Foreign Languages facts

While investigating facts about Foreign Languages List and Foreign Languages In Demand, I found out little known, but curios details like:

A major reason why native English speakers have issues understanding German humour, is that the German language is way too precise to allow for the humorous confusions found in English. Also, German humour is usually delivered with a deadpan, which makes foreigners think they're being serious.

how foreign languages sound to non speakers?

Pol Pot killed people who had glasses or if they spoke foreign language, just because he thought they were smart.

What foreign languages are taught in uk schools?

In my opinion, it is useful to put together a list of the most interesting details from trusted sources that I've come across answering what foreign languages are in demand. Here are 50 of the best facts about Foreign Languages Press and Foreign Languages Institute Hyderabad Telangana I managed to collect.

what foreign languages are taught in us schools?

Only 20% of USA kids learns a foreign language relative to 92% of European kids
The Greeks often described foreign languages as sounding like "bar bar bar." Anyone who spoke a foreign language was called a Barbarian.
Drinking alcohol DOES improve your ability to speak a foreign language.
Babies learn a language by hearing it, but they must hear it spoken directly to them in person by another human being; as little as 12 hours with a human tutor produces dramatic results in babies, compared to no results even after many more hours of exposure to foreign language TV shows.
The easiest languages to learn for English speakers are Afrikaans, Dutch, Swedish, Danish, Norwegian, Italian, French, Spanish, Portuguese & Romanian. This is based on the amount of time it takes for the US Foreign Service to train their diplomats before entering service abroad.
When learning new phrases in a foreign language, hearing those phrases sung and then singing them has been shown to lead to better results than hearing them spoken normally and then repeating them the same way.
Many individual states have laws recognizing American Sign Language as a "foreign language". A number of U.S. universities even accept ASL credit to fulfill foreign language requirements
India's former Prime Minister P.V. Narasimha Rao spoke 17 languages - 8 foreign languages (English, French, Arabic, Spanish, German, Greek, Latin and Persian) and 9 Indian languages (Telugu, Hindi, Oriya, Bengali, Gujarati, Kannada, Sanskrit, Tamil and Urdu)
Häagen Dazs doesn't mean anything in any language, the creator just wanted the name to sound like something foreign
The last US President to speak a foreign language fluently was FDR

foreign languages facts — A person who is good at foreign languages is known as?

Foreign Languages data charts

For your convenience take a look at Foreign Languages figures with stats and charts presented as graphic.

foreign languages fact data chart about Number of foreign languages known by age group in the Europe — Number of foreign languages known by age group in the European Union

foreign languages fact data chart about Most spoken foreign language by country (after English) — Most spoken foreign language by country (after English)

Why foreign languages should be taught in schools?

You can easily fact check why foreign languages should not be required by examining the linked well-known sources.

Directors of the Crank movies let their Asian actors say whatever they wanted in their foreign language and was then later subtitled. Asian viewers then questioned why the dialogue being spoken by the characters didn't match the subtitles.

German was the most-studied foreign language in the U.S. in the years before and even during World War I. About a quarter of high schoolers studied it right before the U.S. entered the war, but only about 1% of high schools still taught it after the war. - source

The phrase "It's Greek to me" has analogues in many languages. In Greek, the foreign language in the saying is Turkish or Chinese. In Turkish, it's French or Arabic. In French and Arabic, it's Chinese. In Chinese, it's "ghost script," "bird sounds," or "chicken intestines." - source

The word barbarian is an onomonopeic word from the ancient Greeks who thought foreign languages sounded like people saying, "bar bar bar", just as English speakers today would say, "It all sounds Greek to me".

In foreign versions of "The Shining", the phrase "all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy" was replaced with idioms common to each different language, such as "The morning has gold in its mouth" or "One 'here you go' is worth more than two 'you'll have it'" - source

When did schools start teaching foreign languages?

Language learners who watch shows with subtitles in their foreign language, learn the language better than those who watch them without subtitles, or with subtitles in their native language.

How many foreign languages are required for college?

A Swiss study found that you can learn new information -- including foreign language vocabulary -- in your sleep

The word "barbarian" was founded by Greeks to describe those that spoke a foreign language. Greeks would hear meaningless "bar-bar"ing.

