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Why not Spanish as essential? | ||
Tags: Polyglot Academy | Language Importance | L3 via L2 | Polyglottery | Alexander Arguelles | Choosing a Language | German | French | Spanish | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| ericblair Senior Member United States Joined 4711 days ago 480 posts - 700 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: French | Message 1 of 115 06 March 2014 at 3:50am | IP Logged |
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Forgive me, as the Subject line does not leave enough characters. I've seen it from
Professor Arguelles, as well as other posters, that the first three languages to tackle for a would-be polyglot are English, French, and German. I was always curious as to why Spanish does not make the list. If we must bump one of the others, what does French, for example, have to offer over Spanish? I know the idea is there are more French language materials to learn other languages, but is the disparity displayed in the collections of, say, Assimil, so common across all language learning materials? 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| napoleon Tetraglot Senior Member India Joined 5016 days ago 543 posts - 874 votes Speaks: Bengali*, English, Hindi, Urdu Studies: French, Arabic (Written) | Message 2 of 115 06 March 2014 at 5:06am | IP Logged |
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Assimil has many courses ( eg. L'Arabe) that are available only in French. Thus the preference over Spanish.
But for most of us, it simply does not matter whether you learn Spanish or French. Few will ever learn as many languages as the good professor. :-) Edited by napoleon on 07 March 2014 at 11:35am 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| luke Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 7205 days ago 3133 posts - 4351 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Esperanto, French | Message 3 of 115 06 March 2014 at 5:14am | IP Logged |
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Professor Arguelles has his Spanish French Italian German video in which he recommends Spanish first. The difference between his two sets of languages and the order in which to learn them seems to have to do with the goal of the learner. As you said, for someone going for broad polyglottery, English, French, and German as a base because of the language learning materials available. In the Spanish French Italian German video, his suggestion is for someone who wants to learn just those languages. He says, even if one gives up after Spanish, particularly someone in the U.S., then they will have a very practical, widely spoken and useful language.
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| Henkkles Triglot Senior Member Finland Joined 4253 days ago 544 posts - 1141 votes Speaks: Finnish*, English, Swedish Studies: Russian | Message 4 of 115 06 March 2014 at 7:55am | IP Logged |
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French is more prestigious as a language of science and a way bigger influence on European culture and literature than Spanish.
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| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6597 days ago 9753 posts - 15779 votes 4 sounds Speaks: Russian*, English, FinnishC1, Latin, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Danish, Romanian, Polish, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Croatian, Slovenian, Catalan, Czech, Galician, Dutch, Swedish | Message 5 of 115 06 March 2014 at 9:40am | IP Logged |
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It also depends on the languages you plan to learn. If you want to learn Portuguese, Guarani, Galician, Catalan, Basque and Italian, start with Spanish or Portuguese :-)
If you don't like Assimil or don't use it as intended, French is not all that essential. For me the main appeal of Assimil are the recordings. I like to shadow them when I already know the content from other sources. Edited by Serpent on 08 March 2014 at 3:57am 3 persons have voted this message useful | |
| garyb Triglot Senior Member ScotlandRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5207 days ago 1468 posts - 2413 votes Speaks: English*, Italian, French Studies: Spanish | Message 6 of 115 06 March 2014 at 10:59am | IP Logged |
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Yeah, I thought that advice was very much for people who're aspiring to learn a large number of languages, because of the availability of courses like Assimil for other languages. I don't think it's very relevant to most of us who just want to learn a few; and even, as Serpent says, for those who want to learn lots it depends what they are.
Personally, in many ways I regret choosing to learn French years ago instead of Spanish, since the latter is far more useful and far easier to find opportunities to use. I know of course that usefulness is subjective and depends on your personal situation, and besides it's not the only reason to learn a language, but I reckon most people would be better served by Spanish than French unless they have a particular interest or connection with French (friends, partner, living in country, etc.)... and if that were the case then they wouldn't be asking the question. Even as a French learner I'm often surprised that it's still such a popular first foreign language to learn in this day and age. 6 persons have voted this message useful | |
| yantai_scot Senior Member United KingdomRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4802 days ago 157 posts - 214 votes Speaks: English* Studies: German | Message 7 of 115 06 March 2014 at 11:53am | IP Logged |
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For a native English speaker, Spanish is the obvious choice for most people in North
America and if you already speak Portuguese as it gives you linguistic access to the whole of the Americas except for Surinam and Aruba (Dutch) and Cuba, Haiti and French Guiana (French). Unless you have a specific interest in one of the above countries or Brazil, it seems straightforward. However, French is still a better choice if you're more orientated towards Africa and want 'more bang for your buck', so to speak. Again, unless you have a specific interest in Equatorial Guinea. And again French crops up as a colonial relic in the countries of former Indo-China. Some niche interests, particularly within the arts (e.g. Opera, Ballet) make use of French (amongst others). As someone living in the UK, I've come across quite a number of French tourists in my old jobs in customer service. I can't remember ever coming across a monolingual Spanish speaker. So for northern Europeans, French will again be more useful, personal interests aside. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Antanas Tetraglot Groupie Lithuania Joined 4812 days ago 91 posts - 172 votes Speaks: Lithuanian*, English, Russian, German Studies: FrenchB1, Spanish | Message 8 of 115 06 March 2014 at 3:08pm | IP Logged |
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I agree with Henkkles. For several centuries French used to be a mark of an educated person as well as of a certain social standing. Almost in the whole world. Spanish is at its best a regional language. And for this reason there are more significant books, operas, and other "linguistic cultural artifacts" in French than in Spanish. French is a also a mark of higher culture. You can more impress a cultivated girl by playing the Spanish guitar than by speaking Spanish (as is the case with majority of other languages). And that is not the case with French.
If you really need to bump something out to make space for Spanish then German would be a better candidate. Of course, unless you intend to use it as a springboard to learn another Germanic languages. Edited by Antanas on 06 March 2014 at 3:23pm 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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