Anybody deaf who can speak multiple languages?

I wish I knew more full languages, I know bits of Russian, Hebrew, Yiddish, Italian, some ASL and a lot of Spanish - though not as fluent as I once was.
When I was at the mall a few months ago I approached the Rosetta kiosk and urged them to make an ASL tutorial since they have so many other languages represented.
 
oh, wait, am sorry, maybe I interrupted. The ques. was - "anybody deaf..."
am hoh.
sorry....
 
Trananto said:
My case is different as my hearing loss is only mild to moderate. But I can speak Chinese (Cantonese) but not read/write. I will probably try to learn Mandarin and how to write Chinese in the next year.
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Interesting that you can speak cantonese...and mandarin as well! Don't you agree Mandarin is a difficult language to learn as deaf/HOH, especially how it's so different from Spanish and other Romance language?
 
Mandarin and basic level Japanese.
Used to know enough for introductory Korean and Spanish, but not using them for awhile makes me forget. :(

Mandarin is not hard to learn, but my experience may be biased as I've had exposure to it for a long time. As with all languages that incorporate Hanzhi aka chinese characters such as kanji, hanja, Vietnamese (forget what's it called here) it is hard because it's purely memorization.

I remember being taught that you need to know at least a few thousand characters to read the daily Chinese newspaper. It's probably easier to read if it has bopomofo/hiragana/etc sided along with the characters.
 
My deaf friends from Hong Kong know Cantonese language very well but they can't understand Mandarin which was very difficult to learn, they told me.
 
I am in kind of similar situation to you.

My family is Chinese (in our immediate family they speak Cantonese, but to other people like uncles, aunts, etc my parents speak Mandarin to them). They moved from Hong Kong to England about 25 - 30 years ago, way before I was born. I was born deaf, so I didn't go to a Chinese school to learn the language and how to read & write. Basically, I'm the odd one out, as the rest of my family knows how to speak it fluently and I don't. The older ones in my family tend not to speak English well so there's difficulty with communication as well.

I do speak half-English and half-Cantonese to my parents though. I'm slowly getting better at the language. I do eventually want to learn how to speak it fluently and read & write. I should ask my parents to teach me.

But I think you're older than me, since I presume you've finished high school. I'm only 15. I've done several years of German and French in school, although my knowledge of it is not advanced. Aside from wanting to learn Cantonese, I want to learn Hebrew, BSL and ASL. That will keep me occupied for quite a while.

Good luck with the Chinese classes!
 
mother tongue

Tsundre said:
I am in kind of similar situation to you.

My family is Chinese (in our immediate family they speak Cantonese, but to other people like uncles, aunts, etc my parents speak Mandarin to them). They moved from Hong Kong to England about 25 - 30 years ago, way before I was born. I was born deaf, so I didn't go to a Chinese school to learn the language and how to read & write. Basically, I'm the odd one out, as the rest of my family knows how to speak it fluently and I don't. The older ones in my family tend not to speak English well so there's difficulty with communication as well.

I do speak half-English and half-Cantonese to my parents though. I'm slowly getting better at the language. I do eventually want to learn how to speak it fluently and read & write. I should ask my parents to teach me.

But I think you're older than me, since I presume you've finished high school. I'm only 15. I've done several years of German and French in school, although my knowledge of it is not advanced. Aside from wanting to learn Cantonese, I want to learn Hebrew, BSL and ASL. That will keep me occupied for quite a while.

Good luck with the Chinese classes!
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everyone here is probably older than you :lol: but you seem to be adapting pretty well with your interests in other languages. i heard a lot of hong kong chinese moved to england and canada because they were sorta british subjects ? i have a friend in england but she is kinda under the radar.
how severe is your hearing loss.
why hebrew?
since you are looking to learn BSl i assume you attend hearing schools. sounds lie you have an interesting life for living on a big old island
 
Oui, je parle Francais...

Oui, je parle francais parce que je suis Canadienne...Yes, I speak french because I am Canadian...sorry just kinda showing off there:cool2: but I'm in the same boat as one of you who said something about can speak and read and write but I can't lipread it anymore...not enough people to "listen" to around. I also do a fairly passable German, I took that a few yrs ago at university....I can proudly say that I can know enough words and phrases in 8 languages to get me drunk, laid and in a fight (not neccessarily in that order!):naughty:
 
DDU said:
everyone here is probably older than you :lol: but you seem to be adapting pretty well with your interests in other languages. i heard a lot of hong kong chinese moved to england and canada because they were sorta british subjects ? i have a friend in england but she is kinda under the radar.
how severe is your hearing loss.
why hebrew?
since you are looking to learn BSl i assume you attend hearing schools. sounds lie you have an interesting life for living on a big old island
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Yeah, Hong Kong was a British colony a long, long time ago. Though I'm not so sure that's why my parents moved here.

