# How has learning English affected your ability to speak your first language?



## Erasmoose06

*Mod note: *
*This thread start in the General Vocabulary/Vocabulario General forum as a linguistic **question**. When it evolved beyond the first post, we thought we'd move the discussion here.*

Hola a todos,

Estoy tratando de preguntar a alguien cuestiones linguisticas para comparar mi proceso de aprendizaje con suyo. Yo se que mientras yo continuo aprender mas espanol, me ha dado perspicacia de mi propia idioma. 

Mi intento es:

"Como ha afectado el proceso de aprendizaje ingles a tus habilidades de hablar/escribir/entender su propia idioma?"

Espero que sea claro y que alguien me pueda ayudar con esto. 

Gracias de antemano.


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## DahDah

Además de corregir tu redacción en español, ¿alguien ha contestado tu pregunta?  Aunque parece que pusiste esta pregunta hace ya meses, me parece muy interesante (además de que no tenía idea que hubiera foros en Wordference).

 En mi experiencia, aprender inglés ha tenido efectos negativos, tanto como positivos en mi uso de mi propio idioma materno, el español (o castellano dirían algunos españoles y algunos latinoamericanos --y entre estos, sudamericanos en particular).  También ha tenido efectos positivos y negativos en mi proceso de aprendizaje de otros idiomas, por cierto, pero ese es otro tema.

 Entre los positivos, creo que tiendo a, por lo menos, tratar de usar mi idioma de manera más precisa; es decir, pienso más en qué es realmente lo que quiero decir y qué significa lo que estoy diciendo; es como que hiciera una especie de verificación de significados constantemente.  Después de aprender inglés, creo que me fijo más en cómo uso el idioma (no sólo el vocabulario) como un instrumento de comunicación y hago muchas veces una especie de rastreo etimológico de algunas palabras y hasta de algo que se podría llamar "análisis sintáctico" de muchas frases.  También tiendo a ser muy consciente de las sutiles diferencias de significado entre palabras muy cercanas semánticamente.  Todos estos están relacionados, aunque hay otros.  (Por cierto, aclaro que no soy lingüista).

 Entre los negativos, algunas veces utilizo palabras o frases que son en realidad préstamos del inglés y que no se usan de la misma manera en español, por lo menos no en mi país.  Esto, lamentablemente, tiene un efecto que no sé si calificar como negativo o como positivo: como consecuencia de mi autocrítica, también me doy cuenta --por medio de la televisión de cable, por ejemplo-- de cómo en todo el mundo de habla hispana (estoy seguro que en diferentes grados en distintos lugares) se tiende a utilizar frases y modismos del inglés (particularmente de Estados Unidos) como si fueran nativos y, muchas veces, se utilizan "mal" (pongo "mal" entre comillas porque hay quienes dicen que no es que estén "mal utilizados" sino que "se apropian" culturalmente.  ¿Quién sabe...?).  Por ejemplo, como hablante del español, no estoy seguro que "remover" en español signifique lo mismo que "quitar" o "retirar" y, sin embargo, en muchos anuncios (o réclames o avisos, o publicidad, o como le llamen en cada lugar) de televisión de distintos países de habla hispana se utiliza para expresar "quitar".  Este caso en particular, me parece que se debe a que esos anuncios fueron originalmente escritos en inglés utilizando "remove" que en inglés sí, efectivamente claramente significa lo que "quitar" significa en español, pero no necesariamente directamente o principalmente lo que significa "remover".

 En el caso de las frases, otro préstamo que últimamente me molesta particularmente es "al final del día", que en mi opinión es una muy fea traducción del "at the end of the day" del inglés, norteamericano primero y luego extendido a todo el mundo de habla inglesa (¡y luego al de habla española!).  No es que sea purista, pero creo que el proceso de hegemonía del inglés tiene efectos destructivos para la riqueza lingüística del mundo.  Al final del día ¿quién sabe, no? Tal vez simplemente sea el proceso de cambio lingüístico mundial en nuestra época.

 I would be very interested to read about your own experiences, and also --if you care to let us know-- what the responses have been to your very interesting question.


