If you could instantly become fluent in another language, which language would you choose, and why? As a side topic, which languages are you now fluent or at least partially fluent in?
I'd like to learn Latin because of it's multi-language applicability and how it would increase my English vocabulary. I used to know Spanish pretty well. I took 3 years in high school and got straight As without cracking open the book. It just came naturally to me. For many years afterwards I would pick up the free Latino newspaper to maintain (and expand) my vocabulary. So my written Spanish used to be (and may still be) pretty good. But I never had a chance to practice conversational Spanish.
I honestly have zero interest in learning another language; I'd have no use for it whatsoever. Occasionally I use an online translator if I see something in a foreign language that I'd like to decipher. I also took 2 years of Spanish in junior high and 3 years of French in high school; have forgotten more than I ever learned.
I'm having a hard time answering this one. I took a couple of years of Spanish in high school and did well, but that didn't help me one bit when I moved to the Mexican border thirteen years later. Maybe I'd learn Swedish because of my ancestry, but all of my relatives who spoke Swedish are dead now. Maybe Spanish; or Chinese so I can communicate with our new rulers.
English has always been my first and second language. Maybe I would choose English for my third language.....and get it right this time.
I took three years of Latin in high school. I will say it helped with "root words". Also, I had a year of high school French (worthless, as the teacher barely spoke French) and one in college. I can get myself into and out of trouble in Spanish. I can speak a little Turkish. I think I'd like to speak Chinese, but I don't see my tired old brain wrapping itself around that.
Don't get me started on Latin. Pet peeve. Because I could have taken Spanish in H.S. instead and didn't. Listened to advisors. I guess I missed the day they showed us how to use Latin to help with root words. They kept telling us it did that. But never saw a practical use. It did force you to identify components of sentences. But I learned that by diagramming sentences in 7th grade. Now THAT was useful. If I chose a 2nd language it would be Spanish. There has never been a crew doing jobs around the house and farm that hasn't had at least one Spanish speaking only person. Usually he was doing all the work, and I had to try and communicate through the boss. That didn't always work.
Presently, I speak English and Bad English. I knew enough French to get us around on a vacation in Paris once but probably couldn't now. Spanish is probably my choice so I could talk to all the immigrants--or most of them. We've had a couple of them up here working. One spoke excellent English and his Spanish dialect was clear, slow and sort of easy to understand. The other spoke poor English but between the two of us we enjoyed what he was doing and he even got my humor. But when you say, getting the knowledge instantly, I would like to learn Mandarin. I have a couple of Chinese friends. I asked one, which is easier to learn, English or Chinese, and she said definitely English. And if China, with it's huge population will continue to flourish, that is probably the way to go. They are already buying up the country.
Russian might be interesting to know if it could be instantly implanted in my brain Matrix style. I would think we already have the muscle sets required to speak Russian almost as well as a native. Convincingly speaking any Asian language with all of its tonal subtleties might be impossible for us.
I once was pretty good with both Spanish and French. I apparently have a talent for languages that is/was natural. When the Navy tested me, I scored higher on the language aptitude test that anyone else in boot camp, so they immediately set me up to go to intelligence school for Chinese. I picked up some conversational Japanese and could read street signs and trains directions, as thy are set up for children. I am not sure I agree that English is easier to learn than Chinese. I have friends who also speak both, and, to speak English is possibly easier, reading Chinese is more difficult. Writing English is difficult because is is so irregular, but learning an alphabet is much easier than learning the characters. I think Japanese is the most difficult language to learn to write, since it uses 3 different alphabets and they tend to mix them all into compositions. Spanish is the easiest language I have encountered since it is almost totally regular in both writing and speaking. I haven't dealt with Italian or Russian, but a Russian speaker I knew said reading Russian is relatively easy once you learn the Cyrillic alphabet.
My late husband spoke French, so of course the Army, instead of utilizing what he already had, sent him to the Defense Language Institute in Monterey for a year's intensive training to learn Russian. I'm glad, though, that they didn't use his French -speaking skills because he would have ended up in Viet Nam, probably. Instead, they sent us to Turkey, which turned out very well.
Sign Language. I studied off and on,used it a bit here and there. But if not in constant use can forget. I already know a bit of Spanish and can say a few things in other languages.
I guess it wouldn't hurt for me speak better English--- or English better! I use to speak German pretty well when I was young but I can't remember to many words at all anymore. I also could do sign language. I have a cousin who was born deaf. We were close growing up. She taught me how to sign. We had fun with that when we were little girls. She taught me the dirty words. I don't remember very much of the sign language anymore neither.