Which (natural) language should I learn?

[01BTC10]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cu_-54aB9lo




Even Phil Ivey try to learn french with Montreal hotties! It looks like he really did enjoy his stay!



As an added bonus: most of these hotties also speak english

[Phinnaeus Gage]

Sandra Bullock speaks German: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IzbrztZFCFA

[netrin]

The hottest women, even the lowest common denominator, are found in Copenhagen. Unfortunately the Danish language, like German and Dutch, is verbal diarrhea but less smooth. I'd have to give a vote up to the ladies of Montreal and Quebec and the always charming français québécois...

...which sounds a bit like this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1hJQsvoY6VU

[Phinnaeus Gage]

The hottest women, even the lowest common denominator, are found in Copenhagen. Unfortunately the Danish language, like German and Dutch, is verbal diarrhea but less smooth. I'd have to give a vote up to the ladies of Montreal and Quebec and the always charming français québécois...

...which sounds a bit like this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1hJQsvoY6VU

Sure, go ahead and convince theymos that French is the way to go. By next year he'll be able to do stand-up comedy like this: Languages--Eddie Izzard.

~Cackling Bear~

[netrin]

I advocate learning as many as one can. Neither German nor French should be particularly difficult starting points. Theymos is not likely to get very far with Chinese in a year while remaining on American soil. However, Chinese will help if he intends to learn Japanese later but not much. Except for a handful of characters and old cultural ties, the two languages are quite different (perhaps Japanese is grammatically and lexicographically closer to English than Chinese).

I personally think Germanic languages (which includes English) are ugly. For me the opportunities to speak and the pleasure of the spoken word are most motivating. I speak French and a few Germanic languages, and while not fluent, I enjoy forming words in Spanish more than any other language on Theymos' short list (others being Romanian, Pali/sanskrit, Hausa, any tonal language, and I imagine Khoisan languages).

Given the short timespan and indecision, it might be worth considering the British Foreign Office's categorization from easiest to hardest for native English speakers (diplomats) to learn:

Level 1
Spanish, French, German, Dutch, Swedish, Italian, Portuguese

Level 2
Swahili, Icelandic, Malay, Indonesian, Romanian

Level 3
Finnish, Croatian, Serbian, Latvian, Czech, Hungarian

Level 4
Arabic, Russian, Persian

Level 5
Thai, Japanese, Chinese, Korean

[John (John K.)]

I advocate learning as many as one can. Neither German nor French should be particularly difficult starting points. Theymos is not likely to get very far with Chinese in a year while remaining on American soil. However, Chinese will help if he intends to learn Japanese later but not much. Except for a handful of characters and old cultural ties, the two languages are quite different (perhaps Japanese is grammatically and lexicographically closer to English than Chinese).

I personally think Germanic languages (which includes English) are ugly. For me the opportunities to speak and the pleasure of the spoken word are most motivating. I speak French and a few Germanic languages, and while not fluent, I enjoy forming words in Spanish more than any other language on Theymos' short list (others being Romanian, Pali/sanskrit, Hausa, any tonal language, and I imagine Khoisan languages).

Given the short timespan and indecision, it might be worth considering the British Foreign Office's categorization from easiest to hardest for native English speakers (diplomats) to learn:

Level 1
Spanish, French, German, Dutch, Swedish, Italian, Portuguese

Level 2
Swahili, Icelandic, Malay, Indonesian, Romanian

Level 3
Finnish, Croatian, Serbian, Latvian, Czech, Hungarian

Level 4
Arabic, Russian, Persian

Level 5
Thai, Japanese, Chinese, Korean

Yay! I know a Level 2 and a Level 5 Language. That makes me a Level 9! 

[Phinnaeus Gage]

I advocate learning as many as one can. Neither German nor French should be particularly difficult starting points. Theymos is not likely to get very far with Chinese in a year while remaining on American soil. However, Chinese will help if he intends to learn Japanese later but not much. Except for a handful of characters and old cultural ties, the two languages are quite different (perhaps Japanese is grammatically and lexicographically closer to English than Chinese).

I personally think Germanic languages (which includes English) are ugly. For me the opportunities to speak and the pleasure of the spoken word are most motivating. I speak French and a few Germanic languages, and while not fluent, I enjoy forming words in Spanish more than any other language on Theymos' short list (others being Romanian, Pali/sanskrit, Hausa, any tonal language, and I imagine Khoisan languages).

