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Easiest "difficult" language?

  Tags: Difficulty
 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages Post Reply
35 messages over 5 pages: 1 24 5  Next >>
tarvos
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 Message 17 of 35
07 February 2015 at 2:56am | IP Logged 
Russian hasn't fried my brain that much actually. There's a bunch of exceptions, but the
structure is still European enough that I found it easy enough to adapt to.

Edited by tarvos on 07 February 2015 at 5:42am

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DaisyMaisy
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 Message 18 of 35
07 February 2015 at 7:44am | IP Logged 
Well, if one really could say there was a "most difficult language" - I think people would flock to it. People like us here on this forum anyway! :)

Of course it's all hypothetical, but plenty of people like a challenge. Although Navajo is pretty mind bogglingly difficult looking!

Tarvos, out of curiosity, why do you find French the hardest?
1 person has voted this message useful



Kc2012
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 Message 19 of 35
09 February 2015 at 9:51am | IP Logged 
What a question. Everything depends on your environment and availability of resources. For
example learning Chinese may be easier if you're living in China than learning French living
in a non French speaking place for example? Obviously it's just an example. But yeah Russian
is certainly a hard language but the fact that the writing system can be learned in a couple
of hours (took me about 3, and another week or so to read it reasonably fluently) is such a
big help! Being able to read a language gives you access to so much vocabulary. A year of
fairly intensive study with lots of reading and listening can get you to a fairly good level
in Russian,this is based on my experience. This is why Chinese frustrates me because the
reading just slows you down so much! But then again characters are to be respected and I do
enjoy studying them.
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tarvos
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 Message 20 of 35
09 February 2015 at 11:49am | IP Logged 
DaisyMaisy wrote:
Well, if one really could say there was a "most difficult
language" - I think people would flock to it. People like us here on this forum
anyway! :)

Of course it's all hypothetical, but plenty of people like a challenge. Although
Navajo is pretty mind bogglingly difficult looking!

Tarvos, out of curiosity, why do you find French the hardest?


First one I had to learn properly. I was finding out more about myself as a language
learning personality. I had many problems listening and conversing and it took me
years to figure out what the problem was. And eventually I solved it. In all of my
other languages it has taken me much shorter. German is a strange exception to that
rule, but here the fact I'm Dutch comes into play.
1 person has voted this message useful



tristano
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 Message 21 of 35
09 February 2015 at 2:09pm | IP Logged 
tarvos wrote:

First one I had to learn properly. I was finding out more about myself as a language
learning personality. I had many problems listening and conversing and it took me
years to figure out what the problem was. And eventually I solved it. In all of my
other languages it has taken me much shorter. German is a strange exception to that
rule, but here the fact I'm Dutch comes into play.


What was the problem? I'm curious now :)
Dutch is my French. French is my German.
Actually I started to study other languages because of Dutch.
1 person has voted this message useful



tarvos
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Studies: Greek, Modern Hebrew, Spanish, Portuguese, Czech, Korean, Esperanto, Finnish

 
 Message 22 of 35
12 February 2015 at 10:25am | IP Logged 
tristano wrote:
tarvos wrote:

First one I had to learn properly. I was finding out more about myself as a language
learning personality. I had many problems listening and conversing and it took me
years to figure out what the problem was. And eventually I solved it. In all of my
other languages it has taken me much shorter. German is a strange exception to that
rule, but here the fact I'm Dutch comes into play.


What was the problem? I'm curious now :)
Dutch is my French. French is my German.
Actually I started to study other languages because of Dutch.


I was being way too passive. I had to actively use the language to get better. I
thought I could just rely on my school knowledge and then speak French, but it wasn't
the case. And I knew my grammar well, so that wasn't the problem either. The problem
was that I wasn't used to situations where French was spoken colloquially and I simply
had to get used to ACTIVELY speaking a language in order to be any good at it.
Nowadays I speak much better French and it's pretty much all due to that realization.
4 persons have voted this message useful



tristano
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 Message 23 of 35
12 February 2015 at 2:41pm | IP Logged 
Yes, I guess that applies to my Dutch too (with the difference that my Dutch grammar is
still basic).

Edited by tristano on 12 February 2015 at 2:42pm

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tarvos
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Speaks: Dutch*, English, Swedish, French, Russian, German, Italian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Romanian, Afrikaans
Studies: Greek, Modern Hebrew, Spanish, Portuguese, Czech, Korean, Esperanto, Finnish

 
 Message 24 of 35
12 February 2015 at 3:42pm | IP Logged 
tristano wrote:
Yes, I guess that applies to my Dutch too (with the difference that my
Dutch grammar is
still basic).


I didn't know the subjunctive at the time and there were some other important things, but
the speaking was more important.


2 persons have voted this message useful



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