Why is English so easy?

Chinese   Wed Nov 01, 2006 10:22 pm GMT
>>
Entonces es tiempo de que yo también comience a postear mis opiniones en Español. Si Greg puede, entonces yo tengo todo el derecho. <<
这是个好主意.我将转往另一语言.英语语言是很容易学习,因为它很少文法.
Chinese   Wed Nov 01, 2006 10:24 pm GMT
>> Les paroles de Tiffany sont à lire — et à relire : elles sont criantes de vérité. <<

Can someone translate this? I don't understand it.
Tiffany   Thu Nov 02, 2006 6:02 am GMT
Basically, he is saying that he agrees with what I said.

Grazie greg per i complimenti :)
^ This is me saying thank you.
meesh   Thu Nov 02, 2006 7:32 am GMT
Tensions always arises in threads that have more than 20 posts.

Ayyyyy!
Guest   Thu Nov 02, 2006 8:37 am GMT
>> Les paroles de Tiffany sont à lire — et à relire : elles sont criantes de vérité. <<

This means:
"Tiffany's words are to be read and reread. They are patently true."
Dave   Fri Nov 03, 2006 10:29 pm GMT
I believe that this whole arguement boils down to two things... where you're from and where you're going. I'm a native English speaker, and found that "crazy spellings and signs" found in Polish (very similar to Czeck) actually made it easier to speak sounds more accurately... unlike same-letter-different-sounds instances in, say, French or German. However, adding to my vocabulary in French or German is much easier than with Polish because of word commonalities and similarities. Regardless, it's damned rude to insult someone because they haven't reached a "native level" in a foreign language. Acknowledge the progress made, not the minor imperfections. We all sound odd to someone else.
Guest   Sat Nov 04, 2006 12:58 pm GMT
>>Regardless, it's damned rude to insult someone because they haven't reached a "native level" in a foreign language<<

It's not a matter of insulting them because they haven't reached 'native level'. It's always admirable to be able to communicate in a foreign language. However, people whose English does not yet resemble anywhere near that of natives speakers, are not really in any position to judge how difficult it is or isn't to learn to speak English properly.
Elaine Pepe   Sun Dec 17, 2006 12:47 am GMT
I agree with Suzanne. In the beginning, English seems to be an easy language, much easier than a Latin language, for example. Verb tenses in English are piece of cake if compared to Latin languages. But when you start learning verb phrases and prepositions, English becomes a nightmare. "Do away with" means virtually nothing to me. But "abolish" does. Why? Because the word "abolish" has a Latin origin. It sounds familiar to me because I speak a Latin language (in Portuguese, we say "abolir"). Another example: "give up" and "desist" (in Portuguese, we say "desistir").
But English is not a Latin language in its origin, right? So I had to learn how to deal with these difficulties. But believe me, verb phrases are a very difficult aspect of the English language.
And what about the pronouns it and they? They can lead to serious misunderstandings, depending on the sentence. Sometimes you are not sure which word they refer to in the sentence. Of course misunderstandings can happen in Latin languages too, but to a lesser extent because in Latin languages there is a broader range of pronouns.
As far as pronunciation is concerned, I don´t think English is a difficult language to learn. It is just a matter to learn phonetics.
Elaine Pepe   Sun Dec 17, 2006 1:31 am GMT
ERRATA

It is just a matter of learning phonetics.
Travis   Sun Dec 17, 2006 11:07 am GMT
To put it simply:

English is easy if you natively speak English or another Germanic language.
Elaine Pepe   Sun Dec 17, 2006 5:24 pm GMT
There are some aspects of the English language that are easy to learn: verb conjugations and irregular verbs, for example. Irregular verbs are not a big deal as they exist in French, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, etc. Why not in English? And after all, the list is not endless. Once memorized, never forgotten.
But verb phrases are a distinctive feature of the English language (I suppose, because I have never studied German, for example). This structure verb + preposition + preposition resulting in a distinctive meaning does not exist in Portuguese (and I would say in other Latin languages). So apparently get away with, put away with and do away with don´t mean anything to me. Besides, put out, for example, has more than one meaning: put out the fire is one thing, put out your best efforts is another. And there are hundreds of examples like these ones. In order to memorize them, you need to associate these verb phrases with a Latin synonym (if available);
Put out the fire = extinguish the fire ("extinguir" in Portuguese). Now I have a clue on what put out the fire means.
Believe, this is not easy to memorize.
English is not so easy as it seems to be.
User   Sun Dec 17, 2006 6:19 pm GMT
Interesting. Yeah, I can see how thosewould be hard. But at least in English we usually keep the parts together e.g. I'll put out the fire, rather than having to always seperate it like in German.
myself   Sun Dec 17, 2006 7:19 pm GMT
Quoting Elaine Pepe :"English is not so easy as it seems to be".

I quite agree.

Learning English is a bit like learning mathematics. If you want to attain a high level, then it will take time, patience, concentration and surely a clear motivation.

Myself.
Guest   Sun Dec 17, 2006 11:02 pm GMT
Hell no. It aint easy. I would remember English as the most irregular language on the planet. Nothing seems logical.