3 languages to travel

European   Sat Oct 24, 2009 10:01 am GMT
I would like to travel around the World and to know other people and cultures.

One of them is English. I would like to study 2 more. Which one do you recommend?

Thanks.
12345   Sat Oct 24, 2009 10:23 am GMT
English, Spanish and French.

Arabic and Russian are also useful depending on the countries.
smart guest   Sat Oct 24, 2009 10:41 am GMT
+ Portuguese
LexDiamondz   Sat Oct 24, 2009 11:46 am GMT
English, Spanish & French.

English is useful for North America, while Spanish will get you through most of Latin America. English & French would get you through most of Africa and the Middle East, and will be useful in the Indian Subcontinent and Europe.
Milano   Sat Oct 24, 2009 12:03 pm GMT
Yes. English, Spanish and French.


The use of them depends on the Continent:


North America: English and Spanish.

Central America and Caribbean: Spanish and English

South America: Spanish

European Union: English, French and Spanish

Africa and Middle East: English and French

Asia-Pacific: English
P.K.   Wed Oct 28, 2009 4:44 pm GMT
A combination of English, Spanish and French will sort you out almost anywhere in the world.
Skippy   Wed Oct 28, 2009 7:17 pm GMT
I'd say English (of course), German, and either Russian or French for EU, depending on whether you were planning on being in Western or Eastern Europe more.
Guest   Wed Oct 28, 2009 7:27 pm GMT
English, English and English. Thank you.
abdce   Thu Oct 29, 2009 7:28 am GMT
English, French, and Russian.

Arabic and Spanish are also useful depending on the countries.
Torino   Thu Oct 29, 2009 7:30 am GMT
English, French an Spanish.

They're useful in:

North America: English, French and Spanish.

Central America and Caribbean: French, Spanish and English

South America: Spanish

European Union: English, and French

Africa and Middle East: English and French

Asia-Pacific: English and French
T.K.   Thu Oct 29, 2009 7:32 am GMT
A combination of English, French, and Russian will sort you out almost anywhere in the world
Dave in Seattle   Thu Oct 29, 2009 9:06 am GMT
The 2 most spoken languages in every Continent, including secondary speakers:

1. North America: English and Spanish

2. Central America and Caribbean: Spanish and English

3. South America: Spanish and Portuguese

4. Europe: Russian and English

5. Africa: Arabic and English

6. Asia-Pacific: Chinese and Hindi

7. Antarctica: English and Spanish



English 5 points
Spanish 4 points

The third language depends on the Continent you prefer to go.
David in Boston   Thu Oct 29, 2009 9:25 am GMT
The 2 most spoken languages in every Continent, including secondary speakers:

1. Anglo and French America: English and French

2. Lesser Antilles: French and English

3. Africa: English and French

4. Europe: English and French

5. South America: Portuguese and Quechua

6. Oceania: English and French

7. Antarctica: English and French

English and French 5 points
Spanish 0 points
Traveller   Thu Oct 29, 2009 9:32 am GMT
The 6 Most Influential Languages in the World, and How to Learn them Online for Free
July 20th, 2007 | Category: Languages

If you’re interested in global travel, you’re probably also interested in learning a couple new languages. There’s no better where to really get involved in foreign cultures than to talk to the locals in their native tongue! But what language(s) should you learn? There are literally thousands of languages spoken in the world today. After all, language learning is tough. It makes the most sense to learn a one of the more influential modern languages, which you can use to communicate with a high number of people across a vast geographic area.

So, which are the most influential languages in the world? Inspired by Andy Hobotraveler’s recent post on The Six Languages to Learn, I decided to do a little research of my own and contribute to the debate of which are the most useful languages to the global traveler. I stumbled across a 1999 study by George Weber ( http://www.andaman.org/BOOK/reprints/weber/rep-weber.htm) that suggests that the 6 most influential languages in the world are:

* English
* French
* Spanish
* Russian
* Arabic
* Chinese

This study looks at the total number of world speakers, geographical influence, economic power of countries speaking the language, literary and scientific use of each language. These are the same 6 languages suggested by Andy in his post, and consequentially are also the 6 official languages of the United Nations.

Personally I found this information extremely interesting and helpful as a traveler. I unfortunately cannot spend my time learning thousands of different languages, so this study lets us know which languages will give us the biggest “bang for our buck”. All of the factors that Weber considered in his study are not necessarily pertinent to the traveler. However, two big factors he considered, that I think are extremely useful to the traveling community are: Total number of speakers (both primary and secondary), and number of countries that speak each language.

Language Speakers Number of countries spoken
====== ====== ===================
English 480 million 115
French 265 million 35
Spanish 320 million 20
Russian 285 million 16
Arabic 221 million 24
Chinese 1.12 billion 5

Now I don’t want to discredit local languages here, and certainly would not say that local languages are not worth learning. Languages do a lot more than just communicate, they express feelings, sentiments, and emotions, each in its own unique way. To forget that demonstrates an extreme insensitivity to those populations and humankind for not listening to each native population through its own medium of expression. However, I do think it’s very interesting to visualize, just how far-reaching each of these languages is. It seems that one really could travel the globe, and COMMUNICATE, with just 6 languages!

http://gobudgettravel.com/languages/the-6-most-influential-languages-in-the-world-and-how-to-learn-them-online-for-free
Edward Hasbrouck   Thu Oct 29, 2009 9:57 am GMT
The most useful languages other than English for world travellers are those that are:


1.used by at least a significant subset of people
2.throughout a large area
3.where English isn't widely used.
Depending on the region of the world in which you are most interested (and leaving aside the varying difficulty of learning different languages),
that would include:


•Spanish (useful throughout Latin America -- even in Brazil spoken Spanish is widely understood, and knowledge of written Spanish is adequate for understanding much written Portuguese)

•Mandarin (useful throughout East Asia, and to a lesser degree in mnay other places)

•Russian (English is not widely spoken in the former USSR, and some people speak Russian in surprisingly many other places)

•Arabic (used as a second language by the literate classes throughout the Islamic world, even where Arabic isn't the primary language).

So, English, Spanish, Mandarin, Russian and Arabic are the most useful languages to travel.

http://hasbrouck.org/blog/archives/000145.html