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Which is more difficult to learn? | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Advice Center |  | |
| lengua Senior Member United States polyglottery.wordpre Joined 6682 days ago 549 posts - 595 votes  Studies: French, Italian, Spanish, German | Message 9 of 27 17 September 2006 at 10:54am | IP Logged | ||
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I have to agree with the chorus of Mandarin, based on my limited experience with Cantonese, Mandarin, and Japanese. Japanese is easier to pronounce, and it isn't tonal, but after that, all the grammatical points are in the Chinese box.
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| Duffie Diglot Newbie United States connect-languag Joined 6641 days ago 5 posts - 5 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Japanese | Message 10 of 27 17 September 2006 at 9:56pm | IP Logged | ||
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Though I haven't worked with Chinese at all before, from what I have heard from another language learning friend of mine, with whom I share a lot of learning styles and abilities, they are really close, but Japanese is a bit easier. Everyone says that there are a lot more patterns in Japanese, and this is true, but it is so easy to get into the swing of learning verb patterns and the honorifics system isn't difficult to master. I think as far as time efficiency, learning the 1,945 primary day-to-day Kanji is better than however many are come across in Chinese.
Then again, this is coming second hand, so I can't verify this with my own experience. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| delectric Diglot Senior Member China Joined 7179 days ago 608 posts - 733 votes Speaks: English*, Mandarin Studies: German | Message 11 of 27 18 September 2006 at 4:41am | IP Logged | ||
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The thing is grammar is rule based and so pretty logical. However, pronunciation is a different matter alltogether some people may learn Mandarin pronunciation very quickly, but most do not. As for writing systems I really do not know which one is harder but there are certainly more characters to learn for Mandarin, where as there are less for Japanese but more meanings for each character. Personally I think it would be easier to attach a whole load of meanings to a symbol than learn a different symbol for each meaning.
Anyway, I have little experience with learning Japanese but hopefully someday I'll be able to say which language I've found hardest. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Raincrowlee Tetraglot Senior Member United States Joined 6700 days ago 621 posts - 808 votes Speaks: English*, Mandarin, Korean, French Studies: Indonesian, Japanese | Message 12 of 27 18 September 2006 at 5:47am | IP Logged | ||
Maybe you'll feel differently after you've tried. The main problem isn't so much learning the different readings of the Japanese characters as it is the difficulty that comes from encountering the characters in new situations and not knowing which reading to apply. This means that you can't pick up new words by reading -- you have to consult a dictionary any time you see the character in a new environment to make sure which reading should be applied. I'm sure that will become less necessary as mastery increases, but it makes it hard when still a relative novice. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| japkorengchi Senior Member Hong Kong Joined 6678 days ago 334 posts - 355 votes | Message 13 of 27 18 September 2006 at 10:03am | IP Logged | ||
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Actually I wonder learning oral Mandarin is not that hard, probably easier than putting a German sentence in a correct way. Today I have just had some Mandarin practice with an American. He spoke good Mandarin. And sometimes even though he mispronounced some words, the contextual situation helped us clarify what he actually wanted to talk about.
Perhaps due to the fact that the grammar of Chinese is much easier than other languages, it’s much easier to avoid making grammatical mistakes in Mandarin. Just imagine the time and effort you have to make a grammatically correct German sentence, spoken Mandarin is actually not that hard to be correct. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Charlie Newbie Korea, South geocities.com/charle Joined 6639 days ago 17 posts - 18 votes Speaks: English* | Message 14 of 27 19 September 2006 at 5:30am | IP Logged | ||
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Okay folks, here's my opinion on Asian languages, having spent three years in Hong Kong, having gone to Japan multiple times, and being in my third year of living in South Korea.
