Quotes About Multilingualism

I speak five languages: English, Swedish, French, Italian, and German.

I've never been bored in my life, man. I've never been bored or lonely. Are you kidding? No way! I'm an orchestrator, a musician, a producer. I love everything. I've studied languages from Farsi to Greek to French, Swedish, Russian... How can you get bored?

I use Mandarin, Korean and English on a daily basis and usually only use Cantonese when I'm speaking with my relatives. I don't think it's very difficult for me to switch between each language because I've been doing it for so long.

Growing up in Switzerland, you learn German pretty much from day one in school. You learn French and Italian as well. I took English as an extra language because I figured that was the language of the world.

And if they are lucky enough to be exposed to multiple languages, they will master all of them, as long as the languages are presented in a natural context, such as when dad speaks Spanish and mom speaks English or the live-in nanny speaks French.

My father taught us to learn as much as possible of any tongue we came across. He says it's better than money in the bank.

Par le passé, j'avais appris l'anglais, le néerlandais, l'allemand et l'italien. Il y avait une constante avec ces langues vivantes : je les comprenais mieux que je ne les parlais. C'était dans l'ordre de la logique : on observe un comportement avant de l'adopter. L'intuition linguistique fonctionne même quand la compétence n'est pas encore atteinte.

You know among people who kind of travel a lot and have exposure to the United States and some other countries, they do have accounts, but you know, Russia is not exactly the place with multiple language skills so local networks kind of have an edge.

Anak-anak di Nusantara, sejauh yang saya amati dan pahami, sering diajarkan bahasa secara tak konsisten. Di rumah maupun di sekolah, bahasa yang digunakan kerap tidak hanya satu. Keadaan ini sendiri sebetulnya tidak apa-apa; sebaliknya sangat bermanfaat bagi anak-anak jika mereka mendengar lebih dari satu bahasa sejak kecil. Hanya saja, penggunaannya harus konsisten.

I wish that I spoke more languages. I speak a couple languages, but not well enough to really dub myself. French is really the only one, and it's a difficult thing.

Even in the north, business people and professionals tended to speak French and to look down on the impoverished Flemish-speaking farmworkers and factory laborers.

Die größte Freude ist die, aus verschiedenen Sprachen auswählen zu können, was den Inhalt des Geistes am besten ausdrückt.

Talking in one language and talking in another, I think inevitably, produce two different personalities, as far as I've seen in other people. I assume it does the same for me.

I enjoy singing in different languages, be it Telugu or Bengali. I would like to sing in Malayalam too.

I speak Tamil and Telugu better than Bengali.

Besides Kannada, I also know Telugu and Tamil fairly well.

Habla en francés siempre que no encuentres la palabra en inglés para nombrar alguna cosa, saca ligeramente los dedos de los pies al andar y ¡Recuerda siempre quién eres!.

Además, ¿cuál era mi idioma verdadero? Sabía el alemán, por mi padre. Con Ruth hablaba el inglés, idioma de mis estudios secundarios; con Mouche, a menudo el francés; el español de mi Epítome de Gramática-Estos, Fabio…- con Rosario. Pero este último idioma era también el de las Vidas de Santos, empastadas en terciopelo morado, que tanto me había leído mi Madre: Santa Rosa de Lima, Rosario.

I chose English-speaking and English-thinking people to take decisions for Hindi programmes. It was a mistake.

I remember as a child of five or six lying in the bath marvelling at the different languages displayed on the shampoo bottles around me. From that moment on it was always words not numbers that held a fascination for me.

I think it keeps your brain moving faster, singing in another language.

Of course, English is a very powerful language, a colonizer's language and a gift to a writer. English has destroyed and sucked up the languages of other cultures - its cruelty is its vitality.

Balzampleu!" said the Swiss, who, despite the fine collection of oaths boasted by the German language, had taken to swearing in French.

It is generally felt that the educated man or woman should be able to read Dante, Goethe, Baudelaire, Lorca in the original - with, anyway, the crutch of a translation.