Introduce yourself here

General discussion about learning languages
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SGP
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Re: Introduce yourself here

Postby SGP » Fri Nov 16, 2018 6:18 pm

fcoulter wrote:
SGP wrote:
fcoulter wrote:I just realized that I've been posting to the forums, but haven't introduced myself. So here goes.

I am a sixty year old native American.


There is a number of things I have been expecting to maybe happen on this forum. But this one didn't come to my mind at all. Really surprised :).


?

By the way, I mean "native American" in that I was born in American, not "Native American" in that my ancestors were here before Columbus (or Erikson).


Well, I for one am not a native of English :). Also, if I am not mistaken, even "native" (i.e. without any capitalization) would be used for "pre-Columbus natives" too. What's more, the sole possibility of yourself meaning "native as in: simply grown up there/etc." didn't even come to my mind.

So to me, it seemed as if someone mentioned that while he is a native American (as in "of American pre-Columbus ancestry"), his mother's tongue also is French, i.e. neither English, nor a native American language. So I was kind of double surprised :).

Also, I am sorry if I caused any trouble to anyone by what I recently wrote. It's just that I really like meeting people from different cultures, no matter if it is online or offline. And if a native American (in the meaning that has been mentioned above) would post here, this would be something that doesn't happen as much as other natives of English posting here I guess.

Even if there also are definitely native Americans who use the Internet, no doubt about that one, they can be countless even. Also, I already visited at least one of their web sites in the past. What's more, I certainly do know that there is a very large number of them who is entirely fluent in English.

Now what I just explained was the only reason why I mentioned that I really am surprised, then adding a smiley.
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fcoulter
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Re: Introduce yourself here

Postby fcoulter » Fri Nov 16, 2018 9:07 pm

SGP wrote:
fcoulter wrote:
SGP wrote:
fcoulter wrote:I just realized that I've been posting to the forums, but haven't introduced myself. So here goes.

I am a sixty year old native American.


There is a number of things I have been expecting to maybe happen on this forum. But this one didn't come to my mind at all. Really surprised :).


?

By the way, I mean "native American" in that I was born in American, not "Native American" in that my ancestors were here before Columbus (or Erikson).


Well, I for one am not a native of English :). Also, if I am not mistaken, even "native" (i.e. without any capitalization) would be used for "pre-Columbus natives" too. What's more, the sole possibility of yourself meaning "native as in: simply grown up there/etc." didn't even come to my mind.

So to me, it seemed as if someone mentioned that while he is a native American (as in "of American pre-Columbus ancestry"), his mother's tongue also is French, i.e. neither English, nor a native American language. So I was kind of double surprised :).

Also, I am sorry if I caused any trouble to anyone by what I recently wrote. It's just that I really like meeting people from different cultures, no matter if it is online or offline. And if a native American (in the meaning that has been mentioned above) would post here, this would be something that doesn't happen as much as other natives of English posting here I guess.

Even if there also are definitely native Americans who use the Internet, no doubt about that one, they can be countless even. Also, I already visited at least one of their web sites in the past. What's more, I certainly do know that there is a very large number of them who is entirely fluent in English.

Now what I just explained was the only reason why I mentioned that I really am surprised, then adding a smiley.


After reading (and thinking about) your previous posts, I've edited my original post to be a bit clearer. I think I was running with the "native speaker" language, which is a bit strange in my case. (Born in NY, native French speaker. How strange.) It should make more sense now, but if you have suggestions for improvement...
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FernandoTercio
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Re: Introduce yourself here

Postby FernandoTercio » Wed Nov 28, 2018 2:48 pm

Hello everybody, I'm glad I'm now part of this forum. I will make a log so you all can hold me accountable and I will explain my motives and goals in more detail there , but because this is a presentation post I should present myself.

I'm Fernando and I was born in Spain. I'm 25 at the moment, which is hard to swallow as just yesterday was out of highschool, or so my memory tells me. Anyhow, after dabbling for some years in various languages and different methods (italian, japonese, french, german, esperanto :D ) I figured out it was time to take one of them seriously and become proficient at it. The one I chose was French, for career reasons. I'm also studying Mandarin on the side just because it's fun, but I'm focusing on learning two characters a day only and slowly building my grammar up. So the focus right now is on French up until I can be considered proficient.

I will spend some hours now lurking around the forum to get a better grasp of it different sections, I will read you over there!
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Jiwon
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Re: Introduce yourself here

Postby Jiwon » Fri Nov 30, 2018 4:11 pm

This seems to be a good way to return to the forum after two years of passive reading/dormancy.

