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How many Romance languages... | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| Hello Diglot Groupie Canada Joined 5421 days ago 40 posts - 45 votes Speaks: French*, English Studies: Spanish | Message 1 of 18 15 February 2010 at 3:01am | IP Logged | ||
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As I came across the language families illustrated on this website, I wondered:
How many Romance languages can you learn in, let's say, one or two years, if you are a native speaker of any Romance language? This is not exactly my intention, but according to the site, 200 hours of study is enough for any Romance language speaker to learn another one, and even less for some due the 'transparency' of certain languages. As anyone already attempted such challenge? I wonder what you people think about that possibility. Personally, I would be interested if I had enough free time :/. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| genini1 Senior Member United States Joined 5469 days ago 114 posts - 161 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: German, Mandarin, Japanese | Message 2 of 18 15 February 2010 at 3:55am | IP Logged | ||
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It really depends on how much time you intend to spend per day. If you are going to spend a total of 3 hours a day learning then you could probably knock out 4 in two years.
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| BartoG Diglot Senior Member United States confession Joined 5448 days ago 292 posts - 818 votes Speaks: English*, French Studies: Italian, Spanish, Latin, Uzbek | Message 3 of 18 15 February 2010 at 7:48am | IP Logged | ||
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Many years ago, a linguist, Frederik Bodmer, thought that the key to peace in Europe would be for everybody to be able to talk to each other. So he wrote a book, The Loom of Language, that teaches, in one (very thick) book, the fundamentals of the major Romance and Germanic languages. Now, Bodmer's presentation is a lot like Michel Thomas' - the rules aren't absolute, and they aren't designed to make you a native speaker. They're meant to help you get the language right enough that you can be understood and can pick up on what the person you're talking to is saying. Let's take two examples:
1) Vocabulary Latin f- = French f- = Italian f- = Spanish h- = Portuguese f- Latin -li- = French -ill- = Italian -gl- = Spanish -j- = Portuguese -lh- Latin -a = French -e = Italian -a = Spanish -a = Portuguese -a Latin -us = French [nothing] = Italian -o = Spanish -o = Portuguese -o Latin filius = French fils* = Italian figlio = Spanish hijo = Portuguese filho Latin filia = French fille = Italian figlia = Spanish hija = Portuguese filha Latin folia = French feuille* = Italian foglia = Spanish hoja = Portuguese folha 2) Grammar future tense = infinitive + avoir/avere/haber I will speak = French je parlerai Italian parlerò = Spanish hablaró (note that the "h" drops in Spanish and Italian, and that the "a" in "-are" changes to"e" in Italian.) Knowing about tricks like these, you can explicitly learn that French X = Italian Y... and pick up a lot fast, but at the risk of associating inexact cognates or coming close enough with your grammar to be understood, but with mistakes arising from mixing up the tricks from one language to the next. Or you can study each language individually, but with knowledge like this at the back of your mind to help you understand new content faster. If it's your goal to be an expert in all the Romance languages, you've got your work cut out for you, even with the transparency factor. But since you mentioned free time as a consideration, here's a program that will help you get a solid foundation in five languages within 2 years, working around a half hour per day: 1) Do the fundamentals courses for Michel Thomas French, Spanish, Italian and Portuguese. One week per course = 4 weeks 2) Pick up The Loom of Language and read through the sections on Romance vocabulary and Romance verbs. Just skim so you'll see what's going on; don't try to master anything. 3 weeks 3) Do the Assimil courses for French, Italian, Spanish and Portuguese. Read through 20 or 30 words from the Romance section of the Language Museum in The Loom of Languages every night to keep up your associations within the Western Romance languages. Assuming 15 weeks per course, that's 60 weeks. 4) Do the Pimsleur Romanian course, (2 weeks) then read through Colloquial Romanian (15 weeks) 5) Skim through the Bodmer Romance language stuff to refresh your memory of the Western Romance languages. Read through the whole language museum (don't memorize anything, just notice the connections). 5 weeks Allow for the possibility that you have a life and fall behind from time to time: 15 weeks That's two years, assuming my math is correct, to learn 5 languages well enough to go anywhere from Lisbon to Bucharest and have some idea what's going on around you and maybe take part in it. If you're setting your sights higher, of course, you'll need to check out suggestions for the individual languages. Best of luck! EDIT: hablaré = I will speak; the trick with the future works better if you conjugate haber correctly! Thanks to ellasevia for catching the error. Edited by BartoG on 19 February 2010 at 8:31am 9 persons have voted this message useful | |||
