As someone learning Japanese I’d recomend you not learn from duolingo
For Japanese use genki, them quartet
I am currently going through genki
I second that for Chinese. Use HelloChinese.
Does that include lessons for Canto by any chance? Or just Mando?
Just mandarin. There’s not many resources for Cantonese that I found when searching. You’re likely best off hiring a tutor.
What to use for French? Anyone got an idea?
The back of cereal boxes. Worked for me, I can order Cheerios in half the known world.
Can you give more detail about why you don’t like duolingo and why you do like genki?
To expand on why I don’t like duolingo it’s because you can’t structure the lessons and the material to work best for you
Genki and quartet which I will do after genki is part of my own personalised lesson structure
By gathering your own resources you can structure the lessons best for you
French and existential ennui, name a better duo.
…lingo
Lemmy and beans
Also lemmy and jeans
As long as you have completed your lesson the bird won’t murder your family, so you’ve got that going for you at least.
Ce n’est pas un mème. Ce sont mes sentiments!
I took a few years of French forever ago. Never really understood when to use ce over il, along with all the hyphenated forms ce is pushed into.
Personally, I always tried to translate back literally, so qu’est-ce que c’est -> what is it/this that it/this is. But I’ve also felt like this isn’t the best approach given it’s through the lens of an English speaker.
I think ce Is formal, so I use it in that context?
That makes sense. I always took it as ce is a more general “it” while il refers more to people or places, but I’m sure that doesn’t always hold true. And apparently ce is only used as a subject with être for the most part. I’m too analytical to just understand without digging in lol
french is such a headache, but, then again, so is english. it’s just that english is more forgiving when you mess up, lol
but, yeah… ‘ce’ is (iirc) a more formal declarative when speaking generally to an audience rather than when speaking conversationally with another person.
eventually, a native french speaker is going to come in and admonish the both of us for manglish their language, lol
I want to venture into some of the french speaking parts of lemmy, but I’m scared and it’s been waaaay too long lmao. And I definitely wish I could just “get” it like I get english (for the most part), but idk the hopes of that for a second language. Probably have to move to France lol
Like even the way native speakers type and talk is nowhere near “proper” most of the time, but it’s the language. And I wish I could do that in french, ya know? Hey, maybe Quebec will do!
Aaand I upset the native french speaker even more now.
Pro tip: Don’t be sad, be angry.
Okay, but have you ever tried being sad even though rationally speaking everything is going super well? ( Don’t worry about me, I managed to get out of that vibe :3 )
Estoy triste porque todo va mal.
Just wanted to practice my Spanish here.
Good use of “estoy” 👏😎
Gracias mi amigo.
Not that it matters because the point comes across fine, and being hyper fixated on grammar is a form of gatekeeping, but “badly” seems weird here. It might just be an American English or regional American thing to me, but in school, the whole good/well & bad/poor thing was made pretty distinct. Good and bad were descriptors of action where well and poor were descriptors of feeling. I can do good (things) or do bad (things), but things can go well or go poorly.
Grammar stackexchange seems to disagree with me though
As an American, I would definitely use poorly in this context. But since it seems they’re an English speaker learning French, I think it makes sense to say badly. It’s a more direct translation for mal, the word they’re learning
Finally, language learning with real world applications