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## ColdomadeusX

Am I allowed to say in English?
My Spanish kind of sucks so I don't think it's fitting for me to talk like a complete idiot...
Anyways, my language skills were completely wrecked by learning English.
When I stayed with my Grandma for about 6 months when I was 4yrs old, all she ever spoke with me was English because my Grandpa is English/Aussie. I then forgot Vietnamese (my father's language) and two dialects in Chinese!(my mother's language). From then on, I've been pretty embarrassed because of the fact that every asian I know can speak their own language but I can only mouth a few words in badly accented chinese/vietnamese! The whole forgetting-Vietnamese thing can however, be attributed to my parents getting divorced and my alienation towards my Vietnamese family but I'm around Chinese everyday, all day!
It's frustrating-I try very hard to learn the language but I just can't seem to remember anything at the end of the day.
Latin based language, no problem. I've started speaking Serbian and Spanish but I just can't get my mind around chinese or Vietnamese!!


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## Brioche

I'm quite sure that my learning of other languages has had no efectos negativos en mi uso de mi propio idioma materno, el inglés.

However, I do know an Australian-born chap, who went to Germany at age 25, and lived there for 15 years. Just now and then his English is a bit "germanified" or a bit stilted. However, I've never noticed any of these odditiies in his wife's speech.


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## ColdomadeusX

Did you realise you half typed that in spanish and the other half in English?
Lucky my spanish isn't _that_ bad!
anyways, I know plenty of people who have come from other countries and have lived in Australia for more than 15 years and their English is either still very accented (badly in some cases) or they still have alot of trouble speaking English even though they are around Aussies all day,everyday. I think this is probably because of where they come from and the people they surround themselves with- some have friends who can't be bothered to correct them anymore and depending on where they are from their accents are stronger than others.


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## Flaminius

The influence of English to my first language, Japanese, is limited to phonetic aspects; or at least I think so.  Japanese voiceless consonants are unaspirated but ever since I learnt English my P, T, K and other consonants are really aspirated.


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## Etcetera

English tries to influence my grammar. I sometimes notice that I'm trying to speak in Russian sticking to the English grammar rules. Sometimes I also use some English constructions, like "to be supposed to do something". It sounds really funny!
My friends and relatives are aware of that, so they don't start when I say something really odd - in terms of grammar.


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## ireney

It hasn't affected it really. True, I am maybe a bit more prone than other Greeks to use some English expressions such as "by the way" instead of the Greek equivalent (that or go all the way back to the VERY old fashioned way of saying it for some weird reason, which most don't understand by the way  ) or sometimes use an English swear word since the Greek ones tend to be on the long side but I am just following a general trend around here which has more to do with brevity than anything else. One could argue however that it is just a case of all the Greeks who have learnt English being collectively influenced and I know some do use this argument. 

Although my English is rather good it is the English that suffers from my first language than the other way around (in every possible way)


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## Lugubert

I had English in school from the age of 11 to 18. Mixed with six years of German and four or five of French, not to speak of later efforts, I'm quite confident that they-all didn't influence my Swedish.

In my present profession as a translator, I'm on the contrary more stubborn than most in weeding out unnecessary Anglicisms. For example, people generally refer to "e-mail"; I persist in writing "e-post" until explicitely otherwise told by customers.

I tend to speak rather bookishly, taking care not to violate grammar rules etc., so I think that my ability to _speak _my first language is unaffected.


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## Athaulf

In recent years, I've started using English words for certain things for which my native language has (in my opinion) ugly or ridiculously sounding words. But that's a conscious choice rather than an actual influence on my speaking. It's also strictly limited to the occasions when I speak with my peers in an informal way.

The only problematic influence of English is on my punctuation when I'm writing in Croatian. But the problem goes both ways, since nowadays my instinct for proper punctuation is a terribly confused mixture of English and Croatian rules, regardless of what language I'm writing in. Overall, the English punctuation rules are far more logical than the Croatian ones, so I'm probably closer to English in this regard.


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## zeatadu

I don't think there is any effect to my ability of speaking my native language when learing English.
I guess the reason is that English and Chinese are seprately belongs to totally different language system,and it is difficult to make myself confused.
Personally,I found the problem exist when I learn French and English simultaneously,words spelling,grammar,pronunciation,etc.Perhaps the reason is that I am a foreigner for both of the languages.


