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Worldwide interest in Hebrew | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| Lemanensis Bilingual Pentaglot Groupie Switzerland hebrew.ecott.ch Joined 5926 days ago 73 posts - 77 votes  Speaks: French*, English*, German, Spanish, Swedish Studies: Modern Hebrew | Message 1 of 27 23 April 2009 at 9:55pm | IP Logged | ||
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Just in case anyone is wondering just how much interest there is in Hebrew, here are the statistics for www.hebrew.ecott.ch for the period 1 March to 23 April 2009.
2089 visits from 78 countries, with 431 from 39 US states. (1616 unique visitors) I'm absolutely amazed at this level of interest. I realize this doesn't mean learners - but people looking for info about how to learn Hebrew. The top 10 countries are: USA Poland Brazil Spain Mexico Israel Sweden Russia UK Argentina 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Akipenda Lugha Diglot Groupie Canada Joined 5740 days ago 78 posts - 82 votes Speaks: English*, French Studies: Swahili, Sign Language, Spanish | Message 2 of 27 24 April 2009 at 4:43am | IP Logged | ||
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Do people still learn yiddish? I've been trying to pepper up my English with a shtickel of yiddish.
1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| sprachefin Triglot Senior Member Germany Joined 5748 days ago 300 posts - 317 votes Speaks: German*, English, Spanish Studies: French, Turkish, Mandarin, Bulgarian, Persian, Dutch | Message 3 of 27 24 April 2009 at 4:56am | IP Logged | ||
I often sprinkle my German with Yiddish as my grandparents spoke to me in Yiddish as a baby (they cared for me for quite a while) and technically once upon a time I guess I was a native. I often find myself speaking with a slightly Yiddish cadence while using a Yiddish word here or there, it is fun! As for the original subject, I think it is great that Hebrew is a source of interest. I plan to tackle it (I've always wanted to) so I plan to in the moderate future. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Juan M. Senior Member Colombia Joined 5901 days ago 460 posts - 597 votes | Message 4 of 27 24 April 2009 at 6:28pm | IP Logged | ||
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I'd like to learn Hebrew in order to become acquainted with the literature and thought of this very exceptional people, primarily by ordering books over the Internet, but in order to read them I'd need to be able to take my Hebrew to a very high level. Can Hebrew realistically be learnt though by someone who doesn't travel and will most likely never even come into contact with a native speaker? I've had little luck finding vibrant online TV and radio stations.
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| J-Learner Senior Member Australia Joined 6032 days ago 556 posts - 636 votes Studies: Yiddish, English* Studies: Dutch | Message 5 of 27 25 April 2009 at 2:01am | IP Logged | ||
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I've learn a bit of Hebrew and I'm learning Yiddish and Dutch alongside German.
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| JBI Diglot Groupie Canada Joined 5693 days ago 46 posts - 67 votes Speaks: Modern Hebrew, English* Studies: Italian, Mandarin, French | Message 6 of 27 26 April 2009 at 3:44am | IP Logged | ||
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I'm an almost native speaker of Hebrew (I grew up almost bilingual, though Hebrew was clearly a subordinate to English) and I will tell you, that it really isn't worth the effort. Personally, I'm surprised it even has that much interest. With a teaching in Hebrew, if you manage to get past the intense grammar, which has no president in Latin languages (binyanim (sp?) are found only in Semitic languages), and then the vocabulary, even then, almost everyone who speaks Hebrew will speak to you in English as good, or almost as good as yours. The Bible, if that is what people are really interested in, will hardly open up - it's almost a whole different language, similar to learning Medieval English (in the sense of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight), and even then, it has words which really have no translation, and whose meanings have been debated for thousands of years.
That being said, it is cool to have, I guess, and the alphabet is somewhat interesting, but I'm surprised people even bother. It seems a bit of a waste of time for anyone who really doesn't have a connection to the language, mainly Jewish people, and/or Israelis. As for Yiddish, there are still a few Heredi Jews who speak it as a first language, but on the whole, unless you really are an authentic Yiddish speaker, real Yiddish words always seem to sound fake. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Juan M. Senior Member Colombia Joined 5901 days ago 460 posts - 597 votes | Message 7 of 27 26 April 2009 at 4:09am | IP Logged | ||
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Needless to say, I disagree. If I thought I could master Hebrew with the resources available to me, I would pick it up without hesitation. I learn languages as a means to access the subjective world of a community, and there is hardly a people more unique, exceptional and worth knowing than the Jews.
From a linguistic perspective too learning Hebrew is bound to be a very revealing experience. Edited by JuanM on 26 April 2009 at 4:10am 1 person has voted this message useful |
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