Indonesian--easiest language to learn?

KC   Fri Jan 26, 2007 11:36 pm GMT
I am an accredited translator/interpreter (Indonesian>English) and have to agree with Dr Kelly that there is a lot of misguided information about Indonesian. As some have pointed out the afix system is particularly difficult to master, as are the various registers of the language, eg standard, colloquial and 'prokem'. Indonesia is unfortunately full of expats who think they are 'fluent' in 'Bahasa' but in reality not many of them get beyond a reasonable pre-intermediate level. The same goes for more than a few Australian teachers of Indonesian. Pronunciation is not as straight forward as many have been led to believe either, for example 'ng' in intial position-try to get the average learner to pronounce 'ngengat' (moth) correctly and see how far you get! Learning any language to an advanced level, at least as an adult, requires years of study and if possible significant in-country experience.

James Sneddon's book 'The Indonesian Language-Its History and Role in Modern Society' is well worth reading as a follow up to this discussion.
Aga   Tue Feb 06, 2007 12:07 pm GMT
I'm the Indonesian native speaker also. Moreover I can speak Sunda a bit and can 100% understand if one speaks it.
punk ass   Thu Feb 15, 2007 8:57 am GMT
well indonesian is a useless language if you ask most people of more modern or industrialized nations. perhaps if you want to be the manager of a ten thousand strong factory producing nothing but slippers made from native grass then indeed indonesian may benefit you, just how greatly, well look at the current exchange of the currency and you might just lift your nose in utter disgust, but then thats just my two cents.
El   Thu Feb 15, 2007 11:11 am GMT
Why is it called Indonesia? how is the name in your language?
Malisa   Sun Mar 11, 2007 10:51 pm GMT
As a native Malay speaker, I think Malay and Indonesian are the easiest languages to learn. There are neither gender nor tenses specific to the words of choice and no intonations like Mandarin(Chinese).
Ivan   Fri May 04, 2007 7:25 pm GMT
Hi there, I'm native Indonesian speaker myself, speak fluent English and currently mastering Spanish in Mexico.
In my bias-opinion, Indonesian has one of the simplest grammar system. Spanish is harder because of its complex verb-changing system as English has unique pronunciation. Verbs never change in gender-neutral Indonesian, pronunciation is similar to Latin (hence I have no difficulty with Spanish pronunciation, including those rolling 'rr's), word order are always Subject-Verb-Object . Again, the only obstacle is probably mastering prefix, infix and suffix that goes along with the verb; e.g. ajar (to teach), mengajar (the action to teach), pelajar (student), belajar (to learn), pelajaran (field of study), diajar (to be tought).

One thing to remember is that formal Indonesian is rarely used in daily conversation (English and Spanish day-to-day talk is way closer to its formal form) due the fact that Indonesian is a lingua-franca connecting the 300 different languages in the country.
Malaysian   Thu Jun 07, 2007 5:18 pm GMT
I'm Malay and living in Malaysia. For me Indonesian language is easy to learn
zed   Fri Jun 08, 2007 2:02 pm GMT
To Ivan (or any fluent speakers):

Have you met any foreigners who have learned Indonesian well? I have also heard that it's easier than most languages, due to it's regular grammar, pronunciation, and writing system. I've thought about studying it, but I also wonder:

Will a native Malaysian (Bahasa Malayu) and native Indonesian (Bahasa Indonesia) understand each other without difficulty?

Is the written language of each mutually understandable?

Are their authors (or newspapers, or magazines, etc.) that you could recommend for someone getting started?
anton   Mon Aug 13, 2007 12:33 pm GMT
wtf u doing? r u mentally retarded??
anyway, indonesian is not as easy as u guys think!
Jacinto   Wed Aug 22, 2007 7:10 pm GMT
I like to leran Indonesian but I want to learn Ambonese
Ian   Thu Sep 06, 2007 8:48 pm GMT
To Zed:

Yes, I can understand much of what Malaysians say, except Kelantan Malay, where I barely understand a thing. If there are problems, we can always move closer towards bookish Standard Indonesian.

The written language is also mutually intelligible.


My ex-flatmate learned Indonesian, and he was able to do a daily conversation within three months. I was amazed myself.
There are enough sources in the internet. If you want to, I can ask my ex-flatmate about what resources he uses.


To Anton:

I know several languages, and Indonesian is by far the easiest among them all.
Guest   Sat Sep 08, 2007 3:15 am GMT
We all know that no one will take seriously a language that is not European.
Andra   Mon Sep 24, 2007 4:39 pm GMT
I'm a... well, I'm 100% Indonesian but I've only lived in Indonesia half my life. The rest, I spend abroad studying. But I have to agree, from the languages I've learned so far during my studies, Indonesian is the easiest language so far. Out of Italian, French, German and English... a bit of Spanish. It is a pretty easy language to learn but maybe for English native speakers they would probably have trouble with the "r" coz it's more stronger on the tongue than the usual English. (hehe, I know it... even though I'm 100% Indonesian... I have a bit of trouble with the "r's myself... it's what they call "cadel" (if I'm not mistaken)
Nomo   Thu Nov 01, 2007 2:39 pm GMT
Well, I'm malaysian and I can speak malay and english very well. I'm learning chinese now. Among those 3 language, Malay is certainly the easiest because the grammar is extremly simple compared to european language, it has no tonal language like chinese, it uses the usual latin alphabate (the one on your keyboard), and we can know most of the pronouciation directly from spelling the word because the letters usually produce only one specific sound. (in english, spelling is not enough. we need to check its 'Phonetic Alphabet' in order to know the excact pronounciation). By the way, Malay is very similar to Indonesian. Just changing my accent and some words, people mistaken me as a local when I went to indonesia.
Ian   Sun Nov 04, 2007 10:57 pm GMT
My ex-flatmate who learned Indonesian once speak to a Malaysian, and they were able to understand each other.

I can say by far that Indonesian is the easiest major language.