Sharke -
 
I can't figure out how somebody could learn to speak a language by watching movies. There's a lot of time and effort between being able to understand -- more or less -- and being able to say the words and make them into understandable sentences.
 
It's related to the prediction from a few decades ago that because of mass media, everybody in the US would end up with the same pronunciation. That sure hasn't happened, and it's because people learn to talk from the people around them. It's a kind of peer pressure.
 
BTW Hungarian isn't related to any other language. Some people say it has some slight similarities to Finnish and Basque, but that's not obvious.

Mesh

57Gregy
I know French toast.
And French kisses.
Unfortunately, I haven't had either in a while. 

Try some French fries instead.
 
HTH. 

This is the problem when years are passing on too fast.....
Try french songs maybe!!!!
Cheers.

Beepster
PS: IME the most comprehensible French accents are from Africa. Just very well enunciated and seemingly devoid of all the regional slang/colloquialisms Euro/Canucker/etc variants have built up.
 
I'm thinking because it's usually second language. Kind of like I can understand someone from India speaking English about a million times better than I can understand a Geordie or Cockney accent/dialect.
 
Meh... language fascinates me and I've been trying to compile a list of languages to learn before I kick it.
 
1) Well I could probably very easily get my conversational French up to speed and it's really the most immediately useful to me since it's Canada's official second language
 
2) I'm thinking Spanish because I can kind of already glean quite a bit of it from American TV/cinema and it's kind of similar to French (as far as I can tell but perhaps not as similar as Italian).
 
3) German. My stepmom's parents were from Germany (and my stepdad from Austria) so I already have a bit of a foundation there. It is supposedly a REALLY difficult language to become fully fluent in but it's also a gateway to other languages and if I can get my head around those other tongues (giggety) then it would be like a step up in linguistics profiency because then I want to....
 
4) Learn Cantonese and other eastern languages... which, if I managed to learn all that other stuff, would likely take me through to my eventual dirt nap.
 
 
 

Well ,big plan...
If it was me it would ask hundred years to work it out.

Mesh

57Gregy
I know French toast.
And French kisses.
Unfortunately, I haven't had either in a while. 

Try some French fries instead.
 
HTH. 

Toast isn't French toast; kisses aren't French kisses, but fries are fries even if they're not French. Well, they're actually not French. Invented in Belgium? I think.

Mitch_I
Sharke -
 
I can't figure out how somebody could learn to speak a language by watching movies. There's a lot of time and effort between being able to understand -- more or less -- and being able to say the words and make them into understandable sentences.
 
It's related to the prediction from a few decades ago that because of mass media, everybody in the US would end up with the same pronunciation. That sure hasn't happened, and it's because people learn to talk from the people around them. It's a kind of peer pressure.
 
BTW Hungarian isn't related to any other language. Some people say it has some slight similarities to Finnish and Basque, but that's not obvious.

I should say that learning to speak by listening and repeating is probably the most natural form of learning a language, and is closer to how we learn language as babies than sitting in a classroom learning grammar and irregular verbs. 
 
When I was in France as a kid I picked up phrases like bonne nuit and aujord'hui simply by hearing people saying them in context. I had no idea how they were spelled. Similarly, you pick up the difference between avons and avez quite naturally by hearing people say nous avons and vous avez enough. It's no surprise that people generally know more about the formal grammar of their second languages than their first. Who even knows what an irregular verb is without studying language formally? Your native language was learned purely through listening and context, so it's certainly doable. 
 
 

Did you say French? :)
 
I've been using my free access to Rosetta Stone to learn German for the last month or so. It's hard to compare with other methods because I've tried different methods for different languages but I've made more progress in German in a shorter time than I have in Hebrew and Latin - although, to be fair, German is much easier, especially if one already speaks English and French.
 
Just as I did for English, I intend to start immersing myself in the language by watching movies in German. Judging from experience, the reason why I speak English relatively well while many of the folks I went to school with can barely utter a word has very little to do with the basic classes we all had. I wanted to understand song lyrics and be able to read columns in guitar magazines. So I used every resource and opportunity.
 
And the opposite is true - I was forced to take Spanish in college for a couple of years and forgot it all the minute I got out because I did not care for that language. I wanted to learn German, even back then, but Spanish was the only option.
 
I've purchased a box-set of CDs and books by Living Language to teach myself Hebrew a while ago. It is an interesting method too. But then again, I seem to learn a lot quicker when I am exposed to the language. Fortunately, there is a lot of content online, no matter which language you want to study.
 
Anyway - bonne chance, mon ami.

Free access to Rosetta Stone? How do you get that? 
 
I always fancied trying it because it seems like the most immersive method out there. No native language used at all. 

Mitch_I
 ...
BTW Hungarian isn't related to any other language. Some people say it has some slight similarities to Finnish and Basque, but that's not obvious.

No, Hungarian is a Uralic language related to Finnish, Estonian and others. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uralic_languages
 
Basque is considered a language isolate.

I learned a little Hungarian a few years ago, very difficult language in it's structure, but quite pleasant to speak.
 

sharke
Free access to Rosetta Stone? How do you get that? 
 
I always fancied trying it because it seems like the most immersive method out there. No native language used at all. 

My employer.