# Languages

Category: Language and Culture

## Post 1 by redgirl34 (Scottish) on Monday, 31-Jul-2006 9:03:46

What was the hardest language you learned and what was the easiest? For me the hardest language was French and the easiest one is Spanish.

## Post 2 by laced-unlaced (Account disabled) on Monday, 31-Jul-2006 14:10:42

yes. i agree with you on that one.
i speak spanish fluent

## Post 3 by Resonant (Find me alive.) on Wednesday, 02-Aug-2006 3:54:18

Manderin. Not that I'm any good, but I try to teach myself, from time to time, and I find it difficult to pick up. Indonesian is my easiest, also the one I'm best at. Co-incidence?

## Post 4 by tara (the Zone BBS remains forever my home page) on Wednesday, 02-Aug-2006 12:04:33

The easiest foreign language for me is French. Not a lot of people would know that unless they've actually done French and Spanish past a level. Because, Spanish may seem easier in comparison to French when you do them both together at GCSE level, however, there are more actively used tenses in Spanish than in French. However, I'd say that there are the same number of tenses in both languages, but in French, there are about 4 or 5 tenses that exist, but they are considered literary tenses, and were dropped from spoken French in the 1700's. Yes, for me, as a degree student of both Spanish and French, Spanish is the harder out of the 2. I also did German for a year, and yes that has a case system and is tricky for a number of reasons. But, the 2 hardest languages I've tried to learn is Manderin Chinese, I gave up after one lesson, and modern Greek. Its grammar is hard, but the hardest thing for me is the speaking, there are many subtleties in pronunciation that learners of say Spanish wouldn't come across, and I find Spanish hard enough to speak, so Greek is about 10 times harder. couldn't cope with it's tonality etc.

## Post 5 by tara (the Zone BBS remains forever my home page) on Wednesday, 02-Aug-2006 12:06:29

Sorry, I meant couldn't cope with the tonal system in Chinese.

## Post 6 by idoefraty (Newborn Zoner) on Thursday, 24-Aug-2006 15:08:48

Hello
I have learned some languages, and I absolutely agree with the one who talked about Spanish and French a. I started learning French, and it seemed to me difficult both because of the pronounciation and the gap between the written word and the spoken word. In n Spanish there are more tense used in daily speech than in French, even though from the point of the written language, it is pronounced as written.
Since I also learned Russian, I can definitely say that it was one of the hardest languages I have ever tried to learn. I started with vocabulary, and when I reached verb conjugations, and when I found out the case system, and the declension of nouns and adjectives and did not understand why sentences are said so and why it is written that way, I wanted to give up. Bu I took a book and learned the rules, and also by speech I got the experience and I remember the grammatical rules. of how itgoes approximately, of course I have got a lot more to learn. There are also so many exceptions of the verb and noun forms, that don't go according to the grammatical rules. Today I can speak russian grammatically correct, , but I learnt that but It surely was hard for me at first. In Italian I which I have been learning too, there are also difficulties in tenses, and I find myself mixing all conditional and even past and perfect tenses. I think every language has its obstacle, and if you really want to learn it, try to deal with it, because it is the most interesting thing in languages, as I see it.

## Post 7 by redgirl34 (Scottish) on Thursday, 24-Aug-2006 18:07:10

I cant get the accent correct in French. Yet I should be able to because they roll there letter r's just like the scots so do the Spanish but I find the Spanish accent easier.

## Post 8 by tara (the Zone BBS remains forever my home page) on Thursday, 24-Aug-2006 19:16:36

Ah yes, but the French R is a harsher R, where is the Spanish is a rolled one. I can just about do the French R but not the Spanish one. Also, I did a search the other day, just a random internet one about what's the hardest language in the world. and I found an article which tackled it from a British perspective. Apparently, for British diplomats working in the foreign office, the hardest language they've had to learn is Hungarian, because it has 35 cases. I looked up Hungarian and it does use the roman alphabet, so I suppose that's something, least we wouldn't have to learn a whole new alphabet.