This is my opinion. You may disagree with it, but I believe you'll agree that it's well-informed. All of these language are extraordinarily difficult, so this is completely relative. When I say something is easy, it just means "not as difficult as in the other language." 3. Chinese (Difficulty Rating: 9.8/10) The easiest of the three is Chinese (which is fortunate because it's the one we're all going to need to know). I'm serious about this. Its grammar is the same SVO used in English, for the most part. In general, each character has only one sound, whereas each character in Japanese can have two or more sounds. Most regions where Chinese is spoken use simplified characters for writing, which are easier to learn. Some people may find the tones intimidating, and they are definitely not an artificial construct, but it is possible to speak Chinese entirely through mimicry, without being able to write a single tone. After three years at Hong Kong International School, I was completely ignorant of the tones, yet the Chinese seemed able to understand me well enough. Some people assume that reading Chinese is difficult because it uses characters exclusively, without any phonetic alphabet. Japanese uses almost as many characters as Chinese, but unlike Chinese, Japanese generally assigns multiple sound values to each character, so the amount that you have to learn in Japanese is probably greater. 2. Japanese (Difficulty Rating: 9.9/10) I'd say that Japanese is the second most difficult language on Earth. A case could be made for it being the most difficult, but unlike Korean, there are many fluent speakers of Japanese who are not racially Japanese, so there is a lot of living proof that Japanese is possible for non-natives. Japanese has historically been viewed as extremely difficult, but due to the prominence of Japan on the world stage, many linguists have written extremely detailed, helpful books on the Japanese language. Almost all universities, so it would seem, offer Japanese courses, these days. Japanese may be very difficult, but there is an extensive support community for Japanese learners. Learners outside of Japan have access to a wide range of Japanese exports that can be useful for practice purposes. Phonetically-speaking, Japanese is extraordinarily simple, with only five vowels and a very limited number of consonants. There is only one ending consonant in Japanese -- 'n.' For this reason, it is not as easy to mistake one Japanese word for another. 3. Korean (Difficulty Rating: 11/10) Korean is impossible. How do I know this? I go to Yonsei University's Korean Language Institute. I study Korean for four hours a day, five days a week (when I'm not on this darn forum ^^). Korean has 14 simple consonants and 10 simple vowels, which means a wide range of sounds. It is easy to mistake one for another. Koreans are not used to speaking with foreigners, because foreigners generally do not bother to learn Korean. They do not, in general, know how to tone down their vocabularies or slow down their speech so that foreigners can understand them. It has been said that relative to the other Asian languages, Korean has a lot more slang and swearing, and these are things that you will not learn in the classroom. Of course, you'll be lucky to even find a Korean classroom. Japanese classrooms are everywhere, but you'll pretty much have to either have Korean parents or go to Korea to learn Korean. There are next to no resources for learning Korean, and those that exist are often horrible (just take the Romanization-only 201 Korean Verbs, for instance). Whereas Chinese only has one set of word roots, Korean has two sets of word roots: native Korean, and those imported from Chinese, so by speaking Korean, you actually know a sizable subset of Chinese. This is similar to Japanese, but I didn't say Japanese was easy, either. Unlike Chinese and Japanese words, Korean words flow into each other through processes called "liaison," and "aspiration." Korean is only marginally easier to read. You may be able to pronounce words on a piece of paper, but since Korean does not have common word roots with English, you will have absolutely no idea what the word means, unless it's a loanword. Korean has far fewer loanwords than Japanese, so you will be less able to BS your reading ability. Despite the fact that I live in Korea and go to Yonsei, I have never met a white person who spoke Korean at the university level. I really want to meet one, to know that it's possible. Edited by Charlie on 19 September 2006 at 5:37am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Captain Haddock Diglot Senior Member Japan kanjicabinet.tumblr. Joined 6766 days ago 2282 posts - 2814 votes Speaks: English*, Japanese Studies: French, Korean, Ancient Greek | Message 15 of 27 19 September 2006 at 8:05am | IP Logged | ||
You mean in English, of course. :) There are tremendous resources in Japanese for learning Korean; I've considered taking it up for that reason alone. I wonder, are there good resources in Korean for learning Korean? Edited by Captain Haddock on 19 September 2006 at 8:06am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Charlie Newbie Korea, South geocities.com/charle Joined 6639 days ago 17 posts - 18 votes Speaks: English* | Message 16 of 27 19 September 2006 at 8:13am | IP Logged | ||
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That's true. There are probably plenty available in Japanese. There are also plenty that are written in child-level Korean for overseas Korean children. Come to think of it, a book of Korean verbs written in Japanese wouldn't be too difficult for an English speaker to decipher, since the key text is all in Korean.
I would say "if you find such a book, let me know," except that if I have an irregular verb question, I could just take a piece of paper and a pencil, walk out onto the street, and ask some random person, and the whole process would take two minutes. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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