learn to speak french

[monty]

You can't discuss taste.

It sounds more impressive in Latin, but it's still nonsense. What else are we meant to talk about, now that the Olympics are over?

What sounds more impressive in Latin? Did I miss something?

[lonesome paddy]

Getting back to Monty's opening post re learning a language thru music. A good few years ago i met a French guy from St Laurant who in the 1960's played in a pop group and learnt English by checking the words of the songs in a dictionary. He hadn't got technical English but easily held a conversation

[lonesome paddy]

I am Swiss and French is my 1st language and my father being American insisted on using American English terms for items such as faucet for water tap. My Irish mother in getting her own back on him had the poor man demented by calling everything by their Irish names such as Sconna Uisce for his faucet

[martyn94]

You can't discuss taste.

It sounds more impressive in Latin, but it's still nonsense. What else are we meant to talk about, now that the Olympics are over?

What sounds more impressive in Latin? Did I miss something?

The original form of this is the Latin maxim "de gustibus non est disputandum" which means exactly the same but sounds grander. It's nonsense in either language. We may never ultimately settle between the merits of the Beatles and The Rolling Stones (for younger readers, they were 60s pop groups), but there is no reason not to argue the toss about it.

[martyn94]

Getting back to Monty's opening post re learning a language thru music. A good few years ago i met a French guy from St Laurant who in the 1960's played in a pop group and learnt English by checking the words of the songs in a dictionary. He hadn't got technical English but easily held a conversation

It may have worked in the 60s, but I doubt that it would now. I used to visit a forum concerned with difficulties of translation between French and English. It was mostly for professionals, but quite often visited by young francophone people trying to make sense of English rock lyrics. It was very hard to convince them that Led Zep, say, let alone Anthrax Death, were not really expected, or trying, to be grammatical, or even to make any kind of sense except in the most impressionistic way.

I haven't followed French popular music much since the glory days of Françoise Hardy, but my impression is that it is still more-or-less in French. Except maybe rap français, but how do you tell?

[Kate]

When I met my husband, he couldn't speak any English. He came back to England with me and after six months he started saying how shocked he was - he'd started to understand all his favourite songs and suddenly realised how meaningless they were! Sometimes maybe it's better not to understand.

[lonesome paddy]

When I met my husband, he couldn't speak any English. He came back to England with me and after six months he started saying how shocked he was - he'd started to understand all his favourite songs and suddenly realised how meaningless they were! Sometimes maybe it's better not to understand.

But Kate, as your hubby's favourite songs were The Chicken Song, My Ding A Ling and Shaddap You Face, how meaningful was he expecting the lyrics to be.

[Kate]

Oh you've met him LP!!