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## OldAvatar

I think that when you speak and understand English at a certain level, it is not your mother tongue which is getting affected, by contrary, it gets evolved and enriched (of course, if you still have the chance to speak it). But there is definitely the way of thinking which suffers some sort of modifications. As you probably know, thinking in one language could be different than thinking in another language. For me, thinking in English, for example, sometimes appears to be more pragmatical, efficient and more simple than in my mother tongue. But it is probably just a feeling I've got, others may not agree with that.

Best regards


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## Hutschi

Hi, I learned English in school. At first it had little influence.
Later, when I worked with computers, the influence increased much. I used a lot of English words without translation at work, and when speaking German, we apply the German grammar rules. 
Many do not like it, but it is an effective way. It says, that you are speaking about the program and gives the context automatically. In some cases, I do not know the German word. But note: I do not mean English lean words, which are already in the German language. I mean words like: "gecancelt", "gemailt" and others I would not use outside of this environment. It is a kind of "Denglish".


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## Hutschi

Lugubert said:


> In my present profession as a translator, I'm on the contrary more stubborn than most in weeding out unnecessary Anglicisms. For example, people generally refer to "e-mail"; I persist in writing "e-post" until explicitely otherwise told by customers.


 
Hi Lugubert, may be, this is a positive influence. Also avoiding wrong forms and getting a better feeling to your own language may be an influence to your mother tongue.


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## amnariel

I agree with you Hutschi. 
I've been translating from English and to English for a long time and when I speak my mother tongue I'm using very few Anglicisms, especially because in my country, and broader region, Anglicisms are quite often misused and misinterpreted. Why would I kick in with foreign words when there is perfectly understandable word in my language. A word everyone can uderstand, not only those who think they can speak English. 

My newest "favourite" Anglicism is "promptno" - promptly in English, but wrongly used as quickly, as soon as possible, fast. 

Sometimes I have to check actual meaning of a word in the dictionary, just to make sure I'm not going insane and that I'm right when I know that and English word is used in wrong sense


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## french4beth

I am a native English speaker, but I have found that studying foreign languages (French, Russian, and a tiny bit of Japanese) has actually _improved_ my English skills. I also used to teach "English as a Second Language" in Quebec, and I really had to up my English skills to be able to teach effectively.


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## Jigoku no Tenshi

Hello Everybody!

English has been an influence to my native language (Spanish), because I've had to learn English grammar and structures, so I've also been checking how some things work in Spanish, I the early time when I was learning English as long as I translated songs, I used to take loanwords or using false-friends in Spanish, so I wound up saying things like "Eventualmente" meaning "Eventually" when I should say "Finalmente", so It also had a bad influence, but When I started learning how things should be in English, I've also looked for things in Spanish, but since the grammar, and vocabulary in Spanish is larger, I don't overstudy it, thank God, Spanish is my native language, but of course studying English had had affected my Spanish, and I underline studying because even if you're not interested in learing english, in Venezuela we have a lot of loanwords that are used just it is used in English, only in Spanish for example, we say "cachar" from "catch" as a verb, and things like that are very common, I find it very funny when somebody mispronounce a word in English, when we use it in our vocabulary as it was in Spanish for example people saying "full" and pronouncing it as "fall", when in Spanish it's also pronounced "full".


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## alexacohen

The trouble with me is that I keep forgetting the Spanish word when I'm speaking Spanish!
People must think I'm mad when I stop in the middle of an Spanish sentence and say: "now, what was the word?" 
I must stop studying English, seriously!
Alexa


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## french4beth

alexacohen said:


> The trouble with me is that I keep forgetting the Spanish word when I'm speaking Spanish!
> People must think I'm mad when I stop in the middle of an Spanish sentence and say: "now, what was the word?"
> I must stop studying English, seriously!
> Alexa


Not at all, Alexa - sometimes I know the exact word I want in French, but cannot for the life of me remember the English word!?! How embarassing


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## alexacohen

french4beth said:


> Not at all, Alexa - sometimes I know the exact word I want in French, but cannot for the life of me remember the English word!?! How embarassing


Oh, thanks! I thought it only happened to me, and I was getting worried.
Alexa


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## purekoryo792

I used to speak Korean when I was a lot younger. I could communicate with adults. Now I cannot speak it. I am monolingual, learning Spanish.


