Thanks for that! I never really listened in French... so I didn't understand it at all.hermes200 said:
Why do people think English is the hardest language to learn?
- Thread starter Kragg
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to learn, not that hard, to master, impossible
there are millions of rules, every rule has an exception and every rule and exception has a word/situation that can break it
this is why it is so easy to get points back on grammer mistakes, just find a rule that counters what the teacher said was wrong, and your good (iv brought failing grades to As this way before)
it is not the hardest in my opinion though, there are worse languages to learn, like Chinese
there are millions of rules, every rule has an exception and every rule and exception has a word/situation that can break it
this is why it is so easy to get points back on grammer mistakes, just find a rule that counters what the teacher said was wrong, and your good (iv brought failing grades to As this way before)
it is not the hardest in my opinion though, there are worse languages to learn, like Chinese
English should be the easiest language for most non-native speakers to learn. Because of the worldwide dominance of English language TV, music, films, video games etc... many non-native speakers will have heard thousands of hours of English before they ever start to formally study it.
English is strange in its uses.
Sure, being conversant in English isn't exactly a difficult task but becoming fluent in all of its uses requires a mind capable of taking in several different meanings and context to the point of paranoia. While I lived with Quebeckers, they made an attempt to teach me Joual(which I picked up fairly quickly) and its application in respect to poetry. Something I realized quickly was that, despite the words sounding beautiful, there were few abstract ideas I could inject into poetry with the dialect.
I made the attempt to relate beauty to a cup of cold water on a hot day while using Joual only to be met with looks of disbelief. I was told quickly that the language couldn't be used in that manner.
To quote "Conkers Bad Fur Day", English has a tense that I prefer to call "Context sensitive".
All of the whacky rules of phonetics and plural form aside, the implications of an English sentence are legion. You can use a simple phrase to mean several alternatives(I.E: "What nice weather we're having" could easily be a comment on the state of that persons day or a comment on the weather of the prior day). Adversely, a large, verbose slew of carefully cobbled consonants evoking feelings of grandeur and pride could, with an air of effort, relate to something whose meaning is non-existent or simplistic at best.
I do not believe English is the most difficult language but it does pose some interesting problems for someone who is used to communicating in a much more literal sense.
Sure, being conversant in English isn't exactly a difficult task but becoming fluent in all of its uses requires a mind capable of taking in several different meanings and context to the point of paranoia. While I lived with Quebeckers, they made an attempt to teach me Joual(which I picked up fairly quickly) and its application in respect to poetry. Something I realized quickly was that, despite the words sounding beautiful, there were few abstract ideas I could inject into poetry with the dialect.
I made the attempt to relate beauty to a cup of cold water on a hot day while using Joual only to be met with looks of disbelief. I was told quickly that the language couldn't be used in that manner.
To quote "Conkers Bad Fur Day", English has a tense that I prefer to call "Context sensitive".
All of the whacky rules of phonetics and plural form aside, the implications of an English sentence are legion. You can use a simple phrase to mean several alternatives(I.E: "What nice weather we're having" could easily be a comment on the state of that persons day or a comment on the weather of the prior day). Adversely, a large, verbose slew of carefully cobbled consonants evoking feelings of grandeur and pride could, with an air of effort, relate to something whose meaning is non-existent or simplistic at best.
I do not believe English is the most difficult language but it does pose some interesting problems for someone who is used to communicating in a much more literal sense.
The language has several root languages, and American English in particular has tons of languages depending on the region... so the various grammar and spelling rules meshed together into a jumbled mess nyoro~
Im not interested in reading over the whole thread, but Finnish mocks your English language.
The difficulty you experience learning english is based on your mother tounge. You speak Norwegian or Swedish? English is a walk in the park.
Try learning Finnish.... You could probobly cound on one hand the number of foreginers who speak finnish fluently.
Finnish uses a complex form of morphology.
There are 2253 forms for EVERY verb in the finnish language.
The written language is totally different to the spoken (as in, the words themselves are different).
However the real agony comes from modifying words into compount words.... This is a good example.
The difficulty you experience learning english is based on your mother tounge. You speak Norwegian or Swedish? English is a walk in the park.
Try learning Finnish.... You could probobly cound on one hand the number of foreginers who speak finnish fluently.
Finnish uses a complex form of morphology.
There are 2253 forms for EVERY verb in the finnish language.
The written language is totally different to the spoken (as in, the words themselves are different).
However the real agony comes from modifying words into compount words.... This is a good example.
No, Japanese has 3 writing systems, 2 are phonetic where every symbol DOES relate to a sound and one where every symbol relates to an object.Hannan4mitch said:
Hiragana is used for grammatical functions and some words, katakana is used for foreign words and names as well as emphasis (think italicizing in English) while Kanji is the writing system in which every symbol has a meaning.
Example:
I ate a hamburger for dinner.
yuugohan ni hanbaagaa o tabeta.
