Which is the Easiest Language to Learn? Rating the 14 Most Popular Course Offerings
Posted on | February 13, 2012 | Comments Off
Which is the best language to learn? Which is the easiest?
Two different questions, often uttered in the same breath. But that’s okay, because there will be only one answer. Whichever language you wholeheartedly choose to study will be both the best and the easiest. However, here’s some help choosing.
The choices.
Here is the Modern Language Association’s 2002 list of the most commonly studied languages at university level in the United States. I have not included ancient languages like Latin, Biblical Hebrew, or Sanskrit, special purposes languages like American Sign Language, or U.S. heritage languages, like Hawaiian or Navajo since the choice of those languages follows a different dynamic:
1. Spanish
2. French
3. German
4. Italian
5. Japanese
6. Chinese
7. Russian
8. Arabic
9. Modern Hebrew
10. Portuguese
11. Korean
12. Vietnamese
13. Hindi/Urdu
14. Swahili
Difficulty, according to Uncle Sam
First, consider some cold facts. The U.S. State Department groups languages for the diplomatic service according to learning difficulty:
Category 1. The “easiest” languages for speakers of English, requiring 600 hours of classwork for minimal proficiency: the Latin and Germanic languages. However, German itself requires a bit more time, 750 hours, because of its complex grammar.
Category 2. Medium, requiring 1100 hours of classwork: Slavic languages, Turkic languages, other Indo-Europeans such as Persian and Hindi, and some non-Indo-Europeans such as Georgian, Hebrew and many African languages. Swahili is ranked easier than the rest, at 900 hours.
Category 3. Difficult, requiring 2200 hours of study: Arabic, Japanese, Korean and the Chinese languages.
Will you get a chance to practice this language?
Now, consider another important factor: accessibility. To be a successful learner you need the chance to hear, read and speak the language in a natural environment. Language learning takes an enormous amount of concentration and repetition, which cannot be done entirely in the classroom. Will you have access to the language where you live, work and travel?
The 14 most popular courses according to a combination of linguistic ease and accessibility.
1. Spanish. Category One. The straightforward grammar is familiar and regular. It is also ubiquitous in the Americas, the only foreign language with a major presence in the insular linguistic environment of the U.S. Chances to speak and hear it abound. It is the overwhelming favorite, accounting for more than fifty percent of language study enrollment in the MLA study.
2. French. Category One. Grammatically complex but not difficult to learn because so many of it’s words have entered English. For this vocabulary affinity, it is easy to attain an advanced level, especially in reading. It is a world language, and a motivated learner will find this language on the internet, in films and music.
3. German. Category One Plus. The syntax and grammar rules are complex with noun declensions a major problem. It is the easiest language to begin speaking, with a basic vocabulary akin to English. Abstract, advanced language differs markedly, though, where English opts for Latin terms. It values clear enunciation, so listening comprehension is not difficult.
4. Italian. Category One. It has the same simple grammar rules as Spanish, a familiar vocabulary and the clearest enunciation among Latin languages (along with Romanian). Italian skills are easily transferable to French or Spanish. You might need to go to Italy to practice it, but there are worse things that could happen to you. It is also encountered in the world of opera and classical music.
5. Russian. Category Two. This highly inflected language, with declensions, is fairly difficult to learn. The Cyrillic alphabet is not particularly difficult, however, and once you can read the language, the numerous borrowings from French and other western languages are a pleasant surprise. It is increasingly accessible.
6. Arabic. Category Three. Arabic is spoken in dozens of countries, but the many national dialects can be mutually incomprehensible. It has only three vowels, but includes some consonants that don’t exist in English. The alphabet is a formidable obstacle, and good calligraphy is highly valued and difficult to perfect. Vowels are not normally written (except in children’s books) and this can be an obstacle for reading. It is ubiquitous in the Muslim world and opportunities exist to practice it at every level of formality.
7. Portuguese. Category One. One of the most widely spoken languages in the world is often overlooked. It has a familiar Latin grammar and vocabulary, though the phonetics may take some getting used to.
8. Swahili. Category Two Minus. It includes many borrowings from Arabic, Persian, English and French. It is a Bantu language of Central Africa, but has lost the difficult Bantu “tones”. The sound system is familiar, and it is written using the Latin alphabet. One major grammatical consideration is the division of nouns into sixteen classes, each with a different prefix. However, the classes are not arbitrary, and are predictable.
9. Hindi/Urdu. Category Two. The Hindustani language, an Indo-European language, includes both Hindi and Urdu. It has an enormous number of consonants and vowels, making distinctions between phonemes that an English speaker will have difficulty hearing. Words often have clipped endings, further complicating comprehension. Hindi uses many Sanskrit loans and Urdu uses many Persian/Arabic loans, meaning that a large vocabulary must be mastered. Hindi uses the phonetically precise Devanagari script, created specifically for the language. Predictably, Urdu’s use of a borrowed Persian/Arabic script leads to some approximation in the writing system.
