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Why is English so easy? | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| s_allard Triglot Senior Member Canada Joined 5429 days ago 2704 posts - 5425 votes  Speaks: French*, English, Spanish Studies: Polish | Message 73 of 78 13 March 2011 at 5:26pm | IP Logged | ||
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Although this may seem to be splitting hairs, I would like to make a distinction between English being (intrinsically) easy and being (relatively) easy to learn. Yes certain languages may have some specific complications such as an unusual script or phonetic system (relative to one's own), but I find it's difficult to objectively classify a language as easy or difficult. My Mandarin-speaking friends tell me that other than the script and the pronunciation, the grammar is very easy compared, let's say, to French.
On the other hand, a language, English to wit, can be so omnipresent that many people will inevitably pick up something. I live in Montreal, Canada, and in the past, the French-speakers have always been more bilingual than English-speakers. French was often considered too complicated to learn (grammatical gender and complicated verbs). Now that the political landscape has changed considerably and that French has become the totally dominant language in Quebec, lo and behold, the English-speakers have discovered that French is not as difficult as was thought. Obviously, the complications of French grammar have not gone away. What has changed is exposure (French has become omnipresent) and obligation (you need French to get a decent job). In addition, all the English-language elementary and secondary schools place considerable emphasis on teaching French. The end result is that the learning of French is much easier now. Nearly everyday when I take the subway I see teenage kids dressed in uniforms of the best English-language private schools. Many of them switch effortlessly between French and English. Both languages are just as easy or difficult for them. Interestingly enough, we are seeing more and more concerns about the teaching of English in the French schools because English is not as omnipresent as before although it is still important. 5 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| cathrynm Senior Member United States junglevision.co Joined 6124 days ago 910 posts - 1232 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Japanese, Finnish | Message 74 of 78 13 March 2011 at 8:20pm | IP Logged | ||
On this forum this perception is a matter of mathematics. The non-native English speakers here have all managed to learn English. There are no monolingual Swedish speakers posting here. They are pre-filtered for language learning ability. But there are plenty of us monolingual English posters around. All the stories about struggling with the first language are going to come from English speakers. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| irrationale Tetraglot Senior Member China Joined 6049 days ago 669 posts - 1023 votes 2 sounds Speaks: English*, Spanish, Mandarin, Tagalog Studies: Ancient Greek, Japanese | Message 75 of 78 16 March 2011 at 1:09am | IP Logged | ||
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Is there any tables or studies out there similar to the one FSI produced, but showing the relative difficulty of languages to a native speaker from another language (other than English) and the estimated amount of hours to learn various languages, including English?
Is FSI the only institute that has done a study such as this? Surely there are estimated difficulty charts for natives of other languages... 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| FrostBlast Diglot Senior Member Canada Joined 5098 days ago 168 posts - 254 votes Speaks: French*, English Studies: Spanish, Russian, Swedish, Icelandic | Message 76 of 78 16 March 2011 at 1:32am | IP Logged | ||
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There are definite downsides to being born into the international lingua franca - maybe a sort of linguistic laziness.
But then, maybe more people than we think whom are born into another language don't learn English out of a love for languages but rather out of obligation. At least, I do know quite a few people around me who'd rather not learn any other language at all. I find both situations a bit sad, really. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| koba Heptaglot Senior Member AustriaRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5867 days ago 118 posts - 201 votes Speaks: Portuguese*, English, German, Italian, Spanish, Hungarian, French | Message 77 of 78 16 March 2011 at 3:57pm | IP Logged | ||
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English isn't an "easy" language intrinsically; gramatically and phonetically there are far less complicated languages to learn out there.
However, English is there available for everyone to learn it. It's definitely the easiest language to find materials and to practice, therefore the easiest to learn. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Theodcyning Newbie United States Joined 4998 days ago 4 posts - 6 votes Studies: Old English, English* Studies: Russian | Message 78 of 78 19 March 2011 at 5:12pm | IP Logged | ||
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English is Hard
-Meaningless "Do" -Progressive "-ing" -Awkward spelling system English is Easy -Simplified grammar -Exposure -Mixed language (60% French/Latin, 30% Germanic Origin, 10% Greek and others) My advise for learning ESL: Learn how a word is pronounced first and foremost. Then learning the awkward spelling will just be a matter of associating a word you know with the written form. And if you you have questions, people like us will be glad to help. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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