'yuugohan' when written exclusively in hiragana is ゆうごはん, but kanji for this word exists and thus it would generally be written 夕ご飯.
'ni' becomes に. It is a grammatical structure similar to English 'for'.
'hanbaagaa' is written in katakana because it is a foreign word. It looks like this ハンバーガー.
'o' becomes を. It is a grammar structure signifying the direct object (the hamburger).
'tabeta' is past tense of 'taberu' which means to eat. Like 'yuugohan' it is possible for it to be written in hiragana as たべた but it is generally written using kanji in place of the first 'ta' (た
, becoming 食べた
The sheer amount of exceptions makes it hard to speak/write fluently. In terms of structure it's not that hard.
It's pretty easy to say that English is an easy language to learn when you are exposed to it constantly on the internet and pretty much everywhere else.
English isn't my first language, but I learned it when I was young so I can't comment on how it would be to learn it right now. I imagine most of you are native English speakers that are commenting on this issue without having had to actually put a conscious effort into learning the language.
I know people that are living in the United States that are still struggling with the language after many years.
Also, anyone saying that Spanish is harder to learn than English is absolutely insane. Though, of course, it's always hilarious to see Americans absolutely butcher the pronunciations of Spanish words.
English isn't my first language, but I learned it when I was young so I can't comment on how it would be to learn it right now. I imagine most of you are native English speakers that are commenting on this issue without having had to actually put a conscious effort into learning the language.
I know people that are living in the United States that are still struggling with the language after many years.
Also, anyone saying that Spanish is harder to learn than English is absolutely insane. Though, of course, it's always hilarious to see Americans absolutely butcher the pronunciations of Spanish words.
best example to show how the English language is confusing to those trying to learn it:
you can cut a tree DOWN and then chop it UP
you can cut a tree DOWN and then chop it UP
Of course it doesn't seem hard to certain people; they fucking grew up learning it!
OT: Other languages have clear, consistent rules regarding how words are used and how sentences are formed. They rarely, if ever, change the way a word is spelled or the "proper" grammar of something.
English, however, has all sorts of case-specific rules, like the arrangement of I and E next to each other or where certain words are supposed to go/which version of a word you use at what time. "You ALWAYS do X like this, EXCEPT when <insert list of nonsensical cases that only make sense because it's been drilled into your head for years>." "
OT: Other languages have clear, consistent rules regarding how words are used and how sentences are formed. They rarely, if ever, change the way a word is spelled or the "proper" grammar of something.
English, however, has all sorts of case-specific rules, like the arrangement of I and E next to each other or where certain words are supposed to go/which version of a word you use at what time. "You ALWAYS do X like this, EXCEPT when <insert list of nonsensical cases that only make sense because it's been drilled into your head for years>." "
And don't forget who screwed with it just for fun... Merriam Webster. Which is why Americans spell things differently than English people do.Downfall89 said:
The reason I think why is its roots to other languages. English has Latin, Greek, French, German, and other language roots, which means it's sort of like learning a little of several languages.
I think Icelandic wins following what I keep hearing from people (including a few native speakers).
Words are rarely pronounced as they are spelled (Elementary school teachers can go kill themselves for all the fucking lies they tell children that fuck them up in later grades like that little nugget of knowledge), most of our verbs have at least one irregular form, in past, present, and future tense there are three different tenses inside of that, contractions, silent letters, and a shit ton of stuff makes it overcomplicated.
The reason people think it's easy is because they are speaking the slang version of English, which is what the majority of people speak and write in, since technical English is fucking stupid.
Edit: Why do people in the South pronounce Spanish words the worse even though they are the ones most consistently exposed to that language? I mean really, it's not that goddamn hard to pronounce guacamole you morons.
Edit:Edit: I had a lot of trouble learning how to speak Spanish, since Spanish is a much simpler and uncomplicated language without a lot of needless words gobbling up the sentences. I would be trying to say things like I would be in English, but in Spanish instead of saying like "Where are they going to be at?" you could just say "They are where?" and the different phrasing of verbs and nouns messed me up (stupid verbs coming before nouns).
The reason people think it's easy is because they are speaking the slang version of English, which is what the majority of people speak and write in, since technical English is fucking stupid.
Edit: Why do people in the South pronounce Spanish words the worse even though they are the ones most consistently exposed to that language? I mean really, it's not that goddamn hard to pronounce guacamole you morons.
Edit:Edit: I had a lot of trouble learning how to speak Spanish, since Spanish is a much simpler and uncomplicated language without a lot of needless words gobbling up the sentences. I would be trying to say things like I would be in English, but in Spanish instead of saying like "Where are they going to be at?" you could just say "They are where?" and the different phrasing of verbs and nouns messed me up (stupid verbs coming before nouns).
Maybe it's hard because people who don't speak english spell everything wrong anyway. What the hell is 'Bonjour' supposed to say? Are all the keyboards broken or something? And has anyone been to Wales lately? It's just not on, someone should buy these people a dictionary.