Greetings to all. I'm Jiwon from Seoul, South Korea. I've used the same username at HTLAL, so some of you may recognize me.
I first joined HTLAL in 2007, when I was still in secondary school in Sri Lanka, which is where I was exposed to Commonwealth English.
Since then I have returned to Korea, did a double degree in sociology and Indian studies, and finished my military service in the process.
Last year, I enrolled at a law school last year, but dropped out after one semester.
Currently I'm back at my alma mater, doing a master's program in sociology, and specializing in migration and globalization.

It's an interesting time to be living in Seoul at the moment, with all the world paying attention to what North and South Korean leaders are doing.

Language-wise, I speak Korean, English and German. I hang out with expatriate/immigrant community in Seoul twice to thrice a week as a part of my research. Most of them are Caucasian Americans or Europeans, and it's been a refreshing change from the monolingual atmosphere prevalent in Korea. I am also learning Hindi, although it's proving to be a lot more difficult since I am past the basic level.

I am also extremely thrilled that the next Polyglot Conference is in Fukuoka. I am planning to start learning Japanese in January, until the conference starts, just to know how much I can accomplish when I learn a language similar to my L1.
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de gieter
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Re: Introduce yourself here

Postby de gieter » Mon Dec 03, 2018 10:25 am

Oskar. Trinity College, University of Dublin.

I would like to learn hieroglyphics.
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emk
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Re: Introduce yourself here

Postby emk » Mon Dec 03, 2018 11:28 am

de gieter wrote:Oskar. Trinity College, University of Dublin.

I would like to learn hieroglyphics.

Welcome to the forum!

We've had a couple of different Egyptian study groups in the past. Two truly excellent Egyptian courses are:

  • For English speakers: Allen's Middle Egyptian: An Introduction to the Language and Culture of Hieroglyphs. This is one of the best "traditional style" textbooks I've seen for any language. It doesn't assume prior knowledge of grammar, but it includes clear explanations, tons of example sentences, and the best collection I've ever seen of grammatical "particles" (among many other virtues).
  • For people who can read French reasonably well: Assimil's L'Égyptien hiéroglyphique. This is a "learn by osmosis (and hard work)" style of course, but you need to be able to more-or-less read a typical French novel to use it (B2-level French reading comprehension, to use the CEFR scale).
Here's a list of resources that we put together back in 2013:

emk wrote:(Note to taggers: We're not a TAC team.)

Image

Transliteration: is.t n(j).t r n(j) km.t
Manuel de codage: iz-t:1-A1:1*1*1 n:t r:1 n km-m-t:O49
English: Team Egyptian

(Please feel free to suggest corrections to the team name! The is.t n(j).t part is probably unidiomatic.)

About This Team

We've decided that we're going to mess around with Middle Egyptian a little bit every week. Nothing strenuous. In fact, this is something of an experiment to see how far we can go without actually obsessing.

New members are welcome! It's OK if you want to study fast, or if you're just getting started. You can study anything from Archaic Egyptian to Coptic, if you can find the resources.

Team Logs

Teango
tarvos
vermillion
emk (previously here and here)

Courses & Reference Works

- Assimil's L'Égyptien hiéroglyphique. 101 lessons. Excellent, with a French base. The audio CDs are optional, but they make it easier to remember.
- Allen's Middle Egyptian: An Introduction to the Language and Culture of Hieroglyphs. A gentle overview of the grammar, with all kinds of very useful sections, including one listing and explaining about two dozen common particles.
- Loprieno's Ancient Egyptian: A Linguistic Introduction. Nice and meaty linguistic overview.
- Collier, et al.'s How to Read Egyptian Hieroglyphs. A traditional-style course, with a strong emphasis on reading tomb inscriptions.
- A concise overview of Egyptian grammar using standard linguistics terminology.
- hierogl.ch. An utterly fantastic online dictionary (if you read French).
- Vermillion has also discovered Egyptian words in the Wikitionary. It's quite extensive.
- Aegyptisches handwörterbuch. The classic, comprehensive dictionary (if you read German handwriting).
- Thesaurus Linguae Aegyptiae, an online and updated version of the Aegyptisches handwörterbuch. Painful to use, but absolutely the best source of for obscure definitions. We have some basic instructions, too.
- Anki deck with 165 common signs. English base, updated August 2014 to include only the most important signs.