 Iversen Super Polyglot Moderator Denmark berejst.dk Joined 6704 days ago 9078 posts - 16473 votes Speaks: Danish*, French, English, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, Swedish, Esperanto, Romanian, Catalan Studies: Afrikaans, Greek, Norwegian, Russian, Serbian, Icelandic, Latin, Irish, Lowland Scots, Indonesian, Polish, Croatian Personal Language Map | Message 4 of 18 15 February 2010 at 11:16am | IP Logged | ||
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It is impossible to say how many Romance languages you can learn in one or two years. It depends on your expectations, your study efficiency and your situation (native language, exposure). The first one will of course take longer time, whereas the next one will be much easier to learn (especially using the shortcuts suggested by BartoG). But coming from a background of, say, English even it could easily take both one and two years just to learn the first one to the basic fluency level. On the other hand: studying diligently (and smartly) AND adding an immersion period you could in principle learn language no. 1 in just half a year. And because the next languages are so much easier to learn you could in principle learn French, Portuguese, Spanish, Catalan, Italian and Romanian in two years. But only if you kept up the spirit and had optimal conditions for your study.
Personally I spent much longer time - even allowing for the fact that I had a pause of 25 years without study activities. And then you also have to reckon with the existence of a lot of dialects and minor languages that can be hard to understand even if you have learnt the main Romance languages. For instance Aromanian is a problem even if you know Standard Dacoromanian. Edited by Iversen on 16 February 2010 at 5:44am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| vilas Pentaglot Senior Member Italy Joined 6961 days ago 531 posts - 722 votes Speaks: Spanish, Italian*, English, French, Portuguese | Message 5 of 18 15 February 2010 at 6:19pm | IP Logged | ||
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Car Hello, io pense qui si tu vole aprender multe linguas romances la melior cosa qui tu pote facer es aprender interlingua le latine moderne que es multo facil pro te qui es de lingua matre francese . Interlingua es basate super le vocabulario pan-romance plus le vocabulario international moderne. Si tu comprende isto que io ha scripte tu pote aprender interlingua e totos las linguas romances que tu vole in prompte tempore. Salutos super internet tu pote trovar multo material pro aprender interlingua www.interlingua.com 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| ellasevia Super Polyglot Winner TAC 2011 Senior Member Germany Joined 6143 days ago 2150 posts - 3229 votes Speaks: English*, German, Croatian, Greek, French, Spanish, Russian, Swedish, Portuguese, Turkish, Italian Studies: Catalan, Persian, Mandarin, Japanese, Romanian, Ukrainian | Message 6 of 18 15 February 2010 at 6:21pm | IP Logged | ||
I apologize, but I can't help but correct this small error that you have listed in this. The Spanish future tense for hablar would actually be hablaré (which still works with that pattern; the present tense of haber for yo is he), not hablaró. This is very interesting, though, and I have noticed many of this sound shifts in the Romance languages without ever formally studying them. Now I'm feeling rather pathetic that I'm still not at basic fluency after having studied it for over a year and already knowing Spanish, French, and Portuguese! 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| ellasevia Super Polyglot Winner TAC 2011 Senior Member Germany Joined 6143 days ago 2150 posts - 3229 votes Speaks: English*, German, Croatian, Greek, French, Spanish, Russian, Swedish, Portuguese, Turkish, Italian Studies: Catalan, Persian, Mandarin, Japanese, Romanian, Ukrainian | Message 7 of 18 15 February 2010 at 6:22pm | IP Logged | ||
Was this in Interlingua? This was exceedingly easy to read...At first, though, I thought it was broken Italian or something... 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Ulmo Diglot Newbie Joined 6087 days ago 20 posts - 22 votes Speaks: Portuguese*, English | Message 8 of 18 15 February 2010 at 8:04pm | IP Logged | ||
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I also thought it was some kind of broken Italian.
I just warn you that learning Interlingua may spoil the learning of all the other Romance languages. 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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