Question about Ukrainian language (Specific Languages) Language Learning Forum

Question about Ukrainian language
Tags: Ukrainian
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Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages

39 messages over 5 pages: 1 2 3 4 5 Next >>

shedl
Tetraglot
Newbie
Ukraine
Joined 3934 days ago
20 posts - 30 votes
Speaks: Russian, Ukrainian*, Finnish, English^C1
Studies: Italian, Spanish, Polish

Message 25 of 39

31 March 2014 at 5:21pm | IP Logged

Thor1987 wrote:

I'm not gonna lie at first I hated the language, just sounded needlessly strange and
unorganized. However after a few weeks I've started to believe its the best sounding
slavic language, as it's more dynamic than the others.

It's very pleasant to hear! Also if you're interested you'll probably want to hear some
poetry by Taras Shevchenko.

Here's the link:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6g6gawv2mOc

Speach starts from about 0:58. Hope you'll like it because Ukrainian poetry is probably
the most representative tool to show the beauty of this language!
1 person has voted this message useful

pesahson
Diglot
Senior Member
Poland
Joined 5728 days ago
448 posts - 840 votes

Speaks: Polish*, English
Studies: French, Portuguese, Norwegian

Message 26 of 39

31 March 2014 at 5:48pm | IP Logged

I think with time Ukrainian will become more popular, like Polish and other Slavic languages became more popular once their economic situation improved, more tourists came, etc. Russian will be the go-to-Slavic languages still. There's plenty of resources, lots of speakers, it's still a kind of a linga franca in some parts of the world, great literature, etc. But more and more people tackle other Slavic languages as well.

I don't have plans on learning Ukrainian, but I'd love to have a better passive understanding of it, as well as of Czech and Slovak. I wish it was like in Scandinavia in our part of Europe, that people can speak their respective languages and understand each other. I know Polish and Ukrainian are even more similar then Russian and Polish, but I'm always impressed with how quickly Ukrainians start picking up Polish. Many times on our TV stations, there are interviews with Ukrainians who speak Polish and they're doing really well.
3 persons have voted this message useful

shedl
Tetraglot
Newbie
Ukraine
Joined 3934 days ago
20 posts - 30 votes
Speaks: Russian, Ukrainian*, Finnish, English^C1
Studies: Italian, Spanish, Polish

Message 27 of 39

31 March 2014 at 7:44pm | IP Logged

pesahson wrote:

I think with time Ukrainian will become more popular, like Polish and
other Slavic languages became more popular once their economic situation improved, more
tourists came, etc. Russian will be the go-to-Slavic languages still. There's plenty of
resources, lots of speakers, it's still a kind of a linga franca in some parts of the
world, great literature, etc. But more and more people tackle other Slavic languages as
well.

I don't have plans on learning Ukrainian, but I'd love to have a better passive
understanding of it, as well as of Czech and Slovak. I wish it was like in Scandinavia
in our part of Europe, that people can speak their respective languages and understand
each other. I know Polish and Ukrainian are even more similar then Russian and Polish,
but I'm always impressed with how quickly Ukrainians start picking up Polish. Many
times on our TV stations, there are interviews with Ukrainians who speak Polish and
they're doing really well.

Yes, you're right! And I absolutely agree that Ukrainian and Polish are more similar
than Russian and Polish. I've already written above that my father who doesn't speak
Polish can get used to speak it after a week or two being in Poland.
As a great lover of languages I can say that it's very urgent for me! Especially if our
family move to Poland one day, as we plan. =)
1 person has voted this message useful

Ari
Heptaglot
Senior Member
Norway
Joined 6582 days ago
2314 posts - 5695 votes

Speaks: Swedish*, English, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Mandarin, Cantonese
Studies: Czech, Latin, German

Message 28 of 39

01 April 2014 at 6:45am | IP Logged

I've been toying with the idea of learning Czech recently. How close is that to Ukrainian?
1 person has voted this message useful

shedl
Tetraglot
Newbie
Ukraine
Joined 3934 days ago
20 posts - 30 votes
Speaks: Russian, Ukrainian*, Finnish, English^C1
Studies: Italian, Spanish, Polish

Message 29 of 39

01 April 2014 at 3:39pm | IP Logged

Ari wrote:

I've been toying with the idea of learning Czech recently. How close is that
to Ukrainian?

Speaking about how close is Ukrainian to Czech I can say that these two languages are
similar enough. Czech is partially understandable for ukrainians. Also the basic Czech
and Ukrainian vocabularies are very alike due to Swadesh list. But this similarity is
seen for those who speak Ukrainian or Slovak.
If interesting check this link:

http://en.
wiktionary.org/wiki/Appendix:Swadesh_lists_for_Slavic_langua ges
3 persons have voted this message useful

Chung
Diglot
Senior Member
Joined 7156 days ago
4228 posts - 8259 votes

20 sounds
Speaks: English*, French
Studies: Polish, Slovak, Uzbek, Turkish, Korean, Finnish

Message 30 of 39

01 April 2014 at 4:32pm | IP Logged

Ari wrote:

I've been toying with the idea of learning Czech recently. How close is that to Ukrainian?

They're similar but only partially mutually intelligible. The overall divergence may feel like that between Faroese and Swedish
1 person has voted this message useful

hribecek
Triglot
Senior Member
Czech Republic
Joined 5349 days ago
1243 posts - 1458 votes

Speaks: English*, Czech, Spanish
Studies: Italian, Polish, Slovak, Hungarian, Toki Pona, Russian

Message 31 of 39

02 April 2014 at 6:05pm | IP Logged

I'm not a Polyglot but I also started learning Ukrainian without any real reason. I was attracted to it initially because it seemed like a very neglected language among language lovers and because I wanted to expand my knowledge of Slavic languages. I'm similar to Chung in that Russian just doesn't do it for me, I guess it's just too popular.

I'm planning to go to Ukraine in the Summer, but the choice of language came before the choice of travel destination in my case.

I've been learning it for 3 months now and am really enjoying every aspect of it. I was surprised to see how similar it is to Czech, I expected it to be a lot closer to Russian than it is. Czech has really helped me to get lots of Ukrainian words and grammar for free.

I've noticed a similar trend to Pesahson regarding Ukrainians' ability in other Slavic languages; the best foreign Czech speakers I know are Ukrainians.
1 person has voted this message useful

Serpent
Octoglot
Senior Member
Russian Federation
serpent-849.livejour
Joined 6597 days ago
9753 posts - 15779 votes

4 sounds
Speaks: Russian*, English, Finnish^C1, Latin, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese
Studies: Danish, Romanian, Polish, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Croatian, Slovenian, Catalan, Czech, Galician, Dutch, Swedish

Message 32 of 39

02 April 2014 at 11:55pm | IP Logged

I assume you don't count Slovaks? :D

And hm, how much experience with Russian do you have? Coming from the other side I can't say it's far from Russian and Belarusian. Ukrainian does have some interesting similarities with Czech though, like the h and I think no vowel reduction?

2 persons have voted this message useful

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