Given the short timespan and indecision, it might be worth considering the British Foreign Office's categorization from easiest to hardest for native English speakers (diplomats) to learn:

Level 1
Spanish, French, German, Dutch, Swedish, Italian, Portuguese

Level 2
Swahili, Icelandic, Malay, Indonesian, Romanian

Level 3
Finnish, Croatian, Serbian, Latvian, Czech, Hungarian

Level 4
Arabic, Russian, Persian

Level 5
Thai, Japanese, Chinese, Korean

Yay! I know a Level 2 and a Level 5 Language. That makes me a Level 9! 

You're such an idiot! 2 and 5 make 8. Aren't you learned?

~Cackling Bear~

[netrin]

[01BTC10]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=283sjvDBZMA&feature=related

[Kettenmonster]

Given the short timespan and indecision, it might be worth considering the British Foreign Office's categorization from easiest to hardest for native English speakers (diplomats) to learn:
Level 1
Spanish, French, German, ..., Italian,
Level 2
...
Level 5
... Chinese, ...

Ok so much for Chinese, but no real help on the rest.

My approach runs like this: You need communication partners with whom your one-year-experience in language x is helpful.
German?
Why learning German, whilst already speaking English fluently? Very few german speaking people have less than one year of experience with english (except for the southeastern part of Europe probably).

Italian?
Rarely spoken compared to the others, but if you like Operas ... still one year wouldn´t be of much help.

French?
A bit like Italian, although more widely spread in the world.

Spanish?
Well the last one left and a very good choice, provided you agree on my approach.

[organofcorti]

Bugger! You forgot Switzerland ... although ä klisigs Chuchichäschtli is pretty ununderstandable to any native german.

Anyone who includes (Northern/Eastern) Switzerland as a German-speaking country is completely deluded.

The languages they speak over there are dialects of German that are about as close to real German as Dutch is.

In other words, it's not German at all. Plus each city/valley speaks a different version of the darn thing, to
the point where they have a a hard time even understanding one another within the country.

Yes, they can all understand real German over there, but the moment they'll speak to one another, you won't
have a clue what they're saying, even native Germans speakers don't.

Plus ... if you count language aesthetics as a criteria (some languages sound way worse than others) when
it comes to swiss-german, just one word: ugh. Sounding worse than German is hard, but they somehow pull
it off.

Again, totally unbiased opinion  

You forgot Wallis. It's in the south and is by far the hardest swiss dialect to learn, due in no small part to its inclusion of French, Italian and Romansch. And the fact that as a canton it's mostly a very long and isolated valley and didn't get the "German 2.0" updates that everyone else did in the 1700s.

But by god you guys are such pussies! Wallisertiitsch is the most manly and aggressive language I've ever heard or spoken. Just thinking "huere schiissdrechhhhhh" makes me feel more manly.

[rudrigorc2]

Portuguese for sure, just visit Brazil and decide for yourself.

[John (John K.)]

I advocate learning as many as one can. Neither German nor French should be particularly difficult starting points. Theymos is not likely to get very far with Chinese in a year while remaining on American soil. However, Chinese will help if he intends to learn Japanese later but not much. Except for a handful of characters and old cultural ties, the two languages are quite different (perhaps Japanese is grammatically and lexicographically closer to English than Chinese).

I personally think Germanic languages (which includes English) are ugly. For me the opportunities to speak and the pleasure of the spoken word are most motivating. I speak French and a few Germanic languages, and while not fluent, I enjoy forming words in Spanish more than any other language on Theymos' short list (others being Romanian, Pali/sanskrit, Hausa, any tonal language, and I imagine Khoisan languages).

Given the short timespan and indecision, it might be worth considering the British Foreign Office's categorization from easiest to hardest for native English speakers (diplomats) to learn:

Level 1
Spanish, French, German, Dutch, Swedish, Italian, Portuguese

Level 2
Swahili, Icelandic, Malay, Indonesian, Romanian

Level 3
Finnish, Croatian, Serbian, Latvian, Czech, Hungarian

Level 4
Arabic, Russian, Persian

Level 5
Thai, Japanese, Chinese, Korean

Yay! I know a Level 2 and a Level 5 Language. That makes me a Level 9! 

