Today's Friday Five is about Language. I have an average to above average understanding of the English language, even if it doesn't seem like it sometimes. I took two years of French in high school. That resulted in me being able to say "My name is Dee" and that is pretty much it. I took 2 years of American Sign Language in college. I have done a lot better retaining ASL. I am decent with finger spelling and can remember some vocabulary. This list is the top 5 languages I'd like to learn (or relearn).
Irish/Gaelic: I have always loved Ireland. I want to go there for a summer. First on my list is Irish. Yeah, I know only a small number of people speak this language but I think it is really pretty. Plus, any dog in my future would be better off trained in Irish, considering there is less than a million native speakers world-wide (per Wikipedia, which may be sketchy).
Spanish: Here in the States, we have a growing Hispanic population. Spanish is a very diverse language and I would genuinely like to learn it for my own personal benefit. Also, I like to eaves drop on people and it is difficult to do when I have no idea what they are saying.
French: Another diverse language, French varies from France, Creole Louisiana, to parts of Canada. I really enjoyed taking French in high school, even though I retained almost nil. It is very pretty and with practice, I think I could pick it up again. Conversationally, it shouldn't be hard given I am alright with ASL (which is based on the French language).
Portuguese: This is a recent interest given that my favorite contender in The Glee Project is from Brazil and half his communications to/from fans is in Portuguese. I have abused Google translate so much being nosy. The "hear" function has made it so I really want to learn the language. It is very melodic.
German: German has been on my to-do list for a long time. My heritage is incredibly mixed and I ask very little about my family, but I am almost positive my great-great grandfather came here from Germany. Or maybe I mistook it for German when it was Polish. I don't know. I just know that I was really young when I told my mom that I wanted to learn German one day. It is still on the list twenty years later. One of these days.
