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What makes English difficult? | ||
Tags: Difficulty | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| Bruno87 Diglot Groupie Argentina Joined 4384 days ago 49 posts - 72 votes  Speaks: Spanish*, English Studies: German, Portuguese | Message 9 of 45 16 December 2012 at 4:07am | IP Logged | ||||||||||||||
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People who say "such languague is easy" are the same people who don't speak well such
language. English isn't a easy language at all by those stuff you have pointed out, besides the phrasal verbs and the use of the prepositions, etc. Edited by Bruno87 on 16 December 2012 at 4:08am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||||||||
| fnord Triglot Groupie Switzerland Joined 5035 days ago 71 posts - 124 votes Speaks: German*, Swiss-German, English Studies: Luxembourgish, Dutch | Message 10 of 45 16 December 2012 at 1:16pm | IP Logged | ||||||||||||||
1. Indeed it is. But personally, I don't mind much. At least not anymore. I've always found pronunciation rather easy to learn (if you can produce the individual sounds): I need to hear and recognize once or twice and can usually remember ist pronunciation. So once I have achieved some passive comprehension in a language, it's becomes a mere task of imitating. Stringing a sentence together is more difficult - but maybe easier in English than in some other languages.
To be fair, German speakers do distinguish between "Ich arbeite" und "Ich bin am Arbeiten". And you can also hear "Ich mache die/meine Arbeit"
Learn individually? How about this four-step rule: 1. comma 2. the auxiliary verb, same tense, negated (if there's no auxiliary in the sentence, just use "do") 3. personal pronoun 4. question mark Granted, forming questions is a bit cumbersome compared to other languages, but it's not too bad. 4) English requires helping words to create questions in the present.
French or German is certainly not among them. Ich schrieb Ich habe geschrieben Ich hatte geschrieben Ich habe ihm geschrieben gehabt Ich hatte him geschrieben gehabt The last two may not be standard language but you will come across them. But then, I wonder whether native speakers of English do use all these past tenses in informal speech.
Some words? In school we learned a fairly simple rule: three syllables and more -> use "more" I assume there are enough threads and examples in this forum why English is easy to learn. For me, one of the most prominent (non-)features of English is the lack of inflection for person and number in verbs and the rare, almost fossilized distinction between male, female and neuter gender: I speak English You speak English He/she speaks English The (female) newscaster speaks English The (male) newscaster speaks English We speak English You speak English They speak English The (female) newscasters speak English The (male) newscasters speak English This makes it really easy for the beginning learner - whereas in other languages these are probably the most common mistakes 4 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||||||||
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6599 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 11 of 45 16 December 2012 at 2:16pm | IP Logged | ||||||||||||||
And you can speak English perfectly well without using tag questions, in fact I think many foreigners overuse them. And understanding them is much easier than forming them. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||||||||
| daegga Tetraglot Senior Member Austria lang-8.com/553301 Joined 4523 days ago 1076 posts - 1792 votes Speaks: German*, EnglishC2, Swedish, Norwegian Studies: Danish, French, Finnish, Icelandic | Message 12 of 45 16 December 2012 at 2:21pm | IP Logged | ||||||||||||||
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Well, although German has all these different past tenses, it doesn't distinguish between them. Präteritum and Perfekt have the same meaning, the only difference being that the former is used in writing, the latter in speaking (there can be some mix in speaking though, but they have the same function). The other tenses are only seldom used with the Plusquamperfekt sometimes used like Perfekt in spoken German (in some regions), but otherwise it's rather formal.
In English on the other hand, all these different tenses have a precise meaning and if you choose the wrong one, you either say something different than you intended to or you sound just wrong. In German, you can also say "ich arbeite" instead of "ich bin am Arbeiten" (but not the other way round), it doesn't really change the meaning (that's what the context is for), in English that would be wrong. The Scandinavian languages work pretty similar to English though. As for forming the comparative with -er or more: the rules that are learned in school are only rules of thumb. They work most of the time, but not always. We usually get enough exposure to English that it doesn't matter though, who thinks about rules when forming the comparative anyway? Only the school kids when writing their tests I suppose. Edited by daegga on 16 December 2012 at 2:33pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||||||||
| Bao Diglot Senior Member Germany tinyurl.com/pe4kqe5 Joined 5768 days ago 2256 posts - 4046 votes Speaks: German*, English Studies: French, Spanish, Japanese, Mandarin | Message 13 of 45 16 December 2012 at 6:20pm | IP Logged | ||||||||||||||
That's not true. The difference is rather one of style and register/dialect, and not one of innate meaning. Of course, that makes many German speakers believe those past tense forms are mutually interchangeable, and when learning English map those forms to most similar ones in English and use them following their German habits. Either way, I believe it all boils down to how different two languages are from each other in terms of vocabulary and grammatical concepts and devices used. Probably also script and phonology. When there are many parallels starting out is easier, and you're likely to reach a self-sustaining level and working proficiency sooner. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||||||||
| Марк Senior Member Russian Federation Joined 5058 days ago 2096 posts - 2972 votes Speaks: Russian* | Message 14 of 45 16 December 2012 at 7:33pm | IP Logged | ||||||||||||||
And it is easier to learn how to form English questions than how to make this different voice tone in Russian. English has tough phonology, especially vowels. The spelling is contreintuitive and irregular which makes it difficult to learn words at the beginning. Plus it has articles, which are very hard to grasp. The correct usage of the Perfect tenses is still difficult for me. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||||||||
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6599 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 15 of 45 16 December 2012 at 9:12pm | IP Logged | ||||||||||||||
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| Spinchäeb Ape Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 4472 days ago 146 posts - 180 votes Speaks: English*, German | Message 16 of 45 16 December 2012 at 9:32pm | IP Logged | ||||||||||||||
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Another thing that can make English difficult is the fact that there are lots and lots of idioms. A non-native speaker can learn what the nouns and verbs mean, only for them to remain confusing when they show up in idiomatic expressions. For example, "I want to ask her out." If a non-speaker doesn't know this idiom, he's probably wondering what he wants to ask her. Does he want to go outside and ask her something? You just have to know the idiom.
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