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Do you want to speak more languages? Sure, as Sally Struthers used to say so often, we all do. But the requirements of attaining proficiency in any foreign tongue, no doubt unlike those correspondence courses pitched by that All in the Family star turned daytime TV icon, can seem frustratingly demanding and unclear. But thanks to the research efforts of the Foreign Service Institute, the center of foreign-language training for the United States government for the past 70 years, you can get a sense of how much time it takes, as a native or native-level English speaker, to master any of a host of languages spoken all across the world.
The map above visualizes the languages of Europe (at least those deemed diplomatically important enough to be taught at the FSI), coloring them according the average time commitment they require of an English speaker. In pink, we have the English-speaking countries. The red countries speak Category I languages, those most closely related to English and thus learnable in 575 to 600 hours of study: the traditional high-school foreign languages of Spanish and French, for instance, or the less commonly taught but just about as easily learnable Portuguese and Italian. If you'd like a little more challenge, why not try your hand at German, whose 750 hours of study puts it in Category II — quite literally, a category of its own?
The map reckons Gaelic, Welsh, Breton, and Basque are off the charts.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Lester on Monday December 04 2017, @06:42PM (1 child)
Once I read that English is not as easy as Spanish (I'm Spaniard). Starting to speak English is easier than Spanish, (simple flexion verbs, no grammatical gender...).
But after going through the first difficulties, Spanish is much easier to master than English.
English has a very difficult pronunciation, Spanish has 5 vowels, English 12. Orthography is easy in Spanish (when you see a new written word, you know how to read it). Phrasal verbs is something you never master. Vocabulary is duplicated, Germanic roots vs Latin roots (i.e. get out vs exit). Verbs have no flexion, so there are many nuances that are expressed with phrasal constructions. The meaning of a lot of words depend on the context, much more than in Spanish (probably because English has much more monosyllabic words than Spanish).
So, learning a language to check in a hotel is easier in English than Spanish, but to have an interesting conversation or reading a book, it's easier in Spanish than English.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday December 04 2017, @09:43PM
The FSI focuses less on how easy it is than how long it takes to learn because that's the relevant piece of information. Since these are diplomats and staffers there's a ton of motivation to do the work necessary as failing can lead to losing not just a job, but an awesome opportunity.
But, languages in general are hard to rank by difficulty because they have different forms and structures. Mandarin Chinese is in some ways an incredibly easy language at first, but it becomes more and more difficult as you get into it. The written form requires an incredible amount of work to get much out of it.
As you, correctly, point out, what you're intending to do with the language is also a significant factor. Sometimes, like with Spanish, the reading is easier, and sometimes, like with Mandarin, the speaking and basic communication is easier.
In most cases though the degree to which you can start using the language productively is the biggest difference between an easy and hard language. If you can quickly learn a few phrases and just keep adding to that, it's going to be easier than if you're having to do a ton of study in order to make any use of the language.