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Pashto’s difficulty | ||
Tags: Pashto | Difficulty | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
 strickvl Bilingual Tetraglot Pro Member Jordan alexstrick.comRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4699 days ago 27 posts - 41 votes Speaks: English*, Dutch*, Arabic (Written), Arabic (Levantine) Studies: Persian, Pashto, Dari Personal Language Map | Message 9 of 10 25 March 2012 at 10:25pm | IP Logged |
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Yes, I have studied (and speak) Arabic, Pashto and Dari/Persian, and Arabic is actually quite nice in that it is pretty
systematic in how it operates. The pronunciation (use of retroflexes etc) isn't really too big a problem. I was lucky to live in a Pashto speaking area for 4 years, though, so the immersion part wasn't such a problem. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Kenney90 Newbie United Kingdom Joined 5873 days ago 24 posts - 39 votes | Message 10 of 10 30 March 2012 at 2:56am | IP Logged |
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The hardest part of Pashto for me is the verb system. The first obstacle, at least for me, was adjusting to the subject-object-verb word order. Before Pashto, I've never encountered a language which placed verbs at the end of the sentence and it was really daunting at first. Many Pashto verbs have irregular stems for both present and past tenses which have to be memorized along with the verb, although that part really isn't too difficult. Pashto verbs also express aspect, which is also alien to an English-speaker. For instance, activities which require little time to complete (usually) add و [wu-] to the beginning of the verb. Let's say that I want you to read a book, I would say: دا کتاب لولئ [dā kitāb lwaləy]. If I wanted you to read a word, I would say: دا کلمه ولولئ [dā kalima wulwaləy]. Most verbs are form their aspects like this, but some of the most common ones form their different aspects differently. Another strange bit about Pashto verbs, to form the past tense with a transitive verb, you must put the subject in the oblique case and the verb agrees with the object of the sentence in both gender and number.
The oblique and vocative cases aren't difficult to figure out where they are placed, however it is difficult to figure out how the word should inflect to reflect the case because there are so many rules to form these cases. Likewise, in order to form plural you have to memorize a good number of rules in order to express the correct plural form. Many nouns, especially familial terms, are irregular. Adjectives are also quite a challenge. My Pashto instructor says that there are approximately 14 inflectional patterns for adjectives. Adjectives inflect for both gender and number. Overall, I consider Pashto to be a difficult language. Although the language sounds simple on paper, applying all of these grammatical rules in speech on-the-fly is rather difficult, although I am getting much better. I can already read ~70% of a newspaper despite only being a first-year student. 3 persons have voted this message useful |
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