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I am Italian, I live abroad and mostly speak English since ~8 years. The "issue" I face is that the dialect version of my Italian feels easier and easier, but I
by kfk 10y ago
I am Italian, I live abroad and mostly speak English since ~8 years. The "issue" I face is that the dialect version of my Italian feels easier and easier, but I believe I still kept a good written version of the language. Few years back I spent 1 year in Spain - I had serious issues communicating in Italian during that time. I think as long as your foreign language is very different, you are good, if it's similar, not so much.
Edit. Ok, to tell the truth, I don't feel very compelled to maintain a good spoken Italian. On the other hand, I do want to keep my written version as sharp as possible.
- paride5745 10y agoSame for me. I'm Italian, lived in UK for a few years, and I have problems with Standard Italian, so much that often I use English grammar in Italian or I have to Google translate from English to Italian for words. Also, I noticed as well that my home dialect is getting stronger than Standard Italian, although I lived in another part of Italy for almost 10 years.
- walterstucco 10y agoI'm Italian as well and I understand forgetting a few words, but losing the ability to speak Italian properly in just a few years sounds too much...
- mixmastamyk 10y agoI had this problem after an extended time in South America. Learning Portuguese almost totally destroyed my spoken Spanish, even though I can still read it fine. I even had to stop some "carioca" accent features because they were making it into Spanish. P.S. You may find it useful that "since 8 years" is awkward in English, "for 8 years" would be preferred.