Bilingual, Trilingual, Multilingual

Satori

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I read a very interesting discussion recently at another forum about those who speak multiple languages and how the brain seems to compartmentalize various languages and even mix and match languages at will (franglais, for instance).

One member described the following:
I noticed that when I was searching for a word in my third language (Spanish), my brain would substitute a word from my second language (French), but never a word from my first language (English). It seemed like the brain has a place for the native tongue, and another place for new languages.

Other members relayed the same problem. And then another member responded:
What you're all refering to is somethiing called your interlanguage. It's an internalised system of knowledge - the place where all your grammatical (syntax, phonology, etc) knowledge is stored.

Interlanguage is basically the language produced by second and/or foreign language learners who are in the process of learning a language.

While learning a language the learner goes through various processes - among them are:
1) borrowing patterns from the mother tounge (this is also called language transfer)
2) extending patterns from the target language which is the language you are learning (this is also called over generalization)
3) expressing meanings using the words and grammar which are already known (this is called communicative strategy and this among others involves the borrowing patters and words from another language.

And yet another member had this to share on the subject:
I remember seeing a video once where people tested a woman who was bilingual, and then had later in life learned another language. Let's say french/english and later learned spanish. Well she was hooked up to a monitor so they could track what parts of her brain she used in response to questions. First they would speak to her in english and french, and she would respond in english and french. She used the same part of her brain for those. Then they asked her a question in spanish and she responded in spanish. She used a different part of her brain! So...there is a difference from learning a language as a child and learning one later in life. This probably has something to do with the substituting of words...because if you are searching for a word in german you are in one part of your brain which also "knows" spanish...you aren't thinking in the other part which "knows" english and french!

Since we have a lot of members on this forum who speak multiple languages, I thought it would be interesting to see if any of you have had similar problems. Also, if you have any knowledge or anything you would like to add about this subject, it would be greatly appreciated, as I find this subject fascinating! :)
 
Well, I wouldn't say that I'm even bilingual, but I know that sometimes when I try to say something in Spanish, I end up throwing in Japanese words or case particles, etc., and it took me a while to not use the SOV order. Of course, I don't know much Spanish, just what I remember from high school, but it seems to me that anything other than English is the "foreign language department" in my brain, and it's all fair game. For example, here is one that I said last night: "es caliente, ne."
 
I seem to have compartmentalized Japanese and English (both acquired from birth to present) separately, and French (ages 1-17) /German (ages 14-16) is mixed together because I learned German at one point with the same teacher as for French, in back-to-back classes (middle/high school). However, my Latin is yet (learned from ages 12-17) in another part of my brain, and so far, in learning Egyptian Arabic, I'm not having any compartmental problems with that although I'm learning it so late in life.
 
I speak Japanese and English, and when I read some documents in French, Spanish, or Portuguese, my brain always tries to find refereces in English, not my native language which is Japanese. But actually this is not surprising, since those languages are similar. And also this is the same for Chinese, when I read Chinese, the reference comes from Japanese, never from English. Never tried it for Korean though...
 
Great thread!

I really could relate to other multilinguists here...
I am a trilingual, however, was bilingual from birth: Japanese and English, and later: Japanese, English and Danish from the age of about 5-6.

Japanese, English and Danish I don't think about much when speaking, as I just speak it....

Later on, I learnt German, French and Latin in school and continued with these languages in high school, and much later, I learnt Arabic.
These "later" languages I think about much before speaking e.g. grammar, using dictionary etc...

Although I comprehend 7 different languages (incl. Latin, for grammar purposes for especially learning the Latin languages), I can also understand Norwegian and Swedish, as they are very much alike Danish.
 
These are all very interesting responses!

Another person posted the following:

I have the same problem! I speak French and German fairly well, took a year of Spanish in high school, and am currently taking Chinese and Italian. I get most flustered when visiting my Italian professor who shares office space with my former French professor and having to switch between the languages to speak with the both of them. I always reach for my German vocabulary when lost for a word in Italian,and I get this look of COMPLETE disgust from my professor. However, I have noticed that this does not happen at all in Chinese as the entire language is just so...well...foreign that I do not connect it with the others. The wonderful thing about Chinese is that there are no bloody verb conjugations...the horrible thing is that one has to memorize thousands of characters and figure out the difference between 40 words pronounced in essentially the same manner. I just love it! It's a bit like dressage for your voice.

Has anyone else also noticed that when they begin to learn a new language they start to dream in that language? This happens to me every time I'm beginning to process the new material. Though with Chinese I dream more of writing characters than speaking...

