You can never speak a language by just studying it,no matter how much you study. Yes, you read that right. Studying is the wrong thing to do if. you want to speak a language. I’m totally serious. Last night I ran into some English speakers and heard the. same thing I’ve heard thousands of times about other languages: they have been studying German for years and. don’t speak it yet, even though they now live in Berlin. Every day, I get dozens of e-mails from aspiring sharing their tales of woe with me; they’ve spent a.