Korean Job Discussion Forums

nasigoreng · Joined: 14 May 2004

For people who speak 3 languages:

I'm working on a 3rd language but I keep mixing up the words from my 2nd language (spanish) and my target language. Next, I'll meet someone who speaks spanish and then I'll be thinking in my target language as i try to converse spanish.

Is this normal? I'm hoping to acquire a fourth or maybe even a fifth language but I'm afraid I'll turn into a schizophrenic.

thebum · Joined: 09 Jan 2005 Location: North Korea

I've not had this problem, but I know it is normal. My native language is English. I speak Spanish fairly well (but I would still like to improve it) and Korean fairly well. I am going to study Korean more when I go to Korea, which should be soon. I also know a lot of Latin, but I don't really ever speak it.

Unfortunately, I don't have any good advice for you, but as I said, it is normal, so don't get too down about it.

tzechuk · Joined: 20 Dec 2004

Prefectly normal. I speak fluent Cantonese and Mandarin Chinese and English, and conversational German and Italian. You would have thought that with German and Italian being so relatively different I wouldn't get them mixed up, but I do! Weird, huh?

My husband speaks English, German and French fluently, as well as Korean (being Korean).. he is always mixing up French and English words - partly because he learned French first and got to know the words in French first.. like medicine, he always says medicament... heh..

Once you are completely fluent, you will be able to use the correct words.

tommynomad · Joined: 24 Jul 2004 Location: on the move

tzechuk's right: perfectly normal. It's because your L1 uses one part of the brain, and all your others (L2, L3, L4, etc.) share another. So sometimes you get your lines crossed. My dad's fluent in 5 and adds 3 conversationally. Sometimes we have a whole conversation without knowing which language we're speaking!

mithridates · Posted: Tue Feb 15, 2005 1:02 am Post subject:

Are you sure that's right? I don't feel like I'm using the same part of my brain when looking at French and Norwegian as I do when using Korean or Japanese. I remember studying a bit of French back in Japan before I went there for my disastrous pilgrimage and I had to tell myself to stop using the Japanese part of my brain and switch back to the Indo-European side. I'm working mostly on Chinese now, but it doesn't feel like it belongs with any of the others either.
When I'm with Korean people that know Japanese we'll switch back and forth between the two because they work so well together, whereas English just interferes with the flow.

meagicano · Joined: 02 Jan 2005

I have that problem, especially between French and Spanish. I'm completely fluent in French, and learned Spanish in high school, but I often get the two mixed up. It's challenging, and it's completely unconcious.

The worst part was when I had French class immediately before Spanish. That was rough.

Demonicat · Joined: 18 Nov 2004 Location: Suwon

maybe Korean and Japanese are R-brain due to the scientific nature of them =^.^=

Dude, good luck on keeping your old fluency while learning the new language. I used to be darn good with ghetto spanish. I then moved to africa and learned french, quick fast and in a hurry. Now my spanish is darn near gone. Heck even my english is hurt as I always say (pardon my spelling) D'main instead of tomarrow, I frequently say Wei, and N'est pas is my standard, right?

tommynomad · Joined: 24 Jul 2004 Location: on the move

I read somewhere (my gut says Nature but I could be wrong--it was around 1985) about the second-language centre in the brain. Apparently, if the area in question isn't used by 6 or 7 years old, it essentially shuts down. That's why it's so hard to learn L2s after that age: you have to use a part of the brain that wasn't meant for language learning. But if you do learn a L2 by that age, that part of the brain stays functional throughout your life, and other languages learned employ that same area.
It's beena long time, if anyone else has any research about this I'd love to hear it!

Zenpickle · Joined: 06 Jan 2004 Location: Anyang -- Bisan

I do that all the time. If I can't think of the word in Korean, I'll switch to German. If I'm speaking to someone in German, I'll throw in Korean words.

gi66y · Joined: 15 Aug 2003

I think it's normal to get confused when you speaking in a language you don't use often. I did the majority of my education in French, so I was relatively fluent 10 years ago, but not having used it much since then I've forgotten a lot.

So, now when I do speak French I throw in Korean words, sometimes without realizing it until I see the blank look on their face. I'm sure this is because whenever I try to think of a French word that doesn't immediately come to mind, my brain inevitably goes to the Korean word first because I speak Korean everyday. However,if I sit and speak in French for awhile (30 minutes or so) that problem seems to go away fairly quickly.

billybrobby · Joined: 09 Dec 2004

Yeah, I get totally mixed up too. I'm only fluent in English, but I studied a little bit of Spanish in college and I've been learning a lot of Korean what with living here and all. Now when I think back about Spanish all I can think of is Korean. I know the word for drunk is something like 'burracho' but if I think of it in a sentence I just think '�� ʹ� burracho.'

Today I was sitting on the bus, in the very back in those seats that are way high up, and I could look down at the book this girl in front of me was reading. It was a book to teach Spanish to Korean people. And it was very odd to me. She was reading a section on spanish verb conjugation and I was thinking, "why the h&ll are the verbs in the middle? they should be at the end"