The easiest and the most difficult languages

opinion   Fri Nov 20, 2009 10:16 pm GMT
Not only French but everything is rather weird in those charts. Probably it's a joke
Antimonner K. T.   Fri Nov 20, 2009 10:22 pm GMT
I'm not sure what "Mongolese" is. Is it "Mongolian"?
illiterate   Mon Nov 23, 2009 10:13 pm GMT
Languages are not difficult. It is the people learning them that have the difficulty. A 5 year old chinese has no difficulty expressing him/herself in chinese. We are constricted by our own language.
Luca   Mon Nov 23, 2009 11:23 pm GMT
That list is a non sense. First of all, you have to consider your mother tongue to' judge another language difficulty. For instance, slovak would be a joke if you are a czech or a pole and so on. But the oddest thing is the 'difficult' label given to french while spanish is considered easy. I have studied both and I can say that they are on the same level: differences in terms of difficulty are not that relevant.
pepito   Thu Nov 26, 2009 9:29 am GMT
How is it, that being French SO similar to Spanish one is the easiest in the world and the other one among the most difficult ones? I don't get it!
Franco   Thu Nov 26, 2009 12:55 pm GMT
French sounds are much more difficult than the Spanish ones.
Franco   Thu Nov 26, 2009 12:56 pm GMT
For example average student need several hours to learn how to pronounce 100% of Spanish words, whereas in the case of French pronunciation one needs years of learning .
Otis Optimus   Thu Nov 26, 2009 1:28 pm GMT
<<For example average student need several hours to learn how to pronounce 100% of Spanish words, whereas in the case of French pronunciation one needs years of learning . >>

Coming from English, Spanish has hard sounds, too, although French may be somewhat more complex. In Spanish you have the J, R, RR, B/V sounds, and the vowels take getting used to, since you don't want to go schwa-ing them out. In French, you have a few tough vowels, the R sound, and perhaps nasals.

French spelling may be tougher, but for a native English speaker, this prsents no real problems, since you just need to remember how each word is spelled, and we're used to that already.

Spanish Grammar is tougher, and there always seem to be certain sentences with inscrutible syntax (caused by pro-drop?) that French doesn't have that much of.
curious   Fri Nov 27, 2009 3:17 pm GMT
pro-drop

What does this mean?
I survived Poughquag   Fri Nov 27, 2009 3:37 pm GMT
<<pro-drop>>

Usually, the subject pronoun is dropped in sentences, since the verb endings tell us which pronoun it should be:

Example:

English: "I am fat"

Spanish: "[Yo] Soy gordo/gorda"
dropped   Fri Nov 27, 2009 4:01 pm GMT
<<Spanish Grammar is tougher, and there always seem to be certain sentences with inscrutible syntax (caused by pro-drop?) that French doesn't have that much of. >>

I think that you refer to passive reflexive sentences. They can be quite hard for learners. The fact that Spanish is pro-drop does not pose any relevant difficulty in my opinion as verbal endings carry the apparently missing information.
poiu   Fri Nov 27, 2009 4:24 pm GMT
For example average student need several hours to learn how to pronounce 100% of Spanish words, whereas in the case of French pronunciation one needs years of learning

French pronunciation is perhaps easier than the other Romance languages. The accent is always on the last syllable.
Kat   Fri Nov 27, 2009 6:34 pm GMT
Hey people,

Is actually anyone of you Eastern-European? I know all people from West think all Eastern-European countries are the same and therefore their languages must be pretty much the same as well, but they are really different.
I myself speak Slovak, Czech, English, German, some Polish and studied a bit of Spanish, plus have a Master's in linguistics and can tell you that even in such close languages as Slovak and Czech, there is a hell of a difference in grammar and the whole system as such. I'm not saying and don't even think Slovak is the most difficult language in the world, but it is def more complicated than Polish or Croatian etc. ... by far!!! These are completely different systems.

With this approach I could very well say, that English and German are the same languages, because they developed from the same base. And hope you know there is a huge difference between these 2 languages! (Even though having similarities.)

So just to sum it up: Eastern Europe is not one country and doesn't speak one language, in case you didn't know.
lopi   Fri Nov 27, 2009 7:52 pm GMT
The person who wrote the above message is dumm!
curious   Fri Nov 27, 2009 7:58 pm GMT
but it is def more complicated than Polish or Croatian e

Could you please explain me the main differences in grammar, syntax and morphology between Polish, Czech and Slovak? You should convince me that Slovak is the most difficult...Even European Portuguese is more difficult than Spanish but they are rather similar anyway. By the way, most people think that their own language is the hardest. Why on earth?