hmm hi people..need to ask you guys about languages..
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so has any1 taken courses in japanese,french or korean?
which is better to take?? -
french or japanese.
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are u effective bilingual in english and ur own mother tongue?
if yes, then u can pick up a 3rd language
if not, dun bother about a 3rd language.... -
i take b4 japanese if u r a chinese it is ezier to pick up
other races oso can but nid put in effort in recogising kanji
not being racist here ar... -
yes kanji ish difficult for the unintiated. a reason i stopped taking jap altogether plus cant afford
now plannin learn chinese. later find job easier ha. -
hmm but if u generally write english better than chinese,you should take french?
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I am taking French but it's kinda complicated since you dun pronounce words as how you write them. And the nouns, verbs and stuff is kinda confusing.
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Wait till you see German or Russian. The grammar will kill you.Originally posted by Eternal-fire:I am taking French but it's kinda complicated since you dun pronounce words as how you write them. And the nouns, verbs and stuff is kinda confusing.
As for TS, which language do you have a better command of? English or Chinese? (assuming your mother tongue is Chinese)
If Chinese, then there'll be one less hurdle for you in Japanese, which is Kanji. But you still have kana and the grammar (totally different from Chinese) to contend with. Bear in mind though, that not all Kanji in Japanese have the same meaning as in Chinese. I spent about 3 years self-studying Japanese and speaking Japanese around my friends who take it as a third language. And even so, my spoken Japanese is just passable, but it's quite fluent. My written japanese is tons better.
For Korean, they hardly use Hanja (Korean equivalent of Kanji) anymore, except in calligraphy. You'll need to master Hangul, which is an alphabet system of its own, and it's really not easy; I can tell from my experience. However, as you go deeper, you'll realize how similar some Korean words are used and pronounced as in Chinese. For any East Asiatic languages, Chinese helps a lot.
For French, keep in mind that English has borrowed a lot of words and vocab from French. However, the grammar is very complex compared to English, because you have case inflections, noun genders, article inflections. Moreover, the pronunciation is confusing, as the words are not spelt as they are pronounced, unlike English, which does that to a small extent.
As with any language, practice is the key. Listen to it more often. Speak it to yourself when you're alone. Write it often, such as when recording phone numbers or 4D. Read it online more often too. If you're better at it after a while, think in that language.
It took me four years to get to H2 German standard(doing it now in JC), and three years to hold a proper conversation in Japanese. It's not an overnight thing. -
theres no one better language out there....
how bout Spanish? can be used in many countries, abit like English, less difficult than German (to me.. because i think German is much more difficult) -
for me.. spanish is easier than french.. french words are very hard to pronoun...Originally posted by Lorry`:theres no one better language out there....
how bout Spanish? can be used in many countries, abit like English, less difficult than German (to me.. because i think German is much more difficult) -
Im currently taking korean classes now. Korean can be quite simple after u learn the basics like what consonants and stuff like tt. Its quite similar to the chinese han yu pin yin where u piece up the characters together. Its graspsable, although a lot of effort is needed in the pronounciation part and knowing how to use it correctly.
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japanese shld b easier ba..Originally posted by kb24:so has any1 taken courses in japanese,french or korean?
which is better to take??
korean sounds like ppl arguing.. -
i stopped jap at intermediate level, since i got no one to practice with. right now i considering taking up thai as i travel to thailand quite often. y don't u take up a language which you can use and practice?
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jap.
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hmm haha korean sounds like ppl arguing.. anyway is kanji exactly same as chinese? and so jap has 2 ways of writing? kana and kanji??
ok i can probably speak chi a little better,but i write english better. So french or japanese?? -
it's not kana... it's katakana and u missed out hiragana.Originally posted by kb24:hmm haha korean sounds like ppl arguing.. anyway is kanji exactly same as chinese? and so jap has 2 ways of writing? kana and kanji??
ok i can probably speak chi a little better,but i write english better. So french or japanese?? -
Depends on what you mean by better.Originally posted by kb24:so has any1 taken courses in japanese,french or korean?
which is better to take??