10. Modern Hebrew. Category Two. Revived as a living language during the nineteenth century, it has taken on characteristics of many languages of the Jewish diaspora. The resultant language has become regularized in grammar and syntax, and the vocabulary has absorbed many loan words, especially from Yiddish, English and Arabic. The alphabet has both print and script forms, with five vowels, not normally marked. Vowel marking, or pointing, is quite complex when it does occur. Sounds can be difficult to reproduce in their subtleties and a certain amount of liaison makes listening comprehension problematic. It is not very accessible outside of a religious or Israeli context.
11. Japanese. Category Three. Difficult to learn, as the vocabulary is unfamiliar, and the requirements of the sound system so strict that even the many words that have been borrowed from English, French and German will seem unrecognizable. With three different writing systems, it is forbiddingly difficult to read and write. Also, social constraints may impede useful interaction.
12. Chinese. Category Three. Whether your choice is Mandarin or Cantonese (the MLA survey does not make a distinction, oddly enough). It is the most difficult language on this list. It includes all of the most difficult aspects: unfamiliar phonemes, a large number of tones, an extremely complex writing system, and an equally unfamiliar vocabulary. Personal motivation is absolutely essential to keep the student on track. On the positive side, it is easy to find, since Chinese communities exist throughout the world, and Chinese language media, such as newspapers, films and TV, are present in all these communities.
13. Vietnamese. Category Three. This language belongs to an unfamiliar family of languages, but it does borrow much vocabulary from Chinese (helpful if you already speak Chinese!). It has six tones, and a grammar with an unfamiliar logic. It’s not all bleak, however, Vietnamese uses a Latin derived alphabet. The chances of speaking this language are not high, though there are 3 million speakers in the USA.
14. Korean. Category Three. Korean uses an alphabet of 24 symbols, which accurately represent 14 consonants and 10 vowels. However, the language also includes 2000 commonly used Chinese characters for literary writing and formal documents. Speech levels and honorifics complicate the learning of vocabulary, and there is liaison between words, making them hard to distinguish. The grammar is not overly complicated and there are no tones. It borrows many Chinese words, but the language is unrelated to other languages of Asia.
The most important factor of all: personal motivation
The third, most important factor is up to you. The easiest language to learn is the one that you are most motivated to learn, the one you enjoy speaking, the one with the culture that inspires you and the history that touches you spiritually. It is useless to try to learn a language if you are not interested in the people who speak it, since learning a language involves participating in its behaviors and identifying with its people.
So, consider all three factors: motivation, accessibility and linguistic ease, in that order, and come up with the final list yourself. The bad news is that no language is really easy to learn, but the good news is that we humans are hard wired for a great amount of linguistic flexibility, as long as we know how to turn on the learning process. If the rewards and benefits of the language are clear to you, you will be able to get those rusty language synapses sparking in your head and start the words rolling. Bonne chance!
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The Script – For The First Time – Acoustic Guitar Lesson / Tutorial
Posted on | February 11, 2012 | Comments Off
The Script Tutorial – For The First Time – Acoustic Guitar Tutorial … leave me some comments letting me know if there is anything else you want me to play … thanks guys! xx
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Top 5 Worst Foods You Can Eat That People Think Are Healthy
Posted on | January 7, 2012 | Comments Off
1- Fermented Cheese. Fermented, or ripened cheese is one of the most toxic foods known to man. The smallest quantity has a catastrophic effect on the system. It disturbs digestion and makes everything ferment in the digestive tract, so foods eaten don’t benefit the body. According to Albert Mosséri, a European natural hygienist and researcher, fermented cheeses can create or exacerbate the following conditions: infection, fever, headaches, nausea, cold sensitivity, bad stools, bad digestion. Fermented (or ripened) cheese includes many French cheeses such as: camembert, roquefort, parmesan, blue cheese, aged goat cheese, brie, etc. Fresh or cooked cheese, aren’t as bad, but are not recommended either. Their consumption leads to other problems. So in conclusion, no cheese is recommended for health,
but fermented cheese should be avoided like poison.
2- Fish and Seafood. Fish is getting a good reputation these days. We are told to eat
fish due to its richness in omega 3 oils. That is too bad, because fish and seafood
are some of the worst foods we can eat.
Fish has a tendency to putrefy much faster than meat – perhaps because it contains
more protein. If you put a piece of meat and a piece of fish next to each other in the
open air, you’ll see that fish will go bad much faster. In our digestive tract, heat and
humidity encourage this putrefaction. The poisons then created from the
putrefaction of flesh foods, particularly fish, are dangerous to the system.
On top of that, there is absolutely no safe fish on this planet anymore. They are all
more or less contaminated with heavy metals such as mercury, whose effects on the
human body are extremely detrimental and difficult to deal with. We know that 40
tons of mercury are released into the US by power plants using coal combustion.
The mercury contained in coal moves through the air, finds its way into the water
and then accumulates in the flesh of fish that live in it. For that reason, there is no
safe fish anymore. Just one serving can contain enough mercury or other heavy
metal to contaminate a person. For all of those reasons, I would recommend
avoiding fish like your life depended on it. Is seafood any better? It’s actually worst.
