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@this-is-not-an-alien

 

That is AMAZING!!! Like I never would’ve guessed in a million years English wasn’t your first language you’re so fluent!

Thank you so much!

And thank you for allowing me to infodump! I didn’t want to do it randomly, but I do enjoy infodumping!

Now, small warning, I’m basing all of this on myself and my multilingual friends, so none of these are hard and fast rules.

Do bilingual/multilingual people frequently use syntax or phraseology of a different language from what they’re speaking?

Hmm, this is a tricky question, and the closest answer I can give is, it depends. Allow me to elaborate!

The way I think of knowing multiple languages, is by having an imaginary box for each language. Everything about the language is in that box, grammar, vocab, syntax, etc.

Now, many people who only speak one language think that all the languages go in the same box and you might grab the wrong word/grammar by accident, but that’s not how it works. Every language has its own box, and when you’re speaking that language, you’ll use the grammar/vocab in that language-box, and not any of those in the other ones.

You won’t blend in words from other languages by accident. You may do this on purpose, but the only time you’ll mix up words is when you genuinely don’t know it in that language, and then it won’t be an accident. Or if you blank, as aforementioned.

(I hope my box metaphor makes some semblance of sense XD)

BUT! It does happen sometimes because you can genuinely forget. I have occasionally literally translated a saying and used it, thinking it was correct. This doesn’t only happen in your second/weaker language, I’ve translated English sayings into my mother-tongue and used that. It confuses the

Also, some stuff just slips past and you might make a mistake. But, there’ll always be someone who’ll “helpfully” correct you, in the most patronizing tone possible. (Hear the sarcasm.) “Yes, Karen. I know I used the wrong article. You understood me, didn’t you? Hold your waffle and mind your business.”

Some people are crazy elitist about how you speak ‘their’ language, so someone always corrects you when you make a mistake.

A German friend of mine once called someone ‘long’ instead of tall, because that’s how you say it in German (And Dutch). Stuff like that happens to everyone, especially when you’re tired/distracted. And it’ll happen a lot more if one language is considerably weaker than the other. It’ll also depend on how young you were when you learned it. If you learned it when you were older, you’ll probably struggle more and make more mistakes.

Another cool thing about languages is that when you’re really upset you’ll default into your mother-tongue. You might be fumbling for words you’d usually know because your thoughts are completely raw and you don’t have the composure to translate.

The same thing happens when you’re badly hurt. You might use an exclamation of pain from your mother tongue, even if you haven’t used it in years. (That’s a personal experience, but I’ve read the same thing.)

Another thing I see a lot is when characters just randomly switch languages while speaking to characters who don’t share the language. This is a bit iffy because it isn’t something you’d commonly do.

It really depends on who you’re talking to, for example, I’d never, ever, ever speak Afrikaans to a Dutch person in casual conversation because they look at you like you’re a three-headed caterpillar that fell from Mars.

But, if I’m close to someone, I might. If you’re familiar with the person and you know they won’t judge you, you might use a few words, especially stuff you can’t translate well. So, Rosario’s carino and idiota are perfectly fine! Also, if you want to use phrases in different languages, just put them in the narration! That’ll work just fine, and it reads more naturally since thoughts are messier than dialogue.

How do you say ‘hi how are you?’ In Dutch informally and how in more ‘correct’/formal way?

There are several ways, but here are some of the most common ones:

“Hoi! Alles goed?” (Hey, everything okay?) Casual, you’d use it with someone you already know.

“Hallo, hoe gaat het met u/jou?” (Hello, how are you?) Formal. Dutch has a respect pronoun, u instead of je. Both mean you, but you’d use u with a considerably older person or someone in authority. You’d also use it in a more formal setting. Oddly enough, this is one of my favorite things about Dutch. It makes everyone think you’re extremely polite, even though otherwise you talk normally.

How many different forms of slang are their in your mother-language?

Oooh! This is my favorite thing! I’m going to use Dutch instead of my actual mother-tongue since it’s a lot more interesting.

Dutch has a freakish amount of dialects and accents. It’s crazy! You can literally tell where someone lives as soon as they say “Good morning”. There are at least ten dialects, but you can subdivide them roughly into regions. Also interesting, there’s a lot of joking back and forth about the regions, and they all have their stereotypes, all of which are funny:

Friesland (Far north.): Basically a country, complete with their own language, flag, and anthem. They have a completely different language, and I won’t go into that now.

East: Hillbillies and cow farmers. Enough said.

West: Posh city people.

South: They talk funny, and they have hills mountains!

Even though the Netherlands is tiny, the dialects aren’t even mutually intelligible. They literally sound like different languages.

Whew, that was fun! If you have any more questions, please ask! I really enjoyed infodumping! And to anyone who read through the whole thing, congratulations XD Sorry if this was too much information!