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## Jigoku no Tenshi

alexacohen said:


> The trouble with me is that I keep forgetting the Spanish word when I'm speaking Spanish!
> People must think I'm mad when I stop in the middle of an Spanish sentence and say: "now, what was the word?"
> I must stop studying English, seriously!
> Alexa





french4beth said:


> Not at all, Alexa - sometimes I know the exact word I want in French, but cannot for the life of me remember the English word!?! How embarassing



Well, now it is three of us, I most of the time know a word in English that fits in a Spanish sentence, but in Spanish there's not such a word or there is it but in more than one, or in a Slang, for example in English I say "She's a *trendy* girl!" but in Spanish that is "Ella es una *chica a la moda*" so I think in trendy but in Spanish there's not such a word unless I use a slang as "Pava" and say "Ella es una *Pava*" of course even among Spanish speakers, some of them might not understand that word, so most of the times I know a word in English that fits but not always can find the same one in Spanish, unless I use an explanation or a slang, as well as there are words in Spanish that I commonly use but I can't find the exact one in English


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## amnariel

Jigoku no Tenshi said:


> Well, now it is three of us, I most of the time know a word in English that fits in a Spanish sentence, but in Spanish there's not such a word or there is it but in more than one, or in a Slang, for example in English I say "She's a *trendy* girl!" but in Spanish that is "Ella es una *chica a la moda*" so I think in trendy but in Spanish there's not such a word unless I use a slang as "Pava" and say "Ella es una *Pava*" of course even among Spanish speakers, some of them might not understand that word, so most of the times I know a word in English that fits but not always can find the same one in Spanish, unless I use an explanation or a slang, as well as there are words in Spanish that I commonly use but I can't find the exact one in English


 
May I join this lovely group   


This happens to me almost daily and in every language I know/use.

Once I was translating entire meeting without using word "provision" because I could not even remember which letter the word begins with. Should I mention here that meeting was about a law and that provision was most frequently used word


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## Judica

Some words simply do not translate from one language to another. 

I thought learning English had a bad effect on my 'American'. I lived outside of the US growing up and we used the World English (heavily British) vocabulary. When I returned to the US, I had major problems.


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## Etcetera

amnariel said:


> May I join this lovely group


Count me in, please.
But I really bother about it only when I'm speaking to someone who doesn't know English. If the person knows English, I simply insert this English word if I can't remember its Russian equivalent or this equivalent doesn't suits me, and everything's OK.


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## Bienvenidos

Living in the United States for my entire life has really affected my ability to use my native language; I didn't LEARN English until I was 4, but now it's definitely my other "mother tongue." This happens with a lot of immigrants who grow up in the United States. My parents talk to me in Persian but I usually talk back in English; it's sad, really. I know so much more English than I do Persian because I am a heritage speaker. I can converse, sure, but when you ask me to say something like, well, "perplexed millions of people across several nationalistic barriers," then I have no idea.


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## Forero

Some famous person once said, "The U.S. and the U.K. are two countries separated by the same language."

What I notice is that French is harder for me to make myself understood in than Spanish just because the lexicon is almost the same as the English.  That is, most of our words are French in origin but are not used the same ways.  And I have a terrible time with seeing a French word that looks like, or even is the same historically as, an English word, and though I know the languages have diverged in the use of that word, I can't think of the common English word for the idea in my mind from the French word.  And vice versa.


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## Forero

Lady Éowyn of Rohan said:


> ... because the English verbs are easy but the French verbs are terrible.



I think French verbs suffer from a disconnect between the written word and the spoken word and the context, which disrupts paradigms and causes things to have to be re-evaluated every few decades or so.  And on top of this, letters from the original Latin spelling are reinjected at strategic places, just for the right look.

But where did French first person forms get the final "s"?  For example "je vais" for "(yo) voy", "je vois" for "(yo) veo", "puis-je?" for "¿puedo (yo)?".


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## Outsider

Lady Éowyn of Rohan said:


> But I have lots and lots of trouble learning French after I learned English because the English verbs are easy but the French verbs are terrible.


