Why are some Europeans able to learn quickly certain other languages while others have big difficulties to do so. Is it a matter of motivation, aptitude or of different complexity of languages if let's say a German is able to communicate in French after about one or two years learning while a French has great difficulties to learn German within four and more years? Russians and Polish are very quick in learning English, German or Spanish - learning Russian or Polish is a nightmare for Western Europeans....why?
complexity of languages
I think that Eastern Europeans such as Russians and Poles have a greater incentive to learn Western European languages because of the great income and quality of life disparities between East and West Europeans. For W. Europeans, there's not much incentive to learn an E. European language because the economies in those countries are, and have been historically much weaker. E. Europeans have a far better chance of improving themselves economically by learning French, English, or German, and consequentially relocating to one of the countries that speaks one of those languages.
The difficulty depends on how related the foreign language is to your native language.
for example: If you speak German, then Dutch, English and the Scandinavian languages are the easiest to learn
>> Russians and Polish are very quick in learning English, German or Spanish
From my esperience, the often repeated assertion that Poles are extremely good in learning languages is wrong. The English and German I've seen from Poles was predominantly average and not better than the English/German of French for example.
>> learning Russian or Polish is a nightmare for Western Europeans....why?
I think Slavic languages are always very hard to learn for Western Europeans who speak a Romance or Germanic language.
for example: If you speak German, then Dutch, English and the Scandinavian languages are the easiest to learn
>> Russians and Polish are very quick in learning English, German or Spanish
From my esperience, the often repeated assertion that Poles are extremely good in learning languages is wrong. The English and German I've seen from Poles was predominantly average and not better than the English/German of French for example.
>> learning Russian or Polish is a nightmare for Western Europeans....why?
I think Slavic languages are always very hard to learn for Western Europeans who speak a Romance or Germanic language.
For us Chinese, even English is a very difficult language, since it (Germanic) is hardly related to our mother tongue (Sinitic). Yet, since a lot of us have the incentive to learn, in particular, those with higher education levels tend to speak English better than others...
My theory: If you learn English as a kid (as a native language), its grammatical and alphabetical simplicity spoils you for anything else.
When you start looking at other languages later on, you're turned off by the tremendous complexity of just about any other language. Either they have accent marks all over the place, enormously complex and irregular verb conjugations, grammatical gender (a real turn-off for E1Lers, BTW), elaborate noun and/or adjective inflections, agglutination, ergativity, non-alphabetic writing systems, tones, clicks, strange sounds, and a whole host of other features that seem odd to us E1Lers.
Unless they have a real knack for languages, native English speakers will have a real tough time learning anything else, except perhaps simplified (artificial?) languages.
On the other hand, what difficulties does English really have, other than a few words here and there with slightly nonphonetic spelling? Obviously, if your native language is non-European, there's the unavoidable issue of unfamiliar vocabulary, but you'd have this problem with any unrelated language.
When you start looking at other languages later on, you're turned off by the tremendous complexity of just about any other language. Either they have accent marks all over the place, enormously complex and irregular verb conjugations, grammatical gender (a real turn-off for E1Lers, BTW), elaborate noun and/or adjective inflections, agglutination, ergativity, non-alphabetic writing systems, tones, clicks, strange sounds, and a whole host of other features that seem odd to us E1Lers.
Unless they have a real knack for languages, native English speakers will have a real tough time learning anything else, except perhaps simplified (artificial?) languages.
On the other hand, what difficulties does English really have, other than a few words here and there with slightly nonphonetic spelling? Obviously, if your native language is non-European, there's the unavoidable issue of unfamiliar vocabulary, but you'd have this problem with any unrelated language.
All of this excuse of languages being complex for English native speakers to learn is basically an excuse of hiding their laziness and that's that.
It's ridiculous, because learning language is NOT HARD! No matter how complex any language, anyone can learn it, if incented. To suggest English speakers can't do it because they're dumb, is silly, if English speakers can lead world in Science and technology and many more, language is nothing for them. It's no need, and laziness, not English is more complicated.
