Which of these languages would most likely attempt to learn(Mandarin,Cantonese,Japanese,Arabic,Korean)?why?

Question

The U.S. state department foreign service institute ranks these 5 languages the most exceptionally difficult languages in the world. The average English speaker needs 2,2000 class hours to reach proficency, 3 times the amount needed to master spanish/french.

-Time magazine, 26 June issue

mandarin, cantonese, arabic, korean, japanese

Answer 1

It should be Mandarin. Most of the countries with Chinese people use this language as their official language. Also, it is the language used by most native speakers next to Hindi.

Once you learnt Mandarin, you will be able to learn other Chinese dialects like Cantonese very easily.

Answer 2

Given that the five languages have no relation to English (which is Germanic with close ties to Romance languages) one shouldn't be surprised that there is difficulty.

The biggest obstacle is the mindset. Westerners think in literal terms and the others (save Arabic) speak in inferred terms. Also Altaic languages have subject-object-verb structure while European languages have subject-verb-object. "I go to the store" in English, but "I the store to go" in Japanese (which has _postpositions_ as compared to English _prepositions_).

In actuality, Altaic grammars make more sense than European grammars. There is no number (plurals), no gender (le/la in French), and the verbs are generally consistent with few irregular forms. The difficulty comes with learning the script.

Korean is a phonetic script that is easily learnt. One can write Korean without any Chinese characters and be understood (North Korea's Kim family dictators banned their use). Japanese can be written solely in English, although one can muddle along by learning only their two simple character sets.

Chinese also has a basic phonetic alphabet used when teaching children. Unfortunately, for some reason use of the Chinese phonetic script is frowned upon when teaching Chinese to foreigners, even though it would make language acquisition much easier.

If one did want to learn Mandarin in English, Singapore writes Chinese with the Latin alphabet and is labelled "Pinyin". The Chinese spoken in Singapore is the same as in Beijing. (A funny anecdote: Actress Michelle Yeoh speaks Chinese fluently, but cannot read the characters. In her movies, she learns the dialogue from Latin spellings and pretends to read the pictographs in films.)

Answer 3

I used to want to learn French but I only got as far as the numbers and the basic phrases so my conversational French is not quite good. And Mandarin is too hard. Too many characters to learn! But now that Im into Korean movies and series, and also Japanese anime, I really would like to learn Korean and Japanese. ^_^

Answer 4

I learned Arabic and am very happy that I did. After that, I would choose Chinese or Mandarin. I know a bunch of people who learned Korean and they all had a horribly difficult time with it - and these are smart people - so it kind of intimidates me (although I do know how to ask for a light)!

Answer 5

Well what you did in the first stanza is basically break up one line dry sands plunge deep into the pit The first stanza's form is cool looking, but you need to choose between form and minimalism. If you want it truly minimalist, cut ALL the fat, here is an example(for better or worse): n this desert, dry sands plunge deep down Bleh I like the poem the way you have it since the stanza looks like a pit, but consider playing around with it and trimming or changing what you can. Try a second version where you don't streamline it into 2 or 3 sentences but rather make the reader piece it together, then see which is better.

Answer 6

You should learn Mandarin and Cantonese, as these are some of the languages that are mainly used in highly developing countries such as China. Don't bother with the rest of them.

Answer 7

Hello,

I have learnt all four that is Mandarin Chinese, Arabic, Korean,Japanese.

Currently looking at Indonesia to learn right now.

Answer 8

catonese or mandarin dont attempt arabic it is very hard to learn if ur just a beginner in it trust me

Answer 9

Japanese and Korean. Mostly because I like the food, and watching their dramas.

Answer 10

Mandarin or Arabic. I'm surprised they don't list Hebrew here, that one is definitely on my list too....