They are no worse than Spanish verbs. In fact, you have more tenses in Spanish than in French.



Forero said:


> I think French verbs suffer from a disconnect between the written word and the spoken word and the context, which disrupts paradigms and causes things to have to be re-evaluated every few decades or so.


Don't know what you mean about re-evaluating paradigms every few decades or so, but English doesn't fare much better than French in the spelling department, does it?


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## sinclair001

I am a spanish native-speaker, and as far as I remember I used to start questions with the pronoun (¿Usted cree tal cosa?, i.e.) and now I realized I am askin in my native languages to start question with the verb (¿Cree Usted tal cosa?)
That is my experience.


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## Forero

Hi, Outsider and others.



Outsider said:


> They are no worse than Spanish verbs. In fact, you have more tenses in Spanish than in French.



It looks to me like French verbs have almost as many forms as Spanish verbs and, in the spelling department, close to the same amount of confusion as English verbs.  This gives French more _unique_ verb forms than Spanish.  That is, compared to Spanish, French has more different types of irregular verbs and more places where the paradigms break down.

For example, knowing only _poder_, _podré_, _puedo_, and _puse_, I am able to produce all the other forms of _poder_, numerous though they are; but knowing _pouvoir_, _pourrais_, _peux_, and _pus_, I am at a loss because I still have to learn where to put circumflexes, how to say "podido", and when to use _puis_.  I still don't even know when to pronounce the _t_ in _peuvent_.



> Don't know what you mean about re-evaluating paradigms every few decades or so, but English doesn't fare much better than French in the spelling department, does it?



On second thought, "every few decades" is an exaggeration.  And I guess the disruption of paradigms happens in every living language, but especially in those where the spelling and pronunciation diverge most.

You're right.  English spelling is pretty dreadful.

Still, my rate of saying something embarrassing is higher in French than in Spanish because French is so similar to English as to look familiar while being subtly different in important nuances.  When I become aware of a faux pas in French, it is usually too late to do anything about it, but even when it's not too late, the first thing I tend to do is commit another faux pas.

Just guessing, I would say -

. One reason is the divergent history of French and English and the fact that they compete as international languages.

. Another reason is that American English and French do not have as much contact as American English and Spanish.

. A third reason is that a mistake in Spanish sounds like the bad grammar of a foreigner, but a mistake in French tends to sound like something else (that I don't mean to say) but with fairly correct grammar.

. A fourth reason is that, although French is "illogical" (as is English), it is nevertheless more standardized than Spanish, which varies from country to country.  This means that Spanish speakers are more aware of common problems of foreigners than either English speakers or French speakers.

Of course, maybe it's just me. Though I was exposed to French in 3rd grade, I took 3 years of Spanish in Junior High School, and learned to love it, before learning French as a written language with grammar and all.  French is loveable of course, but I do have problems with the faux pas.

Does anyone else see French this way, compared to Spanish?


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## tvdxer

I speak English natively.

However, learning Spanish appears to have impacted my English to some extent.  I use relative pronouns more often in writing it seems.  

Learning Italian on top of Spanish also has caused me to use a made-up Spanish word on occasion, e.g. I once used "sueno" (from "suono") instead of "sonido".


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## Forero

I work with computers, and on more than one occasion, I have felt like saying:

"Mutatis mutandis, ceteris paribus, a little hocus pocus, et cetera, I believe we can easily salvage this algorithm."

And this from only seeing each of these Latin phrases once in some mathematical context.  The English "definitions" would just be too long, I suppose.


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## jonquiliser

Hmm... I think I've learnt a lot of new words in Swedish at the same time as I learnt them in English (or some other language). I've learnt about the history of Swedish - as in seeing what words have previously been used in Swedish but are archaic, whereas in other languages they are used. I've found out a lot about the origins of certain words - borrowed from French, Spanish, Latin, German... I recognise words that I might not otherwise understand in my native language, because I know what that particular word means in some other language - sometimes it turns out to be a false friend, but often you can guess at the meaning, at least. Starting to learn Finnish as a first second (he he) language was quite good in a way, as the structures of the two languages are so different; you kind of get a feel for the differing ways in which different languages operate. For me at least this has meant I'm less prone to just transfer a Swedish structure to some other language. 

