audio;

[cockade]

How many of you have your own language from home?

[There is a very distinct pause as Arno realizes that question may need to be clarified.]

By language, I mean something that is unique to your country or culture. For example, I'm from France and our language is French- but if you go to our neighboring country Spain, they speak Spanish instead. Italy has Italian. Britain has English.

Hilariously enough, if you gathered a Frenchman and a Spaniard together, they would be able to hold a somewhat decent conversation in their own languages because they're similar. [There's a bit of a pause as he says "somewhat," because he's pretty sure he wouldn't completely understand Spanish unless given some time to really digest it.] I'm not exactly sure they'd understand everything, but the basics would be covered rather well.

I suppose I'm asking mostly because there's so many of us, and so there's bound to be similarities and differences. Even across worlds. It would be interesting to talk about it, and possibly teach others if they're wanting to learn as well.

[Because almost anything is better than thinking about their current situation or about the Savrii, in his opinion.]

Comments

Audio

[nicearsenal]

Also hilariously enough, if you added a juggler, a German and an Englishman to that little scenario you'd have have the makings of a pretty good joke.

audio;

[cockade]

[OH MY GOD CHLOE. The joke obviously goes over his head.]

There's a joke about that?

audio;

[nicearsenal]

Mm hmm, there are lots of jokes about that.

audio;

[cadeuces]

Well, you know that I'm from Switzerland— were you to speak ​Züritüütsch outside of Switzerland, however, few enough even in Germany would understand you, but speak German, French, or Italian within the country and most will get the general idea as well.

[ It's a little backwards, but one also has to understand that it is a very small country bordered by those languages, so they've all evolved their own little dialects that have skewed it away from easy understanding. ]

It has certainly evolved over the years as well, which doesn't help much. For ease of use I usually just speak German. Though if you're planning on gathering a list, I'm also fluent in French and English with a fair amount of Arabic under my belt, though not enough Japanese to hold a conversation beyond some basic stilted phrases. [ With a touch more amusement: ] And I don't necessarily trust my tutor not to have slipped some jokes into what he taught me, either.

Many of the Latin-based languages remain fairly interchangeable, though, you're correct. Many of the words sound similar enough, though dialect and grammar differences may leave them lacking.

audio;

[cockade]

You know, I've been to another world full of magic and faeries before this one, and I don't think I've ever heard of a word quite like Züri- [He pauses, and boy is his face scrunching up trying to pronounce the word.] Züritüütsch before. [He completely butchers the word but look HE TRIES SO HARD.]

That's quite a list. Unfortunately I'm rather lacking, since French is my home language and I only can barely notice English when it's being spoken. I do know a bit of Gaelic, but that was mostly because of learning wards and magic from the Drabwurld.

That's what I remember, at least. I know that the languages do change a little as time progresses, but I would hope that they don't change so much that no one would recognize them.

[cadeuces]

[ She's clearly muffling a little huff of laughter with his attempt, but she's being polite!!! ]

Perhaps ​Zürichdeutsch will be a little easier? But I think that encompasses the differences quite well, no? The first was Swiss-German, and the second is simply German. It's the specific dialect around the city of Zürich, which is closest to Germany. That is most of what you'll find through the country, but the further west you go, closer to France? Then you delve into français de Suisse— sound a little more familiar? Though I'm afraid my French accent isn't terribly passable.

[ The ties to Gaelic explain his passable attempt, at least, as Gaelic is a far more difficult language to master— but wards and magic...? ]

I feel as though I've heard that before, this Drabwurld. I wasn't aware you practiced magic, Arno. Is that a skill you've retained?

Audio;

[tearsinajar]

It might not be much use here but... If you were interested, I could help add to your list.

English is my first language. The others I've picked up along the way.

[ Like he might do, if he wants to learn. ]

Audio;

[cockade]

...I would enjoy that, actually. [He sounds surprised at the offer. Arno has wanted to learn, but it's always fallen to the wayside and he doesn't really think it would be proper or right to openly ask someone out of the blue.] I can only barely recognize when English is being spoken- as to knowing what the words mean, that's another story.

I'm afraid all I can offer is French in return- and older French, at that.

Audio;

[tearsinajar]

I'll be more than happy to help then.

[ Her smile is in her tone. ]

Is there much of a difference between the two? I mean, I know most things evolve over time, and sometimes languages, but French...?

