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Advice on Spanish and French/German/Por.. | ||
Tags: Professionals | Spanish | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Advice Center |  | |
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6379 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 89 of 91 14 September 2012 at 10:38pm | IP Logged | ||
You said it yourself that it's 3.5/1.2 or 350%/120%. Then how can it be that German is 20% harder while Arabic is those same 350% harder? 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| tarvos Super Polyglot Winner TAC 2012 Senior Member China likeapolyglot.wordpr Joined 4489 days ago 5310 posts - 9399 votes Speaks: Dutch*, English, Swedish, French, Russian, German, Italian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Romanian, Afrikaans Studies: Greek, Modern Hebrew, Spanish, Portuguese, Czech, Korean, Esperanto, Finnish | Message 90 of 91 14 September 2012 at 11:11pm | IP Logged | ||
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I've said it but I'll say it again - if you base your language choice on time you have to
spend on it (how are you going to measure that objectively anyway? Just because the FSI sets their courses to correspond to such a time limit doesn't mean they have to take that long) and scare yourself needlessly away from a language you love because it might take you a month more or less (or even a year), then you need to sort that out before you tackle a language. This is a long endeavour. You are not in it for the short haul. Learning French is not a cakewalk, even if it is comparatively more of a cakewalk compared to Arabic. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| justonelanguage Diglot Groupie United States Joined 4244 days ago 98 posts - 128 votes Speaks: English, Spanish | Message 91 of 91 15 September 2012 at 12:32am | IP Logged | ||
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It's good to have all the data before making a decision. Sometimes people choose options because they are faster than others. For example, one of my friends chose his career (2 year masters) instead of another similar career (7-11 years after college) because it took less time and was less strenuous. It's his decision.
It may be that Arabic (just to be consistent with the "hard" language) is only 3 times harder than X easy language instead of being 3.5 or 4 times harder. However, that doesn't change the fact that it is substantially more time-intensive than the easier one. I haven't met too many English speakers that have said that Arabic/Chinese is as easy as Spanish/French...the anecdotal data seems to support the FSI findings. My language choice is not just based on the difficulty, but on a myriad of factors. Amongst them are: economic utility, difficulty (yes), number of speakers, number of countries it is spoken in, future potential, and to a much lesser extent, how it "sounds" or "how much I like it." I'm not saying that learning French or Portuguese is "easy." Heck, I've studied/spoke/lived abroad Spanish for 11 years and learn something every day and don't consider it "easy." It is, however, *easier*. I know it's a life-long endeavor. However, I am NOT willing to spend 3 or 4 times the effort to reach the same level in one of those "hard" languages. I would like to learn a third language and hopefully will, but it is definitely not the main hobby in my life. I understand the point you are making about being open to other options, but the degree of difficulty is a big deal for me. If it is only a *little* bit harder, like German, I would consider learning it and hopefully get good at it. Besides, there is *very* little chance that I'll live in China, Africa, or the Middle East. I could see myself living in Spain, Costa Rica, Puerto Rico, Canada in the future. That kind of eliminates Portuguese, actually....
Edited by justonelanguage on 15 September 2012 at 12:36am 1 person has voted this message useful |
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