If you are looking for ease of retention, pick one you get in touch with and will use frequently. No point forcing yourself to learn 100 new words and later forgeting half of them due to underusage, I'm sure you will forget how to write some Chinese characters after 5 years in pure English environment. A lot of poly students picked them up only to give up altogether after their term.
Among the three, French is easiest to pick up, in our context. Although the conjugations may take some time to sink it. Pronunciation may be tough, but it is FUN when you get the hang of it.
Japanese has higher economical value if you are considering it as an employment asset. Plus the entertainment value from animes and dramas.
Focus on 1 language at a time. Don't give up too soon. Give yourself at least 1 year to see substantial result. 3 months is not realistic. -
I am learning french now and at first it looks easy but its not, for each noun, object, adjective, there is feminine and masculine. then there is a different word / pronounciation for past tense and present tense and some of these words do not follow a proper derivation- irregular verbs that you have to commit to memory.
i am learning it for almost a year - i can read basic french and figure out the meaning, but i cannot understand when they start speaking french...for me, french is quite difficult compared to say german. I think the most difficult language to learn is Chinese - but once you grasped it, it will make jap and korean easy.
I dun noe about Spanish though, i think it shld be quite esay as well as italian. Anyone know latin or russian?
How about tamil - is it difficult - i mean the writings (also thai)... -
i learnt jap and still learning katakana and hiragana was chicken feet.....can't wait to learn kanji.....looking forward to learning french if i could......
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Jap is easier to learn.
But not easy to use.
u need to stay in japan for a few yrs in order to be fluent.
the other subjects not sure. -
Yeah, I agree, it was tough when first starting out. And I was pulling my hair when I started with German grammar.Originally posted by red_amoeba:I am learning french now and at first it looks easy but its not, for each noun, object, adjective, there is feminine and masculine. then there is a different word / pronounciation for past tense and present tense and some of these words do not follow a proper derivation- irregular verbs that you have to commit to memory.
i am learning it for almost a year - i can read basic french and figure out the meaning, but i cannot understand when they start speaking french...for me, french is quite difficult compared to say german. I think the most difficult language to learn is Chinese - but once you grasped it, it will make jap and korean easy.
I dun noe about Spanish though, i think it shld be quite esay as well as italian. Anyone know latin or russian?
How about tamil - is it difficult - i mean the writings (also thai)...
Finnish is the most difficult language, according to a research. But I think for those immersed in the language everyday, it is only natural to say it is comparatively the easiest.
Spanish's grammar is on par with French, maybe a little easier, but they tend to speak like GPMG, if not faster. I like the Italian accent.
I'm looking for someone to translate my website into French one day. Other languages as well. Maybe you can help? Need business level proficiency. Heh.. -
The word "kana" refers to both "hiragana" and "katakana". They're relatively easy to learn compared to the massive amount of kanji one will use in reading and writing Japanese.Originally posted by newcomer:it's not kana... it's katakana and u missed out hiragana. -
i m currently taking jap now..not very difficult if u are interested in it and have friends to practice with u... just that the hiragana and katakana (both looks like chinese word) must remember else if not u learn all in romanji (english words)..its not that difficult acutally..also...jap is a more useful subject imo because u can watch anime kidding
the grammer part of jap is also abit of smth english and smth chinese so if u r chinese it makes things simpler..if u dont noe chinese..do not fret english is quite useful in Japaneses too... -
go for nihongo!
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Deutschsprecher(in), warum finden Sie Deutschlernen schwierig? Was finden Sie schwierig? Ich denke Deutsch ist leichter als Französisch oder Spanisch... (German speakers, feel free to answer this question
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In all seriousness, I don't think you could really compare the ease of learning phonetic languages with that of non-phonetic ones. That said, I don't think phonetic languages are that tough to master once you get a hang of how the lexicons and structures function for a particular language.
While I used to find the memorising of the noun's gender a chore when I started learning German, I personally can't say it's definitely tougher than Spanish as Spanish has other issues that trouble beginners unaccustomed to its structures as well. In essence, just embrace the language for what it is and enjoy the process as there really isn't any way of convincing yourself one language is easier than another.