

cool in the same way that l33tspeak is cool

[Mr. Palau]

I'm not sure it's that odd. Aren't the turkish descendants of nomadic warriors who conquered asia minor and became muslim and settled down ? I think their language is also closely related (if not the same) to the Tatar tribes in Siberia, and some of the ex-urss countries like Kazakhstan, who are located between China and Europe. I think China have some turkish speaking indigenous minorities within their borders.

Yes they are descended from a group of people known as the "Turkic people" (guess which kind of people from that group the Europeans knew the best?), who occupy large tracts of central asia. I just had no idea that their language was in anyway related to those of the koreans. The central asiatic people that is, I knew the languages of the turks and the other Turkic people must have been related. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turkic_peoples

[Hanslanda]

To me, all english sounds like this:

Person 1: Kentucky Fried Chicken!
Person 2: Kentucky Fried Chicken?
Person 1: Kentucky Fried Chicken!!! Kentucky Fried Chicken!

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Ok, not quite

Oh god, they're onto us. Quick, deploy the Kentucky Fried SEALs!

[Sir Finkus]

I'm not sure it's that odd. Aren't the turkish descendants of nomadic warriors who conquered asia minor and became muslim and settled down ? I think their language is also closely related (if not the same) to the Tatar tribes in Siberia, and some of the ex-urss countries like Kazakhstan, who are located between China and Europe. I think China have some turkish speaking indigenous minorities within their borders.

Yes they are descended from a group of people known as the "Turkic people" (guess which kind of people from that group the Europeans knew the best?), who occupy large tracts of central asia. I just had no idea that their language was in anyway related to those of the koreans. The central asiatic people that is, I knew the languages of the turks and the other Turkic people must have been related. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turkic_peoples

As I understand it, there's still some debate on whether or not they actually are related, but they have similar grammar and stuff so it is speculated that they are.

[Starver]

[this should have been posted last night, so probably out of date now...  responding to something about someone not liking American, and then someone else being incredulous about them not liking an "entire language", IIRC.  Something like that.]

Entire dialect, mabye.  I don't know if I'd go to the extent of "how it sounds" (after all, US accents, of all kinds, are too all-pervasive in UK media (film, TV, 'even' radio[1]) to sometimes even consciously perceive them as foreign, in the heat of the moment) but I tend to pull up short when reading things written in the 'Merkin manner.  "Color", "center", "(schedule/television) program", "(length of) meter", "sulfur", etc, etc...

However, I'm fairly sure you lot over there think the same about "colour", "centre", "programme", "metre" and "sulphur".

(Strangely, I don't mind a "computer program" or an "electricity meter"[2].  So it's quite possible that my condition is psychosomatic and depends on me being conscious of the context!)


[1] Though not so much "import" stuff, since the mid-20thC fad for emulating US dis[kc]-jockeys  There's a few regularly-heard voices that are 'over here' helping out with various dramatisations of various US novels, plus 'American character actors' in various British sit-coms, of course including Jay Tarses and others who may or may not actually be American (I suspect none of the others are, even those playing the colonists[3]) in "Revolting People", the sitcom about pre-/during-/post-Revolutionary America in Jay's native Baltimore.

[2] Was going to say "gas meter", but I can't bring to mind what you'd say for that, given you've co-opted "gas(oline)" as the term for what we call "petrol(eum)".  So, you see, there's still plenty of mystery, here in the UK, about the everyday lives of you rebellious colonials, despite kindly shipping us entertaining program(mes) like House, with actor Hugh Laurie and The Wire with Dominic West, to mention just two of your finest American actors...

[3] Mind you, their real-life counterparts may probably have had something more of a (UK) West Country accent, or thereabouts, at that time.

[Starver]

French. 'Nuff said

Too much uvular and nasal make it sound like a headache.

