Learning a new language.

[Dog--]

So I've always wanted to know Russian, and I found a website that teaches it.

I was just wondering how difficult it is to learn a new language, I've taken the mandatory French classes that are required in Canada, but I hate the language, so I never bothered to try hard with it. And to me it seemed just as hard as English (with grammar and all)

I've always heard that English is the hardest language to learn, so does that mean Russian will be easy? How hard is it to learn a new language in general?

So far I was reading about how it's supposed to be easier, but I'm still thinking on it, as I don't want to waste time learning if it's super hard or anything, as I don't NEED to know the language, I just thought it'd be nice.

 

[Ennui]

I'll put it bluntly: Russian is a very difficult language, and the grammar is nothing like English so you would have to seriously work your ass off to become decent, much less truly fluent. I took a semester of it and holy crap did I suck at it.

However, all of the Russians I know are awesome, Russian history and literature are awesome, and the cyrillic alphabet is also awesome. I still might try to learn Russian, and potentially double major in Russian instead of getting the minor in Russian Lit which is what I'm doing presently. I'd love to be able to read Dostoevsky and Gogol and the like in the original Russian... but that language is really not at all for the faint of heart.

If you don't believe me, try to learn a little bit of it and you'll see what I mean pretty quickly.

 

[Dog--]

Well so far I looked at a few words where the how to pronounce them in English is beside them (and I've got the same thing with the alphabet, like T is T as in Tap kind of thing), I looked at the word, looked at the alphabet, and so far I figured out how to correctly say a few words without looking at their English pronunciation, I only had a tiny bit of trouble with METPO, but the O was underlined and I didn't know what that meant, I pronounced it correctly (Mye-Tro), I just didn't understand at the time that the underline meant to stress the O more.

I don't know for sure, but when you capitalize/underline a letter it means that's the stress point of the word?

As for the culture, I never really thought about it, but thinking about it I also very much enjoy the culture, particularly the music, but the history and all that is cool too.

 

[Kula Meenur]

Russian is easy. Good luck mate

 

[Dog--]

Плохо (bad) - Plo-ko

Хорошо (good) - Kor-oh-show (or is it Hore-oh-show? This chart tells me it's pronounced like the CH in Loch/Bach or like H in Hello)

Are those correct pronunciations? If they are, it actually is easier than I thought. If not.. I still want to try and learn.

 

[The Monkey]

You won't be able to learn Russian from a website, trust me. And if your native language is English, you might wanna start with one of the other Germanic languages: Dutch, German or the Scandinavian languages. Russian is most more different from English than any of the Latin languages (which you encountered with the French).

 

[Ennui]

The X makes a "ch" sound, but more gutteral, like in german (macht). As for stresses, I'm not sure. There are also things called hard and soft signs where you either do or don't palatalize certain segments in words. This is hard to do for english speakers at first. To be honest Russian can get quite hard to pronounce, a lot of the simple words are easy but place names and long nouns or verb conjugations can get really dicey.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/languages/european_languages/languages/russian.shtml
check the last one, bottom right, about the toilet. try and say that three times fast. now imagine conversing in that language.

 

[Raziaar]

I've always wanted to learn Russian too. I still know the alphabet roughly, even though some of the cyrillic letters throw me off on their pronunciation. I know maybe 30 words.

I stopped about a year or so ago though, and haven't started up again. I really want to, but I haven't been able to get ahold of some of the resources I want.


I've never heard that English is the hardest language to learn. I've always heard Chinese is.

I know hello(formal and informal), goodbye(formal and informal), thank you, please, vodka(lol), water, wine, beer, men's toilet, women's toilet, boy, girl, cat, dog and many others.

I just have them memorized though, surprisingly still so since it's been so very long since I actually learned them. I do not know them in cyrillic though, just spoken. I cannot read Russian yet, just pronounce the words from the characters.

 

[Dog--]

http://www***ssianlessons.net/lessons/lesson1_main.php

This is the site I'm using, it seems pretty good.

 

[Kula Meenur]

Khay schastyt'.


Also, you learning in both latinski and cyrillic? Or just cyrillic? I would definately recommend you learn both.

 

[Dog--]

Just Cyrillic.

 

[Raziaar]

What the hell is latinski?

 

[Kula Meenur]

Latin letters Razz soz Learn both brother, because if you go to any country you'll need it.

 

[Dog--]

Khay schastyt

Кaй Cxacтит

Eh? Eh?

Now whatsit mean.

 

[Kula Meenur]

You got it round the wrong way.


"Кaй Caxcтит"

 

[Dog--]

I was still pretty close, considering I've never done that before.

NOW WHAT THE **** DOES IT MEAN?

 

[Kula Meenur]

Don't demand anything it's poor form. Get a tutor.



<3

 

[Escaep]

In Soviet Russia, language learns you!