You're such an idiot! 2 and 5 make 8. Aren't you learned?

~Cackling Bear~

Oops my fault. Should be 6 instead; -1 for lower-then-usual IQ!

[Phinnaeus Gage]

I advocate learning as many as one can. Neither German nor French should be particularly difficult starting points. Theymos is not likely to get very far with Chinese in a year while remaining on American soil. However, Chinese will help if he intends to learn Japanese later but not much. Except for a handful of characters and old cultural ties, the two languages are quite different (perhaps Japanese is grammatically and lexicographically closer to English than Chinese).

I personally think Germanic languages (which includes English) are ugly. For me the opportunities to speak and the pleasure of the spoken word are most motivating. I speak French and a few Germanic languages, and while not fluent, I enjoy forming words in Spanish more than any other language on Theymos' short list (others being Romanian, Pali/sanskrit, Hausa, any tonal language, and I imagine Khoisan languages).

Given the short timespan and indecision, it might be worth considering the British Foreign Office's categorization from easiest to hardest for native English speakers (diplomats) to learn:

Level 1
Spanish, French, German, Dutch, Swedish, Italian, Portuguese

Level 2
Swahili, Icelandic, Malay, Indonesian, Romanian

Level 3
Finnish, Croatian, Serbian, Latvian, Czech, Hungarian

Level 4
Arabic, Russian, Persian

Level 5
Thai, Japanese, Chinese, Korean

Yay! I know a Level 2 and a Level 5 Language. That makes me a Level 9! 

You're such an idiot! 2 and 5 make 8. Aren't you learned?

~Cackling Bear~

Oops my fault. Should be 6 instead; -1 for lower-then-usual IQ!

By bad, too. I concur.

~Cackling Bear~

[check_status]

College doesn't offer Navajo?

Yá'át'ééh, E la na tte?
Dinéena bizaad doo shi?
Háadish yah anída'aldah góne'?
Ahéhee', Nizhónígo Nee Ado’ááł.

If you want to try some languages, here are some free courses:
http://fsi-language-courses.org/Content.php

I vote for Chinese. Guo Tie (gwo-tee-eh) is one of my favorites. No it's not a music artist.
http://mandarintools.com/chardict.html

The first Chinese phrase I learned: Doonay luo mu hi!

The only downside to learning to speak Mandarin is going into Chinese restaraunts and finding they speak Cantonese.

[Kettenmonster]

More than 70 million germans don´t speak Low German: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uOg_8A-Zfn0

[Phinnaeus Gage]

College doesn't offer Navajo?

Yá'át'ééh, E la na tte?
Dinéena bizaad doo shi?
Háadish yah anída'aldah góne'?
Ahéhee', Nizhónígo Nee Ado’ááł.

If you want to try some languages, here are some free courses:
http://fsi-language-courses.org/Content.php

I vote for Chinese. Guo Tie (gwo-tee-eh) is one of my favorites. No it's not a music artist.
http://mandarintools.com/chardict.html

The first Chinese phrase I learned: Doonay luo mu hi!

The only downside to learning to speak Mandarin is going into Chinese restaraunts and finding they speak Cantonese.

I've always thought that Navajo was only a spoken language. Guess I was wrong.

More than 70 million germans don´t speak Low German: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uOg_8A-Zfn0

My grandmother used to tell me that there were two different Lithuanian languages, and she spoke the one from Little Lithuania, whatever that meant.

Here's another attempt to convince theymos that German should be his choice.


Mijn luchtkussenboot zit vol paling, theymos.

~Cackling Bear~

[Kettenmonster]

... and she spoke the one from Little Lithuania, whatever that meant.

I´d guess she came somewhere from Königsberg now called Kaliningrad and spoke Nehrungskurisch (don´t know the englisch translation).

[Vitalik Buterin]

Also, the language will make literally make your ears bleed: it is very guttural and anything
but delicate. Wait till the hotties in the picture above start to actually open their mouth to say
something and you will run away scared.

My totally unbiased opinion, of course  

How interesting. I've heard some other people say this, but my opinion is the exact opposite: I find German quite pleasant, but I just can't stand Spanish.

[Kettenmonster]

 ... so now theymos? What is your decision?

btw: This is german too!
I´d say at 0:24 there is a faulty german to german translation.