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My language is the most difficult | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Philological Room |  | |
| awb Groupie United States Joined 6874 days ago 46 posts - 48 votes Speaks: English* Studies: German, Russian | Message 41 of 67 22 March 2006 at 11:28am | IP Logged | ||
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German has pronunciation irregularities too, usually from French words but also Ski. And German has other areas that are difficult, e.g., adjective declension..
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| JackFrost Diglot Newbie Canada Joined 6808 days ago 17 posts - 17 votes Speaks: English*, French Studies: Swedish, Icelandic | Message 42 of 67 06 April 2006 at 12:22am | IP Logged | ||
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Honestly, the difficulty of a language depends on a person. For example, a person who speaks Chinese may find Vietnamese easier to learn than any other Indo-European languages due its similar grammar structures and many words in Vietnamese from Chinese, and so on. Again, let's take an example for a German, and he may find Dutch and English easier to learn than Romance languages due to English and Dutch's close relationship to German. It all depends from the viewpoint of the person. Saying that English is hard, you'll find some disagreeing. Saying that French is harder than English, you still may find some disagreeing. Saying that Chinese is harder than English, you still may find some disagreeing. Some people find Spanish or Italian easy to learn, that's good for them, but it's annoying to hear some people being offended by hearing that. C'mon, get over with it! Sure the verbs are complicated with conjugations, but not everyone think that way. Of course the nouns can be ridded with declensions, but again, not everyone think this way. I'm trying to say that there is no "universal" way of thinking on the difficulties of languages. Technically, each language has its own degree of difficultity, and there is no such thing as really easy language. I believe there is no possible true way of rating the difficulty of a language (that's why I was little annoyed at this site's language ratings because it's rather subjective).
English is widely known for simple verb systems (with exception of irregular ones), simple nouns, simple adverbs, and so on. It has very little inflections left over from Old English. Unfortunely, this simplity may be conterweighed by making word order complicated due to lack of inflections telling the word's position, meaning, and purpose. Therefore, English may be known to have a strict word order to make up the lost inflection endings. Speaking it, it depends on the person. However we often cannot deny that English is too known for having confusing way how to speak it since the sounds do not always keep up with the written form (an unfortune consequence of keeping the spelling as it is for several hundred years while the language changes). Sounds, it again all depends on a person, but I can particularly say that the frictives ("th" sound ---> ð and þ) are rare sounds among world languages, so many people may find these two sounds hard to reproduce (but honestly, on the contrary to this website's listing, it's not impossible for adults to reproduce). American English way of saying the r blending with the vowel (it's called "r-colored vowels" ----> the "ir" in birth and bird, the "ear" in earth and bear, the "er" in another, etc) is also a rarity among world languages, so some or many may find that hard to reproduce. The rest of the sounds, it all depends on the person since maybe most of the sounds are already present in that person's native langue, or maybe not! As I stated before, English has its own easiness and difficulty aspects. That applies for all languages, not just English. ;) Edited by JackFrost on 09 April 2006 at 1:45am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| TDC Triglot Senior Member United States Joined 6921 days ago 261 posts - 291 votes  Speaks: English*, Mandarin, French Studies: Esperanto, Ukrainian, German, Italian, Spanish, Russian, Persian | Message 43 of 67 08 April 2006 at 10:56pm | IP Logged | ||
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The "th" sound isn't all that difficult to make if you stick your tongue out. My students (Chinese last year, and Russian this year) have usually made this sound wrong, then I say stick your tongue out, and show them. Then they all laugh. Then they try to say th, and they do it just the same. So I force them to stick their tongues out and when they do it that way they get it right almost every single time on the first try. But then 10 minutes later their tongues are back in their mouths again. I don't know...I think it's just a cultural thing about sticking your tongue out that impedes this...
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| Eidolio Bilingual Octoglot Senior Member Belgium Joined 6861 days ago 159 posts - 164 votes 2 sounds Speaks: Dutch*, Flemish*, French, English, Latin, Ancient Greek, Italian, Greek | Message 44 of 67 09 April 2006 at 7:39am | IP Logged | ||
I think another difficult aspect of English is the use of the tenses. French and Dutch mostly use perfect tenses where English uses the simple past. The English use of the perfect tenses, on the other hand, is quite puzzling. The "to be + -ing" forms are also very common in English and uses in situations in which other languages don't. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Zelaia Tetraglot Newbie El Salvador Joined 6809 days ago 29 posts - 37 votes Speaks: Spanish*, FrenchC1, English, Portuguese Studies: Kurdish | Message 45 of 67 18 April 2006 at 2:31pm | IP Logged | ||
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To be honest, I think that English is a very easy language to learn, because of conjugation of course, but it has a huge vocabulary that I haven't found in another language.
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| Sir Nigel Senior Member United States Joined 7104 days ago 1126 posts - 1102 votes 2 sounds | Message 46 of 67 18 April 2006 at 5:10pm | IP Logged | ||
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Which seems to be exactly why a lot of English native speakers think English is the hardest.
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| M-Squared Senior Member United States Joined 7139 days ago 117 posts - 118 votes Speaks: English* Studies: German, Spanish | Message 47 of 67 18 April 2006 at 8:09pm | IP Logged | ||
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Of all the things I've read on this website, I think the difficulty non-native
English speakers have with the "th" sound is among the most surprising. I can see a variety of things that are hard about English, but it is obvious once you study almost any other language how simple a lot of things are. The big vocabulary, sure; the strange spelling bugs every American and English child growing up. But the "th" sound really surprised me. So, in what other languages does the English "th" sound appear? It can't be unique to English, can it? Does it appear in other Indo-European languages? Any non-Indo-European languages? 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| M-Squared Senior Member United States Joined 7139 days ago 117 posts - 118 votes Speaks: English* Studies: German, Spanish | Message 48 of 67 18 April 2006 at 8:12pm | IP Logged | ||
I have to agree. Most of the German grammar rules I can get used to, but the whole adjective declension thing is really annoying. Unlike the ending rules in "der" and "ein" words I don't see what useful role it plays. When you see "des" rather than a "der" it clearly means something, but does the ending of the adjective really change the meaning? 1 person has voted this message useful |
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