"Quatre-vingt dix-neuf".  A beautiful number to say in French...  (And whoever's about to say "soixante-neuf", can consider themselves anticipated!).  Somewhat similar, I consider "Acht-und-achtzig"[1] as a personal exemplar to the nature of German language (leastwise, of the two-digit numbers).

If I want to try to get my Welsh accent up and running, I run through the place-name "Llanfairpwchgwyngychgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch"[2] a few times and attempt to bring Huw Edwards' cadence into it.  Pity my fluence in the language itself is little more than roadsign-quality.  (Or "railway-station sign"-quality? )

[1] I somewhat think I've spelt something wrong, here and with the French example, as I'm back-forming from the phonetic, after a long time not really using either language and never being that good at either...

[2] No points for spotting a typo in that.  I always get something wrong (usually "tislio" instead of "tyslio", even though I pronounce it correctly, or miss the "r" from the "chwyrn" bit) and I have no doubt I've let something slip through on this occasion...

[Starver]

king (M. (guo)wang / K. gukwang)

And now I'm thinking that Gok Wan's parents were attempting an aspirational pun.

(Of course, I know it's as likely to sound like the words for "Horseradish Beelzebub", especially depending on inflection. )

[Blargityblarg]

French. 'Nuff said

Too much uvular and nasal make it sound like a headache.

"Quatre-vingt dix-neuf".  A beautiful number to say in French...  (And whoever's about to say "soixante-neuf", can consider themselves anticipated!).  Somewhat similar, I consider "Acht-und-achtzig"[1] as a personal exemplar to the nature of German language (leastwise, of the two-digit numbers).

If I want to try to get my Welsh accent up and running, I run through the place-name "Llanfairpwchgwyngychgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch"[2] a few times and attempt to bring Huw Edwards' cadence into it.  Pity my fluence in the language itself is little more than roadsign-quality.  (Or "railway-station sign"-quality? )

[1] I somewhat think I've spelt something wrong, here and with the French example, as I'm back-forming from the phonetic, after a long time not really using either language and never being that good at either...

[2] No points for spotting a typo in that.  I always get something wrong (usually "tislio" instead of "tyslio", even though I pronounce it correctly, or miss the "r" from the "chwyrn" bit) and I have no doubt I've let something slip through on this occasion...

I hope that the quadruple L was a typo, because if not...

[Techhead]

For a bit of interesting historical trivia, check out Linguistic purism in English (Wikipedia). Basically, the idea that English should be free of Latin and Greek influences. Poul Anderson piece on basic Atomic Theory written in this style called "Uncleftish Beholding". The concept of "Anglish" has it's proponents even today.

Also:

I hope that the quadruple L was a typo, because if not...

To the best of my knowledge (I don't speak Welsh), in Welsh, 'll' is its own consonant, not two 'l's. Thus, 'llll' is acually a double-ll

[Starver]

Learning the letters and the sounds they're supposed to stand for helps a lot in figuring out the sounds you're hearing though.

I usually work them out through the commonalities inherent between Cyrillic and Greek alphabets (knowing the Greek for algebraic reasons), and also remembering a light-hearted tale about a friend of my Dad (who, for some reason, went to Russia) coming back thinking that the Russian for "Restaurant" was "Pectopah"  (as in "PECTOPAH", as in "ресторан", as in "restoran").

I still stumble over it, but on the (rare) occasion I get time to study some Russian text (e.g. in a scene of a film where they aren't zooming through 'Moscow' too fast, with all guns blazing as the Good Guys are mistakenly trying to capture the Really Good Guy Caught Up In A Web Of Deceit Woven By The Real Bad Guys And He's Trying Real Hard Not To Hurt Them[1]) I get occasions of insight into some of the loanwords and other similarities.

(Also, I once had to use a Russian-topped keyboard.  Although as having near touch-typing abilities, I think I soon just switched the system to be UK (back in the days of DOS!) and ignored the keytops from then on...)


[1] Feel free to take that idea, BTW.  I'm sure there's room in the cinema for a movie made with that unusual premise.