[ AUDIO ]

[patchricide]

It all depends on how interconnected the cultures are, doesn't it? Finding common words from different languages on one planet is one thing. But I would be surprised to find any similarities between Earth's language and Altea's.

Not counting coincidences, of course.

[And yet, she speaks perfect English, somehow. Maybe because Altean is technically a dead language.]

[ AUDIO ]

[cockade]

Perhaps. There isn't much similar between English and French, from what I can tell, but not all languages are meant to sound or speak the same. I believe that's what makes them all unique.

What is Altea like, if you don't mind my asking?

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[redshitlord]

Oh! Me! Pick me!

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[cockade]

[BEWILDERED FRENCHMAN GOES HERE.JPG]

Pick you? For talking about languages or learning them?

[liberaltus]

In Tevinter we speak Tevene and the Trade tongue...well Teven is spoken mostly by the nobility class as the Trade tongue has become the common language that most everyone on Thedas speaks regardless of their secondary language.

Orlesians speak Orlesian and Trade, Antivans speak Antivan and Trade, Elves speak Elvish...rather the Dalish speak Elvish, the Qunari speak Qunlat, the Dwarves well they invented the Trade language more or less, in the Anderfels they speak Ander, in Rivain they speak Rivaini.

There is very little cross communication between the languages though...I suppose Orlesian and Antivan sound similar at times.

[cockade]

I see. Trade as a common language makes sense- I'm not exactly sure what the widespread language is for Earth, unfortunately. I wouldn't exactly say I've had the time to travel.

Thedas has always been interesting like that, I've found. How different does Tevene sound from Trade?

It's the same for many languages back home. I know that French is very different from Japanese, though I couldn't tell you how, exactly. How far apart are Orlais and Antiva? France, Spain, Italy and Germany are all lodged against each other, which is how I imagine our languages can have quite a bit of similarities if spoken together.

audio;

[shadowblends]

Fluently, I speak German, English, and Latin. I know a bit of Romanian from my mutter and some other odds and ends from traveling throughout Europe.

If there are people that would like to learn, I'd be more than willing to teach them whatever they would like to know.

audio;

[cockade]

You know all those fluently? That's impressive. How long did it take you to learn all of them?

{ audio }

[frostedplum]

Oh, hello! I'm from China, so I speak Chinese.

{ audio }

[cockade]

Ah- I don't believe I've met someone from China before. That's incredibly interesting. I'd imagine Chinese is very different from many other languages, like French is compared to English.

video;

[sketchycharacter]

Okay, one: don't listen to Chloe, that's a great joke. Two: I don't really have anything to add, we're from the same world.

video;

[cockade]

[He's trying to keep a straight face and not laugh.

Keyword: trying.]

One: I'm going to have to agree with her- that joke is awful, no matter how much you might say otherwise. Two: I figured as much- but that doesn't mean I'm not interested to know how many languages you know or speak, Nate.

[farmboyjedi]

There are thousands across the galaxy I'm from. Each planet seems to have its own, or several.

I picked up a little Jawa and Huttese on my home planet, and a word or two of Correllian, the language from my brother-in-law's world. And I started to figure out some of what his good friend would say in Shirywook when he was around.

I've picked up bits and pieces of a few others because I see so many different races in my work, although I'm really not fluent. It's because with so many planets, there's also a common language. It's really like this one...kind of strange, I think. It's called Basic.

[And when someone hasn't been fluent in Basic, there's often others who can translate for him, or he's got Threepio to do the job. Still, he's learned a few things here and there.]

[cockade]

That doesn't seem too far off from how Earth is- though I can't say we've even begun to discover everything about our planet yet.

It must be interesting to come across so many different languages, however. How do you keep all of them separated when you recall them?

That seems to be a growing trend- I'm not sure about a common language for us, but hearing that there is a solid language most use to converse, regardless of the multiverse, is reassuring, in a sense.

Audio

[warandpeace]

I'm from Japan. My native language is Japanese, but I speak English and Spanish fluently as well.

[Though now he's thinking of the language parasite, how it spread infection by words. A language weaponized. Thank god the ship never pulled that monster in during their failure of a journey.]

I've noticed that once I've been away from home for a while, the more I appreciate conversations with people from there. Or at least they sound like they could be.

[voice]

[10_20_15_5_50]

It's not exactly mine, since I grew up in English-speaking Canada, but Quebecois French---which I've had some exposure to---is kind of its own weird thing, the sacres especially.