Icelandic and Lithuanian

curious   Sat Jan 03, 2009 6:48 pm GMT
HI, I'd like to have some information about Icelandic and Lithuanian pronunciation and spelling compared to other Germanic languages or Slavic languages for Lithuanian. I know that Lithuanian belongs to Baltic languages along with Latvian and other minor languages. Thanks in advance
Caspian   Sat Jan 03, 2009 8:55 pm GMT
Well, I know some amount of Lithuanian, but I'm afraid I don't know any Slavic languages to compare it to. I can try to ask specific questions about the pronunciation though.
Hjelp! Help, please.   Tue Jan 06, 2009 5:38 am GMT
I'd like to know what language to use in Lithuania as a second choice after English. Russian?

What are some good resources for learning Lithuanian? They don't have to be in English, but I'm interested in recordings, not just text. Thanks.
I don't know much about Lithuanian at all.
Sarmackie   Tue Jan 06, 2009 4:14 pm GMT
Speaking Russian in the Baltic States will take you a long way. During the Soviet era, the government started moving in Russians en masse and the effect in diluting the local populations was so great that there are still significant amounts of people who hardly understand the official languages.
JPT   Tue Jan 06, 2009 5:50 pm GMT
Lithuanian is definately not a Slavic Language. Balto-Slavic have some grammar similarities (comparitively conservative to Proto IE), but pronunciation and vocabulary are very different. It is very difficult, and even knowing Czech and Polish, I had trouble learning much more than "hey" (labas), "bye" (iki), "I don't speak Lithuanian" (as nekalbu lietuviskai), and "I don't understand" (nesuprantu)

The Baltic states in the 90's at least, were very oppressive to the Russian speaking minorities, I'm not sure about today, but it might be something to consider before you just start speaking Russian there.

As for Icelandic, I'm not very familiar, but it sounded crazy and every word seemed to be at least 10 letters long.
Caspian   Tue Jan 06, 2009 9:25 pm GMT
Lithuanian is indeed a Baltic language - the only surviving one, in fact, other than Latvian.

Russian would be a second choice... but the Lithuanians may not like this!

This is a good website: http://www.debeselis.net/

For the audio side, this is pretty good http://www.slic.org.au/Language/LLL_index.swf

And I'm sure Pimsleur could be useful for learning conversation Lithuanian - you can get the 1st free audio lesson at Pimsleur.
szep   Tue Jan 06, 2009 9:37 pm GMT
Caspian
Is Lithuanian so tough? what about pronunciation?
truth   Tue Jan 06, 2009 10:25 pm GMT
<<According to the Lithuanian population census of 2001, about 84 % of the country's population speak Lithuanian as their native language, 8.2 % are the native speakers of Russian, 5.8 % - of Polish. More than 60 % are fluent in Russian, while only about 16 % say they can speak English. According to the Eurobarometer survey conducted in 2005, 80 % of Lithuanians can speak Russian and 32 % can speak English. Most Lithuanian schools teach English as a first foreign language, but students may also study German, or, in some schools, French. Schools where Russian and Polish are the primary languages of education exist in the areas populated by these minorities.>>
Caspian   Wed Jan 07, 2009 10:41 am GMT
<< Is Lithuanian so tough? what about pronunciation? >>

Ok - Yes, Lithuanian is tough, no point denying it. If you take a look on that website, or on Wikipedia, you'll see that each word has so many different case endings, then adjectival endings. If you're good at remembering cases, then this is the language for you!

The pronounciation takes some getting used to. Each consonant can be pronounced 'softly' or 'hardly', depending on the letter following it.

Someone I know is Lithuanian, he said to me 'Kur tu eini?' (where are you going?). I replied 'į autobusų stotelę' (to the bus station). He said I pronounced it too hardly, then tried to teach me the correct way - I could hear no difference, then he continued repeating this word again and again until I got it right. It was the subtle difference in vowel sounds that caught me out!

If you want a difficult language to learn, then here you are; don't let me put you off, though, it's very rewarding if you persevere!
Hjelp!   Wed Jan 07, 2009 10:47 pm GMT
Thank-you, Caspian. Do you say "Hardly" in BE? I haven't seen this used this way before. Do you mean a hard consonant? To me "hardly" means "barely" or "not much at all."
Stavros Costas   Thu Feb 12, 2009 8:27 am GMT
I'll take two, thanks. Any Chinese? No? No problem.
Caspian   Thu Feb 12, 2009 8:20 pm GMT
<< Do you say "Hardly" in BE? I haven't seen this used this way before. Do you mean a hard consonant? To me "hardly" means "barely" or "not much at all." >>

No we don't really - I suppose I just constructed the word just then to express what I mean. I mean 'in a hard way'. After 'softly', it should be clear that 'hardly' is the opposite. I don't mean a hard consonant - because he said it, and I don't know what he meant, at all!
socorro   Sat Feb 14, 2009 9:07 pm GMT
It is very difficult, and even knowing Czech and Polish, I had trouble learning much more than "hey" (labas), "bye" (iki), "I don't speak Lithuanian" (as nekalbu lietuviskai), and "I don't understand" (nesuprantu)




What is difficult in Lithuanian apart from cases? Everyone seems to be terrified by cases in this forum. You can speak Polish and you weren't able to learn more than 4 words in Lithuanian?? That sounds very weird to me....