But anyway, my German teacher always tell us that it takes about 15 years to fully learn a new language. The hardest part is not understanding what the language says, but being able to speak with it. IE, even though I am only in German I I can pick out and get the jist of a conversation, but I can't formulate a good answer in response.

Eventually I want to learn Russian, Arabic, and Chinese. But that will take a lifetime.

 

[Solaris]

My ma, grew up in England and taught herself fluent russian and slovakian and shes not amazingly clever so it can't be impossible.

 

[DEATHMASTER]

The best way to learn a new language is to get a teacher. Self-taught is highly prone to errors and can lead to permanently (or extremely hard to overcome) misunderstanding concepts.
Example - self taught Waps. Compared to me, they're retarded children.

 

[Saturos]

Get Rosetta Stone software.

 

[G(ordon)-man]

Плохо (bad) - Plo-ko

Хорошо (good) - Kor-oh-show (or is it Hore-oh-show? This chart tells me it's pronounced like the CH in Loch/Bach or like H in Hello)

nah, it's Plo-ha and Ha-ra-sho. I believe.

 

[Raziaar]

Get Rosetta Stone software.

Oh god no. Not only is that super expensive, I've heard so many bad things about it. With trying to teach you things that aren't really even applicable at all in Russian or whatever. I forget what the complaints were about it.

 

[Sheepo]

You just want to learn Russian? For no reason?

Are you insane?

 

[tschumann]

I've always heard that English is the hardest language to learn

One of french teachers (an Austrian) said that he found english quite easy on account of the simple grammar and lack of cases and tenses etc.

 

[Phobie]

My first language is French yo. I learned most of the English I know later in life.

And now I effing rock that Anglotongue.

 

[Dan]

I don't know why you would refuse to learn French when you are offered free instruction and live in a country where you could potentially use it, or at least read it if you are out West. But then you suddenly want to learn Russian, which is much less useful and only accessible through a website which is hardly a great way to learn. Immersing yourself in a language environment is 99% faster and more effective than learning spelling and grammar from a book, and combining book grammar learning and an immersion environment is like twice as fast and effective as that.

 

[Dog--]

Russian just appeals to me. My family is Hungarian, does that mean I have to learn it? No, I have some interest in it, but I want to learn Russian. I don't want to learn French, I don't like it. It's a pretty simple answer of "all people are different" just cause you'd learn it doesn't mean I want to.

 

[Phobie]

Nobody doesn't like French.


SHUT UP

 

[Polaris]

Russian is terrible and French is ridiculous.
I would love to speak German and Latin, the language of the enlightened.

 

[Dan]

Russian just appeals to me. My family is Hungarian, does that mean I have to learn it? No, I have some interest in it, but I want to learn Russian. I don't want to learn French, I don't like it. It's a pretty simple answer of "all people are different" just cause you'd learn it doesn't mean I want to.

My point was that if you don't have the interest, inclination, or patience to learn one language when it is offered to you and there is support for that language, then it is doubtful that you will be successful learning a different language with less support and usefulness.

 

[Dog--]

Or maybe it's because I don't have the drive to learn a language I don't want to and I have the drive to learn a language I do.

All the resources are available to me on the web. I learned music theory on my own, I can learn one language. Music is pretty well a language in itself.

 

[Dan]

The arbitrariness of your language preference makes me question how strong that drive is. I just don't see the motivation behind this interest.

 

[Azner]

I picked up a few Russian phrases in a couple of days.

Privet
Spasibo
Prastite
Da
Net

I think learning the phrases and common speaking terms would be easier than learning the language

I would never find enough time to check the rules and all

 

[Raziaar]

I picked up a few Russian phrases in a couple of days.

Privet
Spasibo
Prastite
Da
Net

I think learning the phrases and common speaking terms would be easier than learning the language

I would never find enough time to check the rules and all

Privyet not Privet

Spasiba, not Spasibo, at least in pronunciation I believe.

Don't know what Prastite is. What's that mean?

And Nyet instead of Net.




When and if I ever get back into learning Russian(I hope to), I think grammar is going to be the most difficult aspect. It seems to be the most difficult in all languages. Languages where sentences are rearranged differently than in English destroy my mind!

Like when somebody says a person's name at the beginning of their sentence, but in English it would be represented near the very end. It's difficult for me to comprehend that.

 

[Azner]

Privyet not Privet

Spasiba, not Spasibo, at least in pronunciation I believe.

Don't know what Prastite is. What's that mean?

And Nyet instead of Net.




When and if I ever get back into learning Russian(I hope to), I think grammar is going to be the most difficult aspect. It seems to be the most difficult in all languages. Languages where sentences are rearranged differently than in English destroy my mind!

Like when somebody says a person's name at the beginning of their sentence, but in English it would be represented near the very end. It's difficult for me to comprehend that.

Yes, thats how to pronounce them, but direct Cryllic to English alphabet would have them spelt Privet, Spasibo and such.

From what i picked up 'E's are pronounced 'IE'
'O's are pronounced A
and 'A's are pronounced "AO's