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West Germanic:
English: After 14 years of studying English, I can't really remember what it was like to not understand a single word of it
Scots: Sounds like an English dialect to me.
Frisian: I can't really figure out what they are singing about in the song non-creep posted, but the written lyrics are pretty clear.
German: Native
Luxembourgish: Written Luxembourgish is okay, I can't understand spoken Luxembourgish, though, except for some words. I have problems with West Central German dialects in general...
Yiddish: I can understand bits of it. Probably easier to understand than Luxembourgish.
Dutch: I can understand some written words and could probably get a rough overview of a newspaper article.
North Germanic:
Swedish: Written Swedish is quite easy to understand after a basic Swedish course. Most of the vocab is either similar to German or English. Pronunciation is quite different to the German one, though.
(French ) mother tongue
English second language 100%
German (Hochdeutsch only)third language 100%
Bavaria dialect, Ausrian German 70%
Frisian, Schwaben, Letzeburgisch 30%
Schwyzerdüutsch, Alsatian dialect (Platt) 20%
Dutch, Danish, Swedish 10%
Other : 0%
West Germanic:
English: After 14 years of studying English, I can't really remember what it was like to not understand a single word of it
Scots: Sounds like an English dialect to me.
Frisian: I can't really figure out what they are singing about in the song non-creep posted, but the written lyrics are pretty clear.
German: Native
Luxembourgish: Written Luxembourgish is okay, I can't understand spoken Luxembourgish, though, except for some words. I have problems with West Central German dialects in general...
Yiddish: I can understand bits of it. Probably easier to understand than Luxembourgish.
Dutch: I can understand some written words and could probably get a rough overview of a newspaper article.
North Germanic:
Swedish: Written Swedish is quite easy to understand after a basic Swedish course. Most of the vocab is either similar to German or English. Pronunciation is quite different to the German one, though.
To make things a little clearer, nobody in Scotland actually speaks what people here are callings 'scots' (Very very few anyway) the Scottish populace actually speak English I am not sure but I think the 'Scots' language that seems to be confusing everybody is actually some form of Gaelic isn't it? As an English man who speaks only English (unfortunately) I can categorically say that like all English people I know who have not studied another language I understand as much German or Swedish or Danish, Frisian and French when spoken as I do any other language ie none whatsoever :-(
To make things a little clearer, nobody in Scotland actually speaks what people here are callings 'scots' (Very very few anyway) the Scottish populace actually speak English I am not sure but I think the 'Scots' language that seems to be confusing everybody is actually some form of Gaelic isn't it? As an English man who speaks only English (unfortunately) I can categorically say that like all English people I know who have not studied another language I understand as much German or Swedish or Danish, Frisian and French when spoken as I do any other language ie none whatsoever :-(
Scots is a Germanic language and about 30% of the Scottish population can speak it - but it is essentially a variation of English - but don't tell them!
If a Brit was faced with someone speaking Swedish, or German, or Dutch, I doubt they'd understand much if any of what was being said - especially if the accent is harsh. However, my grandmother picked up Swedish easily when she played host to a couple from Gothenburg and heard them speaking Swedish.
Scots is a Germanic language and about 30% of the Scottish population can speak it - but it is essentially a variation of English - but don't tell them!
If a Brit was faced with someone speaking Swedish, or German, or Dutch, I doubt they'd understand much if any of what was being said - especially if the accent is harsh. However, my grandmother picked up Swedish easily when she played host to a couple from Gothenburg and heard them speaking Swedish.
I honestly don't know myself but I can tell you that I have Scottish family and a lot of Scottish friends and NONE of them speak any language other than English, in fact in all of my time in Scotland I have never found anybody that speaks anything other than English unless they have learnt another European language. Of course I don't usually ask the 'man in the street' however 30% seems a little high to me.
Scots is a Germanic language and about 30% of the Scottish population can speak it - but it is essentially a variation of English - but don't tell them!
If a Brit was faced with someone speaking Swedish, or German, or Dutch, I doubt they'd understand much if any of what was being said - especially if the accent is harsh. However, my grandmother picked up Swedish easily when she played host to a couple from Gothenburg and heard them speaking Swedish.
Swedish is surprisingly easy to pick up once you start both listening to it and reading it. I find it the easiest language to understand other than English.
Part of the battle is learning the extra vowels, how they sound and how they are used (ö, å, ä).
I honestly don't know myself but I can tell you that I have Scottish family and a lot of Scottish friends and NONE of them speak any language other than English, in fact in all of my time in Scotland I have never found anybody that speaks anything other than English unless they have learnt another European language. Of course I don't usually ask the 'man in the street' however 30% seems a little high to me.
The Scots language is not Gaelic. What you are referring to is probably Scottish Gaelic, which is a Celtic language and not Germanic.
The Scots language though, which is spoken by very many Scots, is Germanic. However many people considers it to just be a distinct dialect of English.
Scotland (Gaelic: Alba, Inglis: Scotland) is a kintra in nor-wast Europe, an is ane o the fower kintras[1] that maks the Unitit Kinrick. It taks up the northren thrid o the Breetish island. Scotland haes til its sooth the laund o Ingland, an is bund bi the German Ocean til the eist an the Atlantic Ocean til the north an wast.
A habby is a acteevity duin for pleisur. Whit can be ae bodies's wark can be anither bodie's habby. For ensaumple, a body micht gowf for thair perfaission, but anither body micht gowf in thair free time, an this wad be a habby.
The Unitit States o Americae is a kintra on the North American continent, an it is bund bi twa oceans (the Atlantic, an the Paceefic) an bi twa kintras (Mexico tae the sooth, an Canadae tae the north).
Its current Presses is Barack Obama o the Democratic Pairtie.
To all English speakers out there, which is what the Norwegian language looks like for a Swede in comparison
I honestly don't know myself but I can tell you that I have Scottish family and a lot of Scottish friends and NONE of them speak any language other than English, in fact in all of my time in Scotland I have never found anybody that speaks anything other than English unless they have learnt another European language. Of course I don't usually ask the 'man in the street' however 30% seems a little high to me.
There are 1.5 million who speak it as a second language, and around 125,000 who speak it as a native language, so 30-31% is quite accurate. It might be hard to distinguish Scots from the harsher Scottish accents.
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