Easiest and Hardest Language

Posts0Likes0Joined5/6/2018LocationLapu-lapu / PH
Native
Cebuano, Tagalog
Other English

What do you think is the easiest and hardest language you've learn so far? Other than your native..

Charlyn Amoin

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#1
Posts0Likes0Joined8/10/2018LocationCebu / PH
Native
Cebuano, English, Tagalog
Learning French, Japanese, Spanish

I'm not learning multiple languages yet (but interested in many different ones) but the easy one for me is Spanish (since my native is Filipino). The hardest that I want to learn is French. I like listening to lessons (whether it's learning a language or a different topic) and for me, it's pretty challenging to understand French.

Everyday is a learning journey. Keep going!


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#2
Posts0Likes0Joined6/10/2018LocationLagos / NG
Native
English
Other French

Asides mine, I'm learning French and i must say it's not as easy as i thought. The language and the culture is completely foreign to me and not having someone to practice with makes it really hard sometimes. 

Kevwe A.

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#3
Posts0Likes0Joined8/7/2018LocationAlmeria / ES
Native
English
Other Arabic - Egyptian, French, German, Spanish

I think languages get a little easier the more you learn , I think learning language structure and how you learn best is the hard part  

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#4
Posts0Likes0Joined10/7/2018LocationTrece Martires City / PH
Native
Tagalog
Other English

I think it would be Korean language. I dont have plan to learn it though

do the right thing even when nobody is watching

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#5
Posts0Likes0Joined10/12/2018Location
Native
German
Learning Afrikaans, Arabic - Standard, Danish, Dutch, English, Esperanto, French, Italian, Japanese, Latin, Norwegian, Portuguese, Romanian, Spanish, Swahili, Swedish, Toki Pona
Other Polish, Russian, Sinhala, Tagalog

Charlyn wrote:
What do you think is the easiest and hardest language you've learn so far? Other than your native..


Easiest: Dutch (very close to German), toki pona (because it is very minimalistic), Swahili


Hardest: used to be Japanese, but not any more.

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#6
Posts0Likes0Joined5/6/2018LocationLapu-lapu / PH
Native
Cebuano, Tagalog
Other English

Hi everyone! What makes those specific languages the hardest and easiest one?

Charlyn Amoin

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#7
Posts0Likes0Joined10/12/2018Location
Native
German
Learning Afrikaans, Arabic - Standard, Danish, Dutch, English, Esperanto, French, Italian, Japanese, Latin, Norwegian, Portuguese, Romanian, Spanish, Swahili, Swedish, Toki Pona
Other Polish, Russian, Sinhala, Tagalog

Charlyn wrote:
Hi everyone! What makes those specific languages the hardest and easiest one?


Hi Charlyn the PH-based Forum Moderator :).


Dutch only was one of the easiest because of its proximity to German. Not because of any second reason. Others (like Jess) may find it more difficult, but e.g. Italian more easy. 


toki pona only consists of 100 and something words. Very, very easy grammar. But on the other hand, it is full of riddles because of its built-in ambiguity. Even the maker of that (constructed) language stated it isn't a general-purpose one!


Japanese used to be the most difficult to me, because of being far, far away from any other language I speak. Also, maybe it is additionally difficult because Nippon used to be sort of an isolated island for a long time.


And as for the ease of Swahili:


The introduction of "Teach Yourself Swahili" (the old version by D.V. Perrott) was written by a non-native, more specifically, a consul from Zanzibar IIRC. He/she stated that "Swahili is very easy to learn, in fact, it is the easiest language/among the easiest ones". While this may be just a little bit of a stretch, I still agree with the main message. Almost all verbs are fully (100%) regular. The subjunctive is formed by changing the ending vowel to -e only. Etc. Yes, it has about 10 noun classes, but can get used to them, too.There seems to be something special about Swahili and what I perceive as ease of learning. This may be related to its past, because it started as sort of a creole or an (advanced) pidgin even. In addition, Swahili speakers tend to write just as they would speak, too.


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#8
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