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For those of you who don't know what a dialect is, it's a variation of a certain language. For example, the way that English is spoken in England is one way of speaking English, but then there is also English as it's spoken in America, Canada, and Australia. Since they're all part of the same language, but with certain differences, they are called "dialects" of the English language.

Many modern human languages have dialects. In fact, there are about 50 000 dialects in the world surprised Some examples of languages with dialects are: English, French, Spanish, Portuguese, German, Italian, Chinese, Japanese, and Vietnamese (among many, many others).

So: what do you guys think of dialects in general? Are they an interesting aspect of languages, or do they just add confusion? (After all, some dialects differ so much that it makes it difficult, and sometimes impossible, to understand others who speak another dialect of the same language.)

I find that although in some languages, like in French, dialects can be fun, in many cases it causes confusion. For example, Russian and Ukranian are considered two seperate languages, but a Russian speaker can, in most cases, understand what a Ukranian person is saying pretty much word for word. On the other hand, some German dialects are so different from one another, that a speaker of one dialect will not understand anything that a speaker of another dialect is saying. stare S'craziness...

Dialects? Hot. razz They give more coloour to the language.

My favourites:

English

Australian English. wink
Brittish English, you know, Oxford. <3

I've got a north welsh dialect when I speak welsh and a welsh-irish when I speak english and no one in my family is irish.

I love dialects. When I lived in Japan it was fun listening to the people as they had their ways of saying things. By far Okinawa-ben was the weirdest as it was a language unto its own. In Nagoya you could hear the elderly end their sentences with desu-nyaa. Hehe. In a Japanese guild I am in people really bite my chops about not speaking Tokyo-ben. I had formal lessons in Japanese but after living in my little fishing town its much easier speaking the ~ben from there. Not many want to accept that. rofl

I think dialects are mostly funny. Bavarians have some strange German accent, I hardly understand what they're talking! But I never really met one with a strong accent. Personally I find British English sexy... (After having stayed in Minnesota for a year, I really got used to American English)

May I ask where you're from in Germany? Personally I don't really like the city Berlin, but then I don't live there. I just think that Hamburg beats it by far. As to the Berlin accent... Not sure if I like it so much... I just think that Bayrisch and Saechsisch is great fun to listen to! wink

Yep... there's debate among linguists whether Chinese is a language or a family of languages domokun

lol, now I understand you U^^.
I like our dialect too... (maybe it's not right for me to give an opinion about that)

In the case of English, I think UK's English is better than the USA's one, but the last one is the most spread, and in the end, people incorporates it more than the other one. I can't say anything about Canadian English 'cuz I have never listened a canadian speak D:... but I'm sure the dialect is sweet~

I hope you can understand what I've just said lol
mrgreen