All this said, it happens that "new" languages I've learnt leave their marks on my native language. Often I don't come up with the right word, especially as I speak Spanish frequently and write quite a bit in English... Nothing too serious or permanent, though .  What's worse is when I get lazy and can't be bothered to try and make a decent sentence in one language and end up with a mess for a phrase.  But as I write and read quite a lot, I continously practice - so it tends to be ok.


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## konungursvia

English has helped me a great deal with speaking my mother tongue. It IS my mother tongue.


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## Pirlo

Wouldn't it be better to structure this question as:
_How has learning a second language affected your ability to speak your first language?_

It seems more friendly so that I and others can answer!


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## candy-man

Hi,

Honestly, if I hadn't scratched the surface  of English 3 years ago,I definitely wouldn't be able to communicate in Spanish. It's helped me a great deal, but it's obvious I didn't get the hang of Spanish right away,either. However,when it comes to these both languages one's in jeopardy of getting mixed up and using the so-called Spanglish ;-) Jesus, at some stages it is still inevitable.I get embarassed then.Anyway, with the progress of time, I realise what kind of opportunities I receive everytime I look new words up in my dictionaries.
I'm thinking outside the box, I'm more creative,imaginative, full of new ideas,etc. Just love that,even if I happen to make tons of mistakes ;-) I don't give a damn. I'm especially skilled at speaking and it gives me so much pleasure that I cannot describe that. What's more, that amount of knowledge of English keeps pushing me into delving into Spanish ;-) And I preach the following: Learn from your own mistakes.


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## -Epic-

I have 2 mother tongues (English and Hebrew). Hebrew is a structured based language but for some reason I have far less spelling mistakes in English.
I don't think they have any affect on each other.


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## Etcetera

Here's what a friend of mine said after reading something I'd written in Russian:
- You know what? You're speaking English with Russian words!
I'm afraid she's right.


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## PhilFrEn

Hi all,

I got the same kind of problems.

I am a native French, speaking a daily German at work and English most of the time with my girlfriend or international colleagues.

It appears that on the phone with my parents (French), my French starts to suck! My father always needs to guess some words for me, I can figure out words in English and German, but not in French. The same when I am at the Embassy to make some papers, there were quite amused over there .

That's why I try to use a little bit my French here for instance. I don't use at all except for phoning in France, which is not representing lot's of my daily time! I think 90% of the time in English (10 other %, I don't think ).

Most of all, the grammar I know the best is German grammar, I need to update urgently my French one.

To finish, I would get some kind of troubles to work in French, because so far I have always use either English, either German since one and half year . I have no clue on French technical words in my field of knowledge.

Viva Europa .


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## Binapesi

I am the only one who speak English among the people I know, especially among my friends. I tried my best to make them like (at least) English but negative  .. wasn’t successful at all.


  Then I started to talk to myself. The more I spoke English, the worse my Turkish pronunciation got. It was changing into English speech. The “s”s starts to become “th”s. I pronounce “r”s like I do in English. Friends warn me about this but it’s out of my control. I try to fix it when I remember ..


  I think the worst is you sometimes don’t remember the word in Turkish (your native language!) and you say it in English. They look at you “what is she saying?” but you raise your shoulders above “It’s out of my control, sorry ..”


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## Silvia B

Keyt said:


> I think the worst is you sometimes don’t remember the word in Turkish (your native language!) and you say it in English. They look at you “what is she saying?” but you raise your shoulders above “It’s out of my control, sorry ..”



This happens to me as well, though English is just a language that I am still learning and not something that I use all day.
But sometimes when I am thinking of a specific word it may happen that I remember how to say it in English and not in Italian! which is pretty weird!
But I don't tell anybody, I'd feel like I want to show up (hey, see how many words I know...I am so good that I can translate _everything_ )
and it is not what I want to do..