[Starver]

I hope that the quadruple L was a typo, because if not...

Not a quadruple "L".  A double "Ll".

Can't be bothered to check my own work, but it should have been 58 characters long (51 Welsh letters, with all examples of ll, ng and ch being considered single).

And imagine the fun I have pronouncing "Llandridnod Wells" fully in Welsh!  The "W" roughly as "U" and the "ll" as... well, "ll".  Voiceless fricative whatjamacallit...  Like a Scottish (and Welsh) 'ch' without the 'k', would you say?

[RedKing]

IIRC, "Ll" is an aspirated L, so something like "hl". And "dd" is a soft "th" sound.

Yeah, the main problem with Welsh is the godawful transliteration scheme. When "w" and "y" are two of your most common vowel sounds, it's going to get ugly. And u = ee, and c = k, even though Welsh doesn't use a k. So "Cymru" (the Welsh name for Wales) = kim-ree.

I tried teaching myself Welsh many years ago, and the transliteration thing just threw me so hard. I'd see something like Yr Eglwys yng Nghymru ("The Church in Wales"), and all I could think was, "Pat, I'd like to buy a vowel." My second thought is "Oh my God...the Welsh are all Cthulhu worshippers!"    Only later did I realize that half the letters in that ARE vowels. D:

I was brought up with English though so I have no idea what it sounds like as a foreign language. I've heard it's even "cool" to speak some amount of English in some places in the world.

It is, but in much the same way that kanji tattoos are popular here. Mostly about style rather than comprehension (especially when it comes to English on clothing or signs).

[Starver]

IIRC, "Ll" is an aspirated L, so something like "hl".

Yes, that's a better description.  Certainly at the beginning of the word "Hlandridnod" it's like that...  On the whole, if in the middle of a name (like Machynlleth) I think I tend to de-emphasise the L-ness.  Ma(hc)-un-(hl)eTH (Machynlleth) tends to get less L to it, as does Ust-rad-ve(hl)-t' (Ystradfellte).  In my speech, that is.  With Hlan-go(hl)-en (Llangollen) I'll put more L on the start combo, and less of it in the more embedded pair.  I'm sure a proper Welsh-speaker would know better.  And be able to show the phonemes better than I just have.  Because, if nothing else, Welsh spelling and pronunciation is pretty much tied down in both directions.  (AFAIK.  It's certainly with far less exceptions than with English!)  Almost certainly because whoever brought writing into

When "w" and "y" are two of your most common vowel sounds, it's going to get ugly. And u = ee, and c = k, even though Welsh doesn't use a k. So "Cymru" (the Welsh name for Wales) = kim-ree.

It's different between North and South Wales, and I can never remember which way round, but I've always said something akin to "Kum-ri" (when not accidentally lapsing into English ways and reversing that to "Kim-ru").  You'll also see "BWS" and "STOP" written on the road, which tends to remind one that w=>u, pretty much literally (thus letting u=>i...  as in "ee", not "aye", of course).

I'd see something like Yr Eglwys yng Nghymru ("The Church in Wales")

In that example, you've also got those mutations, that someone has already mentioned.  "Cymru" following an -ng word, or whatever it is.  (No, I can never remember them, though the rules are far simpler than, say, the French -er/-re/-ir verb system.  Not that I could ever get a hang of that, either. )

Also, notice "Eglwys" and compare with the French "Eglise".  Similarly, "Ysgol" is "Ecole" (probably with some accents in there that I'm always rubbish at remembering so omitting out of spite), this latter being "School" in Sais.  Sometimes my limited French have helped augment my limited Welsh.  "Ysbyty" I just think of "Is (a) pity", linking it nicely to the hospital that it is, but I have no doubt is a Taffified version of the latin word from which both English and French words come from, as well as "hospitality"...


(Are we off topic?  Or is discussing a language once widely spoken in the territory of England, give or take, still within the remit of the subject )