Animals such as lobsters, oysters, etc., are literally filters of the ocean. A large
quantity of water goes through them which makes them some of the most
contaminated “foods” on this planet.
3- Spicy Food. Spicy food is any food where strong (or mild) spices has been added
to it. Spices include: black pepper, white pepper, cayenne pepper, ginger, chili
peppers, raw garlic, raw onion, etc, and all the foods that contain them: kimchee,
hot sauces, Tabasco, etc. The consumption of spices is extremely detrimental to
health. They irritate the entire digestive tract, create mucus (that the body produces
to protect itself), and wreck digestion. Spices were first used as medicines, out of
superstition, and then in food. People became quickly addicted to the stimulation
they provide and found themselves progressively unable to enjoy food in its natural
state. The worst food you can eat is spicy food, such as Indian, Thai, Mexican, etc.
In someone not used to it, it will cause diarrhea. The person that is used to it has
undergone a process of morbid adaptation, where the protecting itself from the
harsh spices by hardening its surfaces. This protects against the harmful effect of
spices to some extent, but at the same time it greatly diminishes assimilation, no
the food eaten doesn’t benefit the body very much. Children and anyone with
normal instincts refuse spicy foods. Personally, I refuse to eat spicy food, whether
the spices are in a raw dish or a cooked one.
4- Coffee, Black Chocolate and Cacao — First premise: coffee, chocolate and cacao
(raw or cooked) are stimulants. They contain certain substances (caffeine and
theobromine) that disturb the nervous system. If a person is eating a more natural
diet, these poisons have an even more disturbing effect on the system. For a raw-
foodist, one cup of coffee has the effect of maybe four cups for someone eating a
standard American diet. Personally, half a cup of coffee taken in the morning will
disturb my sleep at night, while my dad can drink a cup in the evening and still fall
asleep. However, as Shelton wrote: “toleration to poisons is merely a slow method of
dying. Instead of seeing in the phenomena of toleration something to be sought
after, it is something to seek to avoid the necessity for.” A detoxified person is
much like a child: she will strongly react to the smallest dose of any intoxicant.
So there is no room for compromise with caffeinated drinks and cacao products,
which include: coffee, hot chocolate, black chocolate, raw cacao beans, black tea,
green tea, maté tea, etc.
5- Wine, and alcohol — According to toxicology (the branch of pharmacology that
deals with the nature and effects and treatments of poisons), alcohol is classified as
a protoplasmic poison, because it is poisoning to both plants and animals – from
the smallest microbe to the most complex animal. Alcohol kills microbes but also
kills the cells of a complex organism, such as the human being. It is an intoxicant
that ruins millions of lives and kills people by the thousand each day, directly or
indirectly.
Unfortunately, it has become a social habit in many parts of the world to intoxicate
oneself with alcohol. This poison habit is so prevalent and is such an intricate part
of our lives that is now considered abnormal to abstain from this popular intoxicant.
Most health professionals are aware of the ill effects of alcohol, but few will
recommend to give it up completely. They will talk about “moderation.” “Drink, they
will say, but be moderate.” How can someone be moderate with such an unhealthy
and addictive product? To my understanding, moderation is only valid for the
healthy factors of life, not unhealthy one. For example, no doctor will tell you, “be
moderate in smoking,” although that is what they used to say. Can we be moderate
with cocaine too?
Now, my readers should understand that when someone eats a healthy diet, alcohol
has an even more disastrous effect on the body. That is because the body has
stopped protecting itself from the various poisons found in a modern diet, because
it is no longer or less in contact with them. Just like a child who has never taken
alcohol will strongly react to it when drinking it for the first time. So my dear
readers, even that little glass of wine has a catastrophic effect on the system. And
when drunk with a meal, it makes everything ferment in the digestive tract. No if
you cannot resist that glass of wine, only have a little and on an empty stomach
only, not with a meal.
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Middle English: Languages of the World: Introductory Overviews
Posted on | December 31, 2011 | Comments Off
Alexander Arguelles presents a series of videos to provide introductory overviews of the languages of the world. Working diachronically through various language families in turn, he demonstrates how to identify each language, translates a text sample to show how it works, and discusses its genetic affiliation and cultural context. For further information about the series, please refer to www.foreignlanguageexpertise.com
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Learn French 16
Posted on | April 20, 2011 | Comments Off
Learn French 16: The Card Game A card game = jeu de cartes United Nations a spade = = une carte Heart Diamond Pique cœur = = = = trèfle club ace Carreau (♂) Deuce = 2 (deux) 3 = 4 = trois quatre cinq six 5 = 6 = 7 = 8 September Huit = 9 = 10 = dix neuf (in terms of the number of cards are always male) Jack (Jack) = Waiter (♂) = Queen Dame (or pure) (♀) re = ROI (♂) solution for the test: – The Trèfle de trois – l ', as de coeur – Le Valet de Carreau – le roi de pique – La Dame deCoeur – Le Dix de Trèfle – The September Pique de Merci à tous ^ _ ^
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