agoreira

What? With a straight face!

megmet

bob_bob

Doubt they are truly fluent in four or five, at a conversational level they may 'wing' it but will never be fluent in that many languages. They may say they are, you may choose to believe them, but of course, there is no real way of knowing if in fact they are telling the truth as they see it or just giving out porkie pies. My step father spoke Latin, French, German and Italian at what the majority of folk would think a fluent level but he never made that boast himself.

cricketman

Noone is "boasting" about it, I just know they do through their work

I share an office with my wife and see her speaking the languages every day. I also know the people she works with who speak many languages

My sister in law is qualified as a sworn translator from Spanish to English, French and Italian. You have to be very fluent to pass those exams.

All these just tells me that the people on here tend to hang around "less educated" people

Lynn R

Whoever did he find to speak fluent Latin to?

JLFS

A dead Roman, silly...............

Lynn R

Oh silly me, must have been having a blonde moment.

jackytoo

Is speaking other languages a sign of intelligence. Some people in the third world speak two are three and cannot read or write....just asking.

Rotor

I`m surprised you have time to hang around "less educated" people on this forum , with your highly intelligent family and business acumen you must be very busy running your empire ...wait no you've told us you live in a rented apartment and run a £50 car and work from home ..so what going on ?

bob_bob

Classical education taught him Latin (School and Oxford in the 30's), German from his family background (he worked at times as a translator for the RAF in and after WW2), French and Italian he 'picked up', he had a flare for mathmatics and language and travelled/lived extensively in pre WW2 Europe. Read my post, he never said he was fluent although others would often see him as so; perhaps a more modest person than some.

To be truly fluent in a language other than your mother tongue is extremely difficult, when people say they are fluent in several I simply don't believe them, some with traits of savantism may get away with it I suppose.

Rotor

I`m with you on that one, some think "getting by" means fluent !

bob_bob

Does not by any means say she is fluent, she no doubt speaks the languages well but truly fluent no, its fine speaking languages but to really understand the nuances, the humour, the dialects of several languages is pretty much impossible.

Fluency is an over used words as its boundaries are so subjective.

cricketman

bob_bob

Yes the people I know are fully fluent in 3,4 or 5 languages. There are exams and tests to verify this e.g. my OH has the higher Cambridge English certificate which means your language skills are as good as a native speaker. THe higher DELE paper in Spain also indicates this

Jackytoo, obviously someone cant read or write if they've never been shown. In some parts of the world people dont see written text very often. Speaking languages is a sign of intelligence as much as being an engineer or doctor is. Intelligence is a pretty abstract concept anyway. Footballers are very intelligent in terms of spacial awareness, but not so much in other areas

I am not descriminatory. I am interested in the opinions of everybody. So called intelligent people can be pretty boring too Everyone is ignorant in something

As for renting being a sign of poverty? In Barcelona and London I know people who rent flats/houses supposedly worth "millions", much cheaper and more felxible to rent. Which is why I rent

We move house every 2 or 3 years and we enjoy doing so, wouldnt make much sense to pay the 7% sales tax every 2 or 3 years would it? Same with the car, we didnt buy a new car until we knew we were here for the long term, now we have one

Anyway, from my experience, the people with flashy personal possesions tend to be those who have had a winfall from selling their council house or something. Those people who have had to earn their money know the value of it and so tend to save and invest it rather than showing it off.

agoreira

I've often spoken for an hour or two to a Spanish skype pal, does that make me fluent? Not by a million miles! Conversational level is nowhere near being fluent. I've heard loads of people claim to be able to speak good Spanish, turns out they've been carp! Agree, "fluent" is a much overused word. An ex Spanish teacher of mine has worked abroad in Russia, Tunisia, Spain etc and speaks all of them to a good level, but I know with the exception of Spanish (spent 7 years teaching in Barcelona) he would never dream of claiming to be fluent in those languages.

agoreira

I've had to retire, but he can run an empire, and still has more time than me to spend on these forums, the man's here from dawn to dusk. Now that is clever!