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## galaxygirl

it had happened to me too. my native language is spanish and sometimes when i´m translting something from english to spanish i know exactly the meaning of the word i´m reading. but i just can´t remember how that word is called in my own language. and if someone ask me what does that mean, i have to say "sorry, i don´t remember my own language"


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## Forero

I tend to have trouble in French where French and English have the same word but not the same meaning.  I either spend a lot of time searching for the _mot juste_ with the English word getting in the way or just using the French word that looks/sounds like the English word even when it's not _a propos._

After using French for a while, say about a week, I run into the same problem - in reverse. 

A similar thing happens when French or English has another form of a common word, such as a verb form of a common noun, but the other language has the noun but not the verb.


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## Gnosi

Well, I guess everyone has a similar problem. Forgetting words or "mixing" languages. I have one question: How easily do you use english loanwords while speaking in your native language? Do you use the same amount of loanwords when let's say you talk to your granny who has no idea of English as when you talk to your friends who know as much English as you do?
Personally I use quite a lot of english loanwords ( it is acceptable where I live and work) but I'm very careful with a certain group of people (since I know they have no knowledge of English) and a struggle to find the greek equivalent to express myself (I may even sound stupid sometimes while trying to remember!)

Gnosi


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## argentina84

When I became fluent in English, It started to affect my first language (Spanish) in several ways:

I started to speak faster and in a stress-timed pattern (against the syllable-timed pattern that is characteristic of Spanish).

I started to forget words in Spanish. I could only recall the English ones, and couldn't translate them.

Now...I simply cannot help using English loan words!!!


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## Horazio

Unless you've been exposed for YEARS to a second language there's no way you're truly affected....

It takes years of full immersion and constant exposure before you're native tongue gets affected.


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## Paparaciii

Very interesting topic!
I think learning any language(and English especially) affects your ability to speak your first language.
If I had to evaluate my English skills in 10 mark system, mine would be ~3. My exposure to English is, let's say, not very big and the only person who is able to speak with me in English is TV.
But I have one medical addiction - wikipedia.comp) where I read a lot of history and geography stuff(in English). When I have read something interesting, sometimes I discuss several themes with my friends or parents and I've detected myself in using English words automatically and unwillingly. And even if I catch myself in time and avoid to use particular English word, sometimes I just can't find an equivalent word in Latvian and I have to spend a lot of time explaining my idea.
But I haven't even started to learn this language seriously!!!!What would happen if I'd go for instance to UK and lived and studied there for several years??


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## Trisia

Horazio said:


> Unless you've been exposed for YEARS to a second language there's no way you're truly affected....
> 
> It takes years of full immersion and *or *constant exposure before your native tongue gets affected.



Just a slight correction, there. Hope you don't mind 

I can't say my English is that great, but it certainly affected my mother tongue. I do have trouble finding Romanian words sometimes, and I often just say the English word without realising it. But that didn't take years of full immersion. Cartoons and books plus the occasional conversations with natives did the trick.

I'm afraid it's a bit sad, really, that I'm losing my vocabulary - my own language is every bit as beautiful as English and deserves my attention


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## amnariel

Trisia said:


> I'm afraid it's a bit sad, really, that I'm losing my vocabulary - my own language is every bit as beautiful as English and deserves my attention


 

This is why I'm paying attention to words I'm using when I speak my language. I dislike using loanwords because it is very important to me to speak clearly and be understood well in my language. Plus, I work with so many people (too many!!!) who use loanwords and at same time do not speak English so they usually use them incorrectly... 




Paparaciii said:


> But I'm not even started to learn this language seriously!!!!What would happen if I'd go for instance to UK and lived and studied there for several years??


 
You have a very good point here Paparaciii  and I would recommend every person who wants to improve a second language and maintain speaking pure native tongue to make sure to stay in touch with friends and family in homeland, to read a lot in own native tongue and always consult dictionary


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## Outsider

As a youth, I would use English loanwords here and there when speaking to other teenagers, but not when I talked to adults. As an adult, I don't normally use as many, unless I'm having a conversation that requires technical terms.


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## salbutamol

He mejorado profundamente mi redacción y mi ortografía, además de aprender más del castellano. En sí, el inglés me ha llevado por buen camino.


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## dexter1355

Not pretty sure. But I had studied French before I studied English for 6 years. That was an advantage. Because English and French, both of them shares the nearly familiar in vocabulary. Although, both of them neither my first language. But, it actually helps me a lot then. ^_^


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