During the recording of "Mork & Mindy" Robin Williams used to tell dirty jokes in foreign languages, to see what he could slip past the censors

Despite its all dialogues being in a modern approximation of the ancient language Apocalypto has been nominated for Golden Globes as a Best Foreign Language film. In fact Mel Gibson used Yucatec Maya language during the film.

The Foreign Accent Syndrome. It is a rare side effect of brain trauma. It causes patients speak their native language in a foreign dialect.

Foreign languages infographics

Beautiful visual representation of Foreign Languages numbers and stats to get perspecive of the whole story.

foreign languages fact infographic about Denmark's Population vs. The Percentage of people who speak — Denmark's Population vs. The Percentage of people who speak a foreign language

When learning foreign languages?

There is a rare condition in which a person will suddenly speak in their native language with a foreign accent, usually occurring after a brain injury.

'Foreign Accent Syndrome' is a rare condition in which a particularly traumatic brain injury may cause the injured person to speak a different language or accent, sometimes taking days to remember their native tongue

Morality changes in a foreign language. Foreign language learners give more utilitarian judgments in moral predicaments than native speakers. A weaker emotional connection to your second language could mean a loosening of your morals.

According to the US Department of State’s Foreign Service Institute it takes up to 4,400 hours to learn a language well. Study for 20 hours a week, and that’s over four years or two decades if you study five hours a week

Venezuela's official language is Castilian. Other languages spoken in Venezuela include Italian, Chinese, Portuguese, Arabic, and Spanish. English is the most commonly used foreign language in Venezuela.

How many foreign languages are there?

Solomon Shereshevsky, who could memorize poems in foreign languages (that he didn't speak) and recall them years afterwards. He could even recall events from early childhood, but he had trouble recognizing faces because they looked different from what he memorized in the past.

Despite George I of Great Britain being foreign born and his first language being German he became King of Great Britain in 1714—to the exclusion of some 57 persons with superior hereditary claims because of an act of settlement prohibiting Catholics from ruling.

CIA University, where CIA employees learn about various intelligence-related subjects, ranging from chemical weapons manufacturing to foreign languages.

Esperanto was considered a "dangerous language" and speakers were harassed and persecuted, especially in Germany and the Soviet Union. Its early success was limited, mostly because of the Czarist regime's suspicion of direct communication with foreigners

The Foreign Service Institute (FSI) seperated languages into five categories based on learning difficulty for native English speakers, with Spanish being one of the easiest and Japanese being the hardest.

It was once common for U.S.studios to simultaneously produce at least one foreign-language version of movies on the original sets but with different casts. Universal famously made two versions of "Dracula," while Fox released the 1930 Western "The Big Trail" in five languages.

Wild birds can learn foreign 'languages': that birds can be bi- or tri-lingual or better.

The word 'Barbarian' gets its meaning from how ancient Greeks phonetically comprehended foreign languages.

His father, Julius Oppenheimer, was a member of the Ethical Culture Society and Robert was educated at the Ethical Cultural School in New York where he studied Greek, Latin, French and German and discovered that he had a gift for foreign languages.

Many European schools have foreign language classes for students as young as six years old.

You actually pronounce the S sound in coup de grâce! This is called a hyperforeignism: incorrectly applying the rules of a foreign language when pronouncing a word; in this case, dropping the last consonant sound from French words. (This is only the rule for words that don't end with E.)

China's embassy in Liberia set up Chinese language courses for Liberians, as the ambassador expressed frustration that nobody in Liberia's foreign ministry spoke Chinese and that there is discrepancy when officials visit China with an interpreter from the Chinese side only

Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy have made several films in foreign language versions by reading their sentences from text boards because in the early years of cinema synchronization was thought of as robbing actors their voice. See link for examples in Spanish, German, French and more.

This is our collection of basic interesting facts about Foreign Languages. The fact lists are intended for research in school, for college students or just to feed your brain with new realities. Possible use cases are in quizzes, differences, riddles, homework facts legend, cover facts, and many more. Whatever your case, learn the truth of the matter why is Foreign Languages so important!