So I'm curious ... do any of you dream in other languages as well?
 
Well, I seem to have everything in the same compartment... being native German, later learned English, then Latin in school, and still later learned Italian and French (even though the latter is in no good condition because of permanent disusue...), and now learning Japanese. I found that if words are substituted (which doesn't happen too often), they're generally substituted from German.
Due to the large exposure to English (since I spend a lot of time in English forums), I find myself sometimes thinking in English... also, I might write texts on my computer (for personal use) in a mix of English and German. When talking to other Germans, however, I always exclusively speak German, so I can separate that very clearly.
Dreaming in foreign languages isn't too uncommon, of what I can remember... but I only very seldomly remember my dreams, so I really can't speak there.
 
I remember at least on one occassion dreaming in Japanese, but I think it's happened a few times. Of course, it's really strange "dream" Japanese. You know, like anything else in dreams don't really make much sense? It's almost on the verge of being unintelligible sounds.
 
Glenn said:
I remember at least on one occassion dreaming in Japanese, but I think it's happened a few times. Of course, it's really strange "dream" Japanese. You know, like anything else in dreams don't really make much sense? It's almost on the verge of being unintelligible sounds.
Yes, happened to me already as well... Didn't make much sense either :relief:
 
I only speak swedish and english so...i don't have any problem...why did i make this post?
 
hum...as for me I'm often mixing manadrin-cantonese as well as french-english ...however since I've forgotten all my german I never mix it with any other language :p
 
yeah...knowing too much languages is bad sometimes hehe...a few days ago I was talking English/dutch to my japanese friend ^^...and sometimes I know the word in japanese or english, but not in dutch :? like "daigakuin"...I wouldn't know how to say that in english lol... :D
 
Well I had french classes through elementary school and I still need one in highschool, my french good enough to understand what is being said and read written material. However I really struggle with replying in French. So I guess I am semi-bilingual. Japanese is limited to a few basic sentences and words however I would like to improve in the future.
 
Back to dreaming in Japanese, it happened to me last night, and it was very lucid. It was really weird, though, because I was talking to this girl who was supposed to be my sister, but this was the first I had heard of her. She was about 10 years old, and she was at my mother's house. When I left there, she followed me, and I was telling her about why I never saw her and why I don't see my mom that much anymore, and the entire conversation was in Japanese, except for the translation of a new vocabulary word. That one really struck me as being odd. She said the word, then I repeated it to her with a rising intonation, and she told me what it meant in English. Then we continued talking in Japanese. Unfortunately, I couldn't really remember the new word, and what I thought it was doesn't exist. :p But I can almost remember entire bits of the dialogue. It's pretty cool, but really weird.
 
I think it's awesome to speak several languages, at least two. Not a lot of people in my country are even bilingual. When I don't speak my mothertongue, I feel more secured, I'm less scared, as if I had a kind of mask. I am allowed to say anything I want.
 
I am trilingual, I speak Arabic (mother tongue), Hebrew and English.

I had an arguement with a lecturer at university, my claim was that although Arabic is my first language and English is only third I find it much easier to express myself in English although I sometimes cannot find the exact words that express a certain situation so I try to refuge to another one of the languages.
Due to that, does that make English my mother tongue, of course he said no, I asked why, already knowing the answer but he surprised me saying that generally 'Mother's Tongue' is the language we hear in our dreams. I couldn't reply because I never remember audio in my dreams, only images. But he had a point.

Here's a question, does your native language have to be your dominant language ?
For me it is not since Arabic is relatively hard and I find that the 'flow' of the English language eases self-expression.
Although I started studying English only in the first grade (Age 6).
 
Here's a question, does your native language have to be your dominant language QUOTE]

In my experience no it doesn't, it depends on the person and their circumstances too I think. My kid's mother language is English but Greek would be their dominant language, even though they are fluent in both. My husband is the opposite, Greek is his native language but he prefers English and expresses himself more comfortably in that language. My mother tongue is English and will always remain my dominant language, even after living in Greece for many years I still think and dream in English. I'm not very good at languages I'm afraid. :sad-2:
 
I learnt Spanish in the last 3/4 years (I'm 22 now). Can I consider myself mothertongue, since I speak it fluently? I don't think so. I still miss some words.
 
I speak Albanian,English,Macedonian and now im learning the french...But i dont know why i have started to forget a little bit Albanian....and it is my first language?
When i read something in frenh my brain translate it in English:S:S
 

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