Guest <<<<My theory: If you learn English as a kid (as a native language), its grammatical and alphabetical simplicity spoils you for anything else.
When you start looking at other languages later on, you're turned off by the tremendous complexity of just about any other language. Either they have accent marks all over the place, enormously complex and irregular verb conjugations, grammatical gender (a real turn-off for E1Lers, BTW), elaborate noun and/or adjective inflections, agglutination, ergativity, non-alphabetic writing systems, tones, clicks, strange sounds, and a whole host of other features that seem odd to us E1Lers.
Unless they have a real knack for languages, native English speakers will have a real tough time learning anything else, except perhaps simplified (artificial?) languages. >>>>
Is the same true for native speakers of French, Italian and Spanish? They all have obviously difficulties to learn foreign languages except perhaps other Romance languages or the relatively simple English?
When you start looking at other languages later on, you're turned off by the tremendous complexity of just about any other language. Either they have accent marks all over the place, enormously complex and irregular verb conjugations, grammatical gender (a real turn-off for E1Lers, BTW), elaborate noun and/or adjective inflections, agglutination, ergativity, non-alphabetic writing systems, tones, clicks, strange sounds, and a whole host of other features that seem odd to us E1Lers.
Unless they have a real knack for languages, native English speakers will have a real tough time learning anything else, except perhaps simplified (artificial?) languages. >>>>
Is the same true for native speakers of French, Italian and Spanish? They all have obviously difficulties to learn foreign languages except perhaps other Romance languages or the relatively simple English?
English speakers don't find it more difficult learning other European languages than Europeans do learning English. I got an "A" for French in my GCSE (my final exams) just before I left school 10 years ago. So I learnt it no problem.
If I decided to learn German or Swedish it'll be no problem for me.
The only European language that daunts me is Finnish which has fifteen noun cases: four grammatical cases, six locative cases, two essive cases (three in some Eastern dialects) and three marginal cases.
Onko totta, että suomalaisessa jouluperinteessä joulupukki oli lapsia syövä villisika?......Is it true that in the Finnish Christmas tradition, Santa Claus used to be a wild boar that would eat children
If I decided to learn German or Swedish it'll be no problem for me.
The only European language that daunts me is Finnish which has fifteen noun cases: four grammatical cases, six locative cases, two essive cases (three in some Eastern dialects) and three marginal cases.
Onko totta, että suomalaisessa jouluperinteessä joulupukki oli lapsia syövä villisika?......Is it true that in the Finnish Christmas tradition, Santa Claus used to be a wild boar that would eat children
I think it's harder for English speakers to pick up many other European languages AT FIRST than vice versa, but once they get their heads round the grammar they can catch up, whereas learners of English often make speedy progress initially but then reach a kind of plateau.
But it's hardly true that English has no complications. What about:
The complex tense and aspect system
Forming negatives and questions - it would be far simpler if these were only formed with 'not' and reversed word order respectively, and not the auxilliary verb 'do'.
Word order: SVO in general, but what about when you have to invert the order i.e. 'Not only did he know..' (plus having to add the auxilliary verb 'do' here as well), or the position of adverbs, far less consistent than a language like German.
Expressing the indirect object, simple at first sight as there's no dative case, but unfortunately sometimes expressed with use of 'to', sometimes with word order. Which is right depends on the verb. 'I give him the book' and I give the book to him' are both correct', but only 'I suggested the idea to him' is correct, while 'I suggested him the idea' is not.
Passive constructions: To native speakers the verb 'to be' sounds right in some constructions, the verb 'to get' in others.
When to use the definite/indefinite article or omit it.
Irregular past tense verbs
Ways of expressing 'to become' - can be 'to become', 'to get', 'to go, 'to turn', 'to come', depending on context.
Tag questions: i.e. 'He wants to, doesn't he?'
Plus other weird inconsistencies, an example of which: 'I must' and 'I have to' mean much (although even here not quite) the same in the positive, but their negatives 'I must not' and 'I don't have to' have different meanings.
