How difficult is learning German for a native English speaker? Say, on a scale of 1-5 with 5 being the most difficult? And what are the most challenging aspects of the language to learn?
German's Learning Difficulty
I'd rank it like this where < indicates easier .
Spanish<French<Italian<German<Russian
Spanish<French<Italian<German<Russian
It depends on several factors, like individual adeptness to learining languages and such, and prior exposure, but I'd say 3 for the average English speaker.
What language would be at level 5? click languages or tonal languages?
What language would be at level 5? click languages or tonal languages?
Hi!
I'd say 4 as well.
Some of the most challenging aspects for an English speaker IMO are:
cases
grammatical genders
The verb conjugation is much easier than the Romance languages, though. Especially since the past tense is reduced to haben/sein + participle. In the spoken language at least.
Grüsse
I'd say 4 as well.
Some of the most challenging aspects for an English speaker IMO are:
cases
grammatical genders
The verb conjugation is much easier than the Romance languages, though. Especially since the past tense is reduced to haben/sein + participle. In the spoken language at least.
Grüsse
Learning any language is difficult... But I'd give it a 3. I'd reserve 5 for something like Hungarian and 4 for Russian... German is tougher than the Romance languages but the Romance languages are pretty easy.
German is easier to learn because German and English belong to the same family of languages whereas Romance languages are less related to English.
In my opinion:
1. Spanish and other Romance languages.
2. German
3. Hungarian. Here also the most difficult languages
4. Arabic and other Asiatic languages with OTHER alphabet.
5. Chinese. Here also Korean and Japanese and other languages from the Far East.
German has 3 genders and a declension system. The plural is not like in English, French or Spanish.
1. Spanish and other Romance languages.
2. German
3. Hungarian. Here also the most difficult languages
4. Arabic and other Asiatic languages with OTHER alphabet.
5. Chinese. Here also Korean and Japanese and other languages from the Far East.
German has 3 genders and a declension system. The plural is not like in English, French or Spanish.
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.
so there, as mentioned German retains the highest amount of IE grammar outside of Slavic languages and the getting comfortable thinking in terms of, "ok, I have to say this adjective noun and demonstrative prnoun in neutral genetive plural" takes considerable effort.
so there, as mentioned German retains the highest amount of IE grammar outside of Slavic languages and the getting comfortable thinking in terms of, "ok, I have to say this adjective noun and demonstrative prnoun in neutral genetive plural" takes considerable effort.
I was trying to focus on German, but if you want to know the easiest major language in this world, then it must be Indonesian.
Yes. Indonesian is easier, more spoken and more important than, for example, French
<<5. Chinese. Here also Korean and Japanese and other languages from the Far East.
>>
I will agree with Chinese, but Korean and Japanese, No. Korean is extrememly easy, and very uniform/analogous--there are few exceptions to rules. Korean writing is also extremely easy.
<<so there, as mentioned German retains the highest amount of IE grammar outside of Slavic languages >>
What about Icelandic? and Hindi?
<<German has 3 genders and a declension system. The plural is not like in English, French or Spanish. >>
German declensions are not that hard: Genitive is easy for English speakers, and the only other one is the Dative Plural. So it's English + 1 more.
>>
I will agree with Chinese, but Korean and Japanese, No. Korean is extrememly easy, and very uniform/analogous--there are few exceptions to rules. Korean writing is also extremely easy.
<<so there, as mentioned German retains the highest amount of IE grammar outside of Slavic languages >>
What about Icelandic? and Hindi?
<<German has 3 genders and a declension system. The plural is not like in English, French or Spanish. >>
German declensions are not that hard: Genitive is easy for English speakers, and the only other one is the Dative Plural. So it's English + 1 more.
my fault oversimplifying (I know nothing of Icelandic other than long hard to pronounce names, but was aware that Hindi also retained much proto IE grammar). As a native English speaker German soounds a bit strange, and based on the time estimates from foreign services vs other Germanic or Romance languages, others agree.
Czechs and Poles often have an easier time with German than English, because they come from the heavilly declined languages, even if the cases "aren't that hard" thinking in terms of cases is a hurdle for people that don't natively use them. Cases rarely are that hard once you get used to it.
Anyway the question was how difficult is German for an English native, well the estimate is 750 hours of class work so category 1.5 on a 1-3 category scale. So relatively easy, but not quite as easy as Norweigen, Dutch, Spanish, Italian, etc.
Czechs and Poles often have an easier time with German than English, because they come from the heavilly declined languages, even if the cases "aren't that hard" thinking in terms of cases is a hurdle for people that don't natively use them. Cases rarely are that hard once you get used to it.
Anyway the question was how difficult is German for an English native, well the estimate is 750 hours of class work so category 1.5 on a 1-3 category scale. So relatively easy, but not quite as easy as Norweigen, Dutch, Spanish, Italian, etc.
You Americans and we Chinese say German has declensions, but it's a big scam to say that's difficult. Actually, syntax is more important (esp. word order), and there are much fewer cognates, or recognizable words, than French.
And the CJKA are also a big scam. Ask any random Chinese about learning English, many of them would say even English has loads of little, intricate words, and particularly prepositions. It has nothing similar to my language. The only thing that reduces its difficulty is its popularity. If JK are grade 1 for me, then English is grade 1.5., followed by 2 (Romance), 2.5 (German), and so on.
And the CJKA are also a big scam. Ask any random Chinese about learning English, many of them would say even English has loads of little, intricate words, and particularly prepositions. It has nothing similar to my language. The only thing that reduces its difficulty is its popularity. If JK are grade 1 for me, then English is grade 1.5., followed by 2 (Romance), 2.5 (German), and so on.