I have a bilateral severe to profound hearing loss. Wear hearing aids though. I want to learn ASL & BSL so I can join the Deaf communities in both countries (probably easier said than done, but I'm willing to put the effort in). I'd also like to learn Hebrew because their language is interesting.. and also because one day I'd like to read the Torah, although I'm not Jewish. And what about you? Do you have a hearing loss? How severe is it? (If you don't mind me asking, sometimes I can be nosy).

Yes, my parents sent me to mainstream hearing schools. As I live in a small town.. actually, village (population >11500), there aren't schools for the deaf. I think, if there was a school like that around here, they would have sent me there. But after when I'm 18 (when I'll move out to go to university) I hope to learn BSL. I'm waiting until then because I am actually worried my parents will disapprove.

How about you? Do you sign? And if so, which one?

Edit: Sorry, read your location. You must use ASL if you sign, silly me. But if you do sign, how long have you been signing for?
 
i lost my hearing at 11. was HOH for years until fully deaf. i can usually understand most people using ASL but my own signing skills go more to SEE. it took me years to stop saying "the" and "at" which bugs the hell out of most deaf.
one thing i miss about hearing is languages. at one time knew some latin and did well with it. i had an ear for languages but then the ears went. hebrew would be fun to learn. the hebrew writing looks a little like arabic. that looks like an imposible written language to understand
 
DDU said:
i lost my hearing at 11. was HOH for years until fully deaf. i can usually understand most people using ASL but my own signing skills go more to SEE. it took me years to stop saying "the" and "at" which bugs the hell out of most deaf.
one thing i miss about hearing is languages. at one time knew some latin and did well with it. i had an ear for languages but then the ears went. hebrew would be fun to learn. the hebrew writing looks a little like arabic. that looks like an imposible written language to understand
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Yea, it looks like an impossible but fascinating written language.
 
sheila022 said:
Hi everybody,

I am a deaf American-born Chinese myself raised in a Chinese speaking household (but family decided to teach/speak to me in English only) . I was implanted when I was 3 years old and had learned to speak English only at that time, but lately, I've started to learn to speak and listen in Chinese. Many times I wished my parents would teach me to speak Chinese when I was a lot younger because it's no fun when you go back to China and people randomly walk up to you in the street and ask me questions in Chinese and that there is a major language barrier between my grandmother, grandfathers, aunts, uncles, and cousins who can't speak English.

So, I'm planning to take Chinese classes at my college and see how it goes, although I do have some rudimentary knowledge of Chinese and are able to speak whatever I have passably, but I want to be able to speak Chinese near fluently. I also had 5 years of experience of learning Spanish in high school and excelling in it...but not much emphasis on conversational aspect in classes, so I just end up acing all of those paper translation/reading/writing part. (Chinese is soo much harder than Spanish!!!!)

I am wondering if there is anybody else deaf and oral who can speak another language fluently or near fluently besides English (no, I don't count ASL). Especially someone at older age like me and learning from scratch.
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You have language sign language ASL and other Spanish! you are experience! I learn language is very bit Spanish and ASL , I know my mom and dad SEE but tough, deaf tutorial told me help me I was 14 yrs change I am fast ASL learn more expert :D I am very good person!
that is lots of more pretty improve! :D
 
DDU said:
i lost my hearing at 11. was HOH for years until fully deaf. i can usually understand most people using ASL but my own signing skills go more to SEE. it took me years to stop saying "the" and "at" which bugs the hell out of most deaf.
one thing i miss about hearing is languages. at one time knew some latin and did well with it. i had an ear for languages but then the ears went. hebrew would be fun to learn. the hebrew writing looks a little like arabic. that looks like an imposible written language to understand
Click to expand...

Thanks for sharing. Latin looks really interesting. Arabic does seem to be very complicated-looking, I agree with you.
 
you being european makes latin more common possibly? you can do your own "da vinci code " adventure :cool2: only in the deaf version.
 
Latin is more common in Europe but sadly it's kind of dying. Latin was once as a subject you could study once but it's been taken over by French/German/Spanish. So as a result, not a lot of people learn it.

:lol:

Yes, I could do with an adventure like that! Dan Brown is a good author.
 
how is the economy in your area? have heard that england is making drastic cuts.
 
The economy isn't too bad.. yet. The cuts are going hit everyone hard in the country (except the rich, as always).

University tuition fees are going to double at least, and triple in some universities. A student studying for three years in university will be on average saddled with about $50,000 - $80,000 debt. I think the fees across the ocean is higher than that maybe?

But seriously, some of the cuts aren't necessary. And how about over there?
 
college fees are worse than that even before any increases. lowest debt load for a student after college here is $25,000 which is about the same for brits when adjusted for currency differences .
after obama got his tail whipped in the latest midtrem elections there wil be more tax cuts. things are getting cut all over and the government workers are really taking it on the chin which isnt all bad.
it is a big shame your military has to join with france to make up a new military though. what ever happened to "Rule Britain" ??:shock:
 
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I used to know some German, Spanish. Latin and French, but, sadly forgot them all as there was no one to practice with after my father died.
 
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