Plus a huge vocabulary with many words with very subtle differences in meaning.
Just some things, sure there are more.
But it's hardly true that English has no complications. What about:
The complex tense and aspect system
Forming negatives and questions - it would be far simpler if these were only formed with 'not' and reversed word order respectively, and not the auxilliary verb 'do'.
Word order: SVO in general, but what about when you have to invert the order i.e. 'Not only did he know..' (plus having to add the auxilliary verb 'do' here as well), or the position of adverbs, far less consistent than a language like German.
Expressing the indirect object, simple at first sight as there's no dative case, but unfortunately sometimes expressed with use of 'to', sometimes with word order. Which is right depends on the verb. 'I give him the book' and I give the book to him' are both correct', but only 'I suggested the idea to him' is correct, while 'I suggested him the idea' is not.
Passive constructions: To native speakers the verb 'to be' sounds right in some constructions, the verb 'to get' in others.
When to use the definite/indefinite article or omit it.
Irregular past tense verbs
Ways of expressing 'to become' - can be 'to become', 'to get', 'to go, 'to turn', 'to come', depending on context.
Tag questions: i.e. 'He wants to, doesn't he?'
Plus other weird inconsistencies, an example of which: 'I must' and 'I have to' mean much (although even here not quite) the same in the positive, but their negatives 'I must not' and 'I don't have to' have different meanings.
Plus a huge vocabulary with many words with very subtle differences in meaning.
Just some things, sure there are more.
<Plus a huge vocabulary with many words with very subtle differences in meaning.>>
Surely, every language has a huge vocabulary, with lots of subtleties -- otherwise, you couldn't express anything very well.
Surely, every language has a huge vocabulary, with lots of subtleties -- otherwise, you couldn't express anything very well.
>>Surely, every language has a huge vocabulary, with lots of subtleties -- otherwise, you couldn't express anything very well<<
Not every language has a vocabulary derived from two language families, where there is often a word from each for many concepts, but where the two words have subtle differences in meaning.
Not every language has a vocabulary derived from two language families, where there is often a word from each for many concepts, but where the two words have subtle differences in meaning.
Once again , English only easy for minimum loafers.
Many people speak English, few speak it excellently.
Many people speak English, few speak it excellently.
<<Many people speak English, few speak it excellently. >>
Can't that be said for most languages?
Most native speakers can't write monumental literature, or deliver spellbinding orations. I'm a native speaker, and my English language skills are decidedly mediocre -- I've always been more of a technical person.
Can't that be said for most languages?
Most native speakers can't write monumental literature, or deliver spellbinding orations. I'm a native speaker, and my English language skills are decidedly mediocre -- I've always been more of a technical person.
<<Can't that be said for most languages? >>
The point was, that foreigners claim that English is such an easy language, easier than other languages. So why they can't speak it so well, if it's so easy?
People say, English natives are less likely to reach fluency in other languages than non natives are likely to reach fluency in English. It seem so, because not many English natives learn languages. But countless non English learn English, and the proportion of them which speaks English excellenty seems large only because there are so many in total who learn it. Probably 2% reach top fluency. But 2% of 3 billion is large number! So on individual basis American can learn Nepalese and have a 2% chance to reach fluency, but not lot of Americans learn Nepalese, so it seems like it's impossible, and people will then claim the dumbness of Americans.
The point was, that foreigners claim that English is such an easy language, easier than other languages. So why they can't speak it so well, if it's so easy?
People say, English natives are less likely to reach fluency in other languages than non natives are likely to reach fluency in English. It seem so, because not many English natives learn languages. But countless non English learn English, and the proportion of them which speaks English excellenty seems large only because there are so many in total who learn it. Probably 2% reach top fluency. But 2% of 3 billion is large number! So on individual basis American can learn Nepalese and have a 2% chance to reach fluency, but not lot of Americans learn Nepalese, so it seems like it's impossible, and people will then claim the dumbness of Americans.