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Easy languages with alternate scripts? | ||
Tags: Writing System | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| Akao aka FailArtist Senior Member United States Joined 5336 days ago 315 posts - 347 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, Mandarin, Toki Pona | Message 1 of 21 21 April 2010 at 1:56am | IP Logged |
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I have memorized a couple Japanese Kana, the Korean alphabet and the Russian alphabet.
As a beginner language learner, I found these languages were quite overwhelming and would like to wait to start these languages. What are, in your opinions, the easiest non-romance/non-germanic languages do you know? Also, Crylic should be avoided because I found the alphabet as dry as Latin because of the extremely similar system. *Edit The meaning of my post was a little misconceived at my own fault, I meant a list of easy to medium languages with non-latin scripts so I have quite a few choices. Thank you :D Edited by Akao on 21 April 2010 at 2:36am 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Smart Tetraglot Senior Member United States Joined 5339 days ago 352 posts - 398 votes Speaks: Spanish, English*, Latin, French Studies: German | Message 2 of 21 21 April 2010 at 2:02am | IP Logged |
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Well I do not know any other alphabets at the moment, just Latin.
I would imagine Hebrew script to be very fun and perhaps easy once one understands it :) 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| NativeLanguage Octoglot Groupie United States nativlang.com Joined 5338 days ago 52 posts - 110 votes Speaks: French, Spanish, English*, Italian, Latin, Ancient Greek, Portuguese, Catalan Studies: Japanese, Mayan languages, Irish | Message 3 of 21 21 April 2010 at 2:20am | IP Logged |
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If I understand correctly, you are asking for a recommendation on a language with a non-Roman alphabet that would be easier to learn based on your native fluency in English.
Based on that, I would recommend Greek which will have many root words that are familiar to an English speaker. If that writing system is not exotic enough for you, I would recommend sticking with an indo-european language but branching into one of English's more distant cousins like Hindi or Farsi. All three of these will provide you with an opportunity to learn a new writing system. None of them will be simple to learn, but, they should be at least a bit more 'familiar' than Korean or Japanese. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| pohaku Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5651 days ago 192 posts - 367 votes Speaks: English*, Persian Studies: Arabic (classical), French, German, Mandarin, Japanese | Message 4 of 21 21 April 2010 at 2:26am | IP Logged |
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My view is that it's my job to arrange my own resources and my own efforts towards learning a given language so that I can keep my motivation high. If I'm not sufficiently motivated, I'll be intimidated or bored and I'll stop. If I am motivated, though, I'll keep on going, day after day, and after maybe 100 days I'll know enough to feel some significant satisfaction, which will motivate me even more.
On a day-to-day basis I have to find tasks that are not too hard and not too easy; that's where it helps to have good resources. And I have to know why I'm learning the language. It may be the beauty of the writing system, the joy of reading a certain author, the food in the country where the language is spoken, something about the history of the language, a good friend who speaks the language or is learning it with me, or whatever. No language, though, is intrinsically intimidating or boring; the level of interest and motivation lies within the learner, and the more experienced learners will know how to manage their own interest and motivation, just like the driver of a car knows that she needs to keep fuel in the gas tank. I could give you a dozen reasons each for learning--and loving--Japanese, Korean, and Russian, even though I haven't learned much about them compared to my principle languages. Looking for an easier language isn't really the answer, I don't think. Look for a language that you love, or at least would really like to get to know better, and nothing will be able to stop you. 5 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Akao aka FailArtist Senior Member United States Joined 5336 days ago 315 posts - 347 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, Mandarin, Toki Pona | Message 5 of 21 21 April 2010 at 2:35am | IP Logged |
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@pohaku
I understand that finding the "easiest" language will not always drive motivation, I would just like a few various and widely-ranged suggestions for languages so I may play with them a bit and see which was the most fun to try out. I have my own way for remembering writing systems other than writing them down, I learn the "ABC's" of that language and then match the pitch of the song on my guitar, then sing along while playing guitar and after a few days I have memorized both the writing system and the sounds with a good starting accent, just a few rough edges to work out if it is not a tonal language. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Saif Bilingual Triglot Senior Member United States Joined 5612 days ago 122 posts - 208 votes Speaks: English*, Arabic (Levantine)*, French | Message 6 of 21 21 April 2010 at 2:48am | IP Logged |
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Modern Greek and Modern Hebrew. Not "easy" languages, but they're not as hard as Mandarin
or Japanese. You may also want to consider Persian (Farsi) if you want something harder than Greek but easier than Japanese. Edited by Saif on 21 April 2010 at 2:52am 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| goosefrabbas Triglot Pro Member United States Joined 6368 days ago 393 posts - 475 votes Speaks: English*, French, Spanish Studies: German, Italian Personal Language Map | Message 7 of 21 21 April 2010 at 3:16am | IP Logged |
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Malay used to be written in the Arabic script, and it has a very simple grammar. But, as with all languages, what it lacks in one aspect, it makes up in another.
1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Akao aka FailArtist Senior Member United States Joined 5336 days ago 315 posts - 347 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, Mandarin, Toki Pona | Message 8 of 21 21 April 2010 at 4:22am | IP Logged |
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Dialects that don't differ much like in Arabic or Chinese please, I don't want to do all
that extra learning if I won't even be going there likely. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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