Easiest language to learn

Guest   Wed Apr 09, 2008 2:14 pm GMT
<<Deacuerdo a mis cálculos el español es e^-1/2 veces mas sencillo sintácticamente que el inglés. >>

In the absence of any quantitative syntactic complexity metric, it is possible to give examples to illustrate how Spanish is syntactically simpler than English?
Xie   Wed Apr 09, 2008 2:25 pm GMT
>>English has got to be the world's easiest in absolute terms, or at least come darned close (excluding languages like Esperanto, interlingua, pidgins/creoles, and certain languages that are designed for international communication).

Interestingly, Esperanto is not much easier than any others, either. Well, much is simplified, but its nature of coining words doesn't make it easy, and the high flexibility of coining any synonyms doesn't, either. I must be talking about something else, obviously, but as I see it, DIFFICULTY has more of its meaning in terms of discourse.

Salutations are most probably the easiest in any language you can think of. No babies are expected to start a debate with their parents and can only murmur a few words every now and then. Even if you are competent in the whole of syntax and morphology (i.e. grammar), if you can "say" nothing even in your mind, your proficiency is very limited.
Guest   Wed Apr 09, 2008 3:33 pm GMT
Easiest language to learn: farting
You should try it
guest2   Thu Apr 10, 2008 7:02 pm GMT
What about Italian? A few people mentioned Spanish, and Italian seems similar, with perhaps an even clearer pronunciation.
Guest   Thu Apr 10, 2008 7:07 pm GMT
That a language is easy to pronounce does not mean that it's easy. Spanish has many verbal conjugations, duplicated objetcs, reflexive verbs and the subjunctive mood. Also who said that sounds, yet clear are easy to pronounce? Spanish RR, R, J , LL and Z are diffcult to pronounce.
Guest   Thu Apr 10, 2008 8:01 pm GMT
"That a language is easy to pronounce does not mean that it's easy. Spanish has many verbal conjugations, duplicated objetcs, reflexive verbs and the subjunctive mood. Also who said that sounds, yet clear are easy to pronounce? Spanish RR, R, J , LL and Z are diffcult to pronounce."

Doesn't really matter how "hard" you try to put it, we all know the truth.
K. T.   Thu Apr 10, 2008 8:05 pm GMT
Spanish is fairly easy for Americans to learn as a first second language because the sounds are easy to make and there is usually a little passive familiarity with some words. Of course, I am talking about the beginning levels in Spanish.

Because of this easy start in Spanish (and the practical reasons for learning it), some people will get to an intermediate or advanced level in the language. Others, will faint at the difficulty of understanding the speed of certain varieties of Spanish and give up. No, that last part is a joke.

French (another language I like) scares some people because of the same issues we have in English. The sounds represented by the letters don't seem consistent. (French makes sense, actually, but students need someone to teach them this.) French also suffers from its perceived reputation. I heard a woman say "Fate accomplish..." today by mistake. I said "Oh, fait accom...do you speak French?" She didn't- she just knew the expression but decided against using it with me because she thought I would think her pretentious. It means "Done deed/deed done" in English in non-pretentious English, I mean, lol.

Anyway, French isn't too difficult, but perceptions about it give it a bad name and people who insist on pronouncing it like English will never fare too well.

German is not too bad either with sounds that seem logical based on the letters, but German also suffers a bit because of well, you know...let's say movie perceptions of Germans, etc. I'm a little careful about letting people know that I speak German somewhat because the reaction of others to German is unpredictable.

"Isn't German always shouted?"
"I remember what the Germans did..."
"Ugh, German. Why don't you learn_______instead."

Not kidding at all about these kinds of reactions.

If you learn a language very distant from your own and you speak English natively, you will think most of the romance languages are a piece of cake compared to bears like Japanese and Mandarin. I really love IE languages no. I still learn some languages not in this big family, but I appreciate that familiarity that makes most of them seem "easy" or at least "possible" to learn.
K. T.   Thu Apr 10, 2008 8:07 pm GMT
I really love IE languages now.
Guest   Thu Apr 10, 2008 8:50 pm GMT
Others, will faint at the difficulty of understanding the speed of certain varieties of Spanish and give up.

Spanish speakers don't speak faster, it seems that they speak faster because Spanish is syllable timed but the amount of words per second is the same as in English.
K. T.   Thu Apr 10, 2008 11:37 pm GMT
I was joking about that. It's probably difficult for people learning Spanish because some speakers don't roll their "r"'s and make another sound, others leave off the ends of words "doh" for "dos" etc. just like in English it depends on the speaker.
Guest   Thu Apr 10, 2008 11:47 pm GMT
I tried to speak through my ass. Trust me. It's really difficult
Guest   Thu Apr 10, 2008 11:57 pm GMT
others leave off the ends of words "doh" for "dos"

Yes, I do that. I like this because Spanish gets more difficult so.
Anon   Fri Apr 11, 2008 12:03 am GMT
<<French (another language I like) scares some people because of the same issues we have in English. The sounds represented by the letters don't seem consistent. (French makes sense, actually, but students need someone to teach them this.) French also suffers from its perceived reputation.>>

French's reputation as being very complex, is completely undeserved; the reality is just the opposite. Someone in another thread commented that french is "the most simplified language in the romance family", because its the least inflected, and I completely agree. I think its the orthography that gives this impression; but this is an illusion.

I think if french were spelled phonetically, people would see it for what it is.
Anon   Fri Apr 11, 2008 12:19 am GMT
"What about Italian? A few people mentioned Spanish, and Italian seems similar."


I have no idea why spanish (of all the other similar romance languages), is always singled out as being simple, and not the rest.
Guest   Fri Apr 11, 2008 12:34 am GMT
I wonder who invented that Spanish is easy.