Things to Read

- The Tale of Peter Rabbit. Hieroglyphs with occasional translator's notes in English.
- Projet d'index global des inscriptions des temples de Karnak. Hieroglyphs and transliterations, searchable by transliteration. Here's an example.
- A New Concordance of the Pyramid Texts (found on this excellent list of online resources, so I believe this is public and officially sanctioned).
- Les aventures de Sinouhé. Hieroglyphs, transliteration, French translation. Be careful with the translation; some of MdV's authors have rather original theories.
- St Andrews corpus, including a large number of PDF files with hieroglyphs, transliterations and translations, plus an XML corpus and Java-based viewer.
- The Westcar papyrus online, with detailed commentary and a dictionary mode.
- And what about Budge?

Technological Goodies

- Grab the Gardiner.tff font to view the hieroglyphs in this thread.
- To enter hieroglyphs on computers, it helps to know the Manuel de Codage conventions.
- To typeset hieroglyphs, try JSesh.
- Linux users familiar with ibus may want to try these experimental input methods.
- To format Egyptian texts for display on HTLAL, check out hierogloss.

As we discover resources, these lists will grow.

Welcome! Let's have fun. And please feel free to correct any mistakes you find.

If you start a new language learning log in the appropriate subforum, I'm sure people will be happy to drop by, say hello, and provide advice. Once again, welcome to the forum!
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SGP
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Re: Introduce yourself here

Postby SGP » Mon Dec 03, 2018 12:54 pm

Hi Oskar.

de gieter wrote:Oskar. Trinity College, University of Dublin.

I would like to learn hieroglyphics.
Now I wonder why exactly you like to learn them. Because this is something that not too many would do.
(Asking as someone with a reading queue that includes learning something about them, too, because of purely historical interest).
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de gieter
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Re: Introduce yourself here

Postby de gieter » Mon Dec 03, 2018 2:06 pm

SGP wrote:Hi Oskar.

de gieter wrote:Oskar. Trinity College, University of Dublin.

I would like to learn hieroglyphics.
Now I wonder why exactly you like to learn them. Because this is something that not too many would do.
(Asking as someone with a reading queue that includes learning something about them, too, because of purely historical interest).
I was initially interested in pre-Christian Germanic Tribalism, through my parents, who are Germans who emigrated to Ireland. I wanted to learn about the origins of Germany, so I went there. Turns out there were few sources on it, the earliest being Tacitus, a pre-Christian Latin historian. I read Germania in English translation, but decided I did not know enough about the Graeco-Roman approach to history, so I decided to begin with what I believed was the beginning of such a thing - I read Sappho, Homer, Hesiod, Nonnos, Appolonius and others in English translation, then started a text containing fragments related to (perhaps written by) Thales of Miletus. In the introduction, however, it claimed that the various phusiologoi (Aristotle's term?) were influenced by Aegyptian and Akkadian sources. When I read this, I decided to investigate the bookstore and a large book called The Book of the Dead fell upon my eyes. I devoured it and decided that I MUST read it in the original.

So here I am. I would like to take some Aegyptology lectures when in Goettingen on erasmus in my fifth through eighth semesters and do apprenticeships in a museum in Hildesheim during the summers, some day working there. I therefore MUST learn hieroglyphs.
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7APTARSHI
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Re: Introduce yourself here

Postby 7APTARSHI » Mon Dec 10, 2018 2:17 pm

Hello everyone, I am Saptarshi Bardhan. I am from India and my native language is Bengali.

I am here to share my knowledge of my own language with you all and I want to learn and practice French and English. A long time ago I had studied Spanish for almost 3 years; I used to attend class of a local language school for 3 hours per week. In 2016, I tried to learn Italian for 1 year. Then I shifted my interest to French and have decided to concentrate on French finally as there are lots of books are available to study French and there is a centre of Alliance Francaise in my city. I want to improve my French and sit for A1 A2 exams as early as possible.

This website is awesome! C'est super! এই ওয়েবসাইটটা দুর্দান্ত...!!! :P :P
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Iversen
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Languages: Monolingual travels in Danish, English, German, Dutch, Swedish, French, Portuguese, Spanish, Catalan, Italian, Romanian and (part time) Esperanto
Ahem, not yet: Norwegian, Afrikaans, Platt, Scots, Russian, Serbian, Bulgarian, Albanian, Greek, Latin, Irish, Indonesian and a few more...
Language Log: viewtopic.php?f=15&t=1027
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Re: Introduce yourself here

Postby Iversen » Mon Dec 10, 2018 2:59 pm

Welcome. We have several students of Japanese and Mandarin, but the big Indian languages are seriously underrepresented here (and unfortunately I haven't had the time and energy to do anything about that myself).
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