No, French is not that difficult. I have strong reasons
(based on linguistics and natural languages acquisition
process) to think that there is no language really
harder than another, even Polish, for example, or some
easier, like English, as it's often said, (I hate
hearing that English is easy; English is a very easy
language... to make mistakes in!).
Care to comment?
Hope to see you there in Berlin,
Franek
Here I am, sad you haven't written back yet, because I
was interested in your response...and...it turns out
that I didn't write you back? I'm sure I wrote
something, because I remember what I said, but I guess
I messed up somehow : )
I said something like...do you also find that people
are more than willing to make a millions mistakes in
English, but then are really embarrassed to make even
one mistake in French? I've found that to be true
here, and I'd like to know if I'm making it up!
And I said something about all languages being the same
to Aliens, but that I really think that languages are
harder or easier depending on what first language you
have, I don't think you'll disagree. I think French
is really hard just because of the accent and the
rules for reading it. They are supposedly very
different from English.
Hopefully I'll hit "send" right this time... : )
-Ruby
Hi Ruby,
I did not write back, as I thought you had no desire to
keep on talking about all this with me. Obviously, I
was wrong! Now, excuse me for the delay in answering;
I've had a busy week-end.
So, to react to what you wrote: I've never thought
about this, actually, and it raised many questions and
problems, mostly about the status of our respective
languages. A lot of people consider English only as a
lingua franca (what they should rather call globish),
and an easy one. Maybe that's why they don't see their
mistakes, and more, they don't even care that much, as
the most important thing is to be understood, and
that's all. French is considered as a very difficult
language, and maybe sometimes sort of snobbish. There
are a lot of other things I could say about this, but
I'd rather say them in a conversation in front of a
pint!!
About what you wrote about languages being more
difficult depending on the language(s) you already
know (say, generally, your mother tongue, but not
necessarily), of course, I definitly agree with you! I
hear very often here in Poland that Polish is the
second most difficult language on Earth after Chinese,
which, in my opinion, is complete bullshit - excuse my
french. Polish is easier if you already know Russian
than if you speak only Spanish, or worse, a
non-indo-european language. That must be terrible if
you are Japanese, because of the syllable structure
(Japanese allows only CV syllable, if you know what I
mean), or if you are Thai because of the tonal
system.
What you said about French is true, but incomplete. For
English speakers, French prononciation is particularly
difficult because of the fact that the phonologies of
these languages are simply on the opposite. The
syllabification, the intonation, the accent, the
vowels, etc., everything is different. That's why the
French have all this terrible accent when they speak
English, and vice versa.
Reading French is also extremely difficult, but just as
English. Once again, these two languages have opposite
rules. But I don't think that reading English is
easier.
To get back to english, when I began to learn it, and
for a very long time, I was really afraid to use it in
front of native speakers, and afraid of making
mistakes. Today, I care less. Nevertheless, I hope I'm
my English is enough correct for you!
And I also hope I wasn't too long. If we meet (BBC?),
you'll see that I can't stop talking if it comes to
linguistic. So, maybe we'll have really interesting
conversations together... or really boring!
Keep in touch,
Take care,
Franek
PS: if ever you're sometimes on msn or skype, you can
find my contact on my CS profile.
Franek,
I'm ALWAYS delayed in answering, sorry : )
Hmmm. Was this true about English even ten years ago?
It seems like it happened so fast. People even just 10
years older than me don't seem to speak half as much
english as people my age. When I was in
Bratislava...and lost...my friend told me not to worry
and just find someone my age and they should be able to
help me...in English. Just ANYONE my age. Anyone?
And sure enough the first person I asked...
Do you also think that there's going be a new language
that's very similar to English as people continue to
not care about their mistakes? I feel almost like I
learned another language being here...I'm starting to
make the same mistakes too...and not really caring
about it until I talk to my parents and it's so
obviously wrong. A very good example is "I explained
him/her..." I say this all the time. It comes to me
much faster than "I explained to him/her..." This is,
I guess, already a language on Wiki...almost. There's
a Simple English...but my guess is, with time, all the
mistakes will be recognized as correct and people who
speak English in the US and England and so on will be
like, hey, we don't speak that. Boom. New language.
Or maybe not.
Some people have thought that I speak the same with
them as I do, say, my brother. When my brother came
here for 2 weeks everyone was somehow very surprised
that I could speak so fast or that I knew so many
words. It almost hurts my feelings that people think
that I can only speak as much English as they've
learned in school. I mean, for a native speaker, my
English isn't very good, but it's still my first
language. Geez. And I want to use English just to
communicate, just like them, obviously I'm not going
to make it harder than it needs to be. But then
there's the people that really want to learn English
and drill me about everything I say and just start
talking to me to practice and and and....and blah blah
blah. I could write a forever about poor little ol'
me, poor little ol' me, the native English speaker.
And that's another question? Where the hell are all
the Americans? I mean, I'm obviously very very happy
not to have met any, but where are they? Why are
people so surprised to when they fond out where I'm
from? Are they all in Spain?
And as much as I complain about having to speak in
English, I think it's safe to say I speak more in
German. And I do the same thing in German as other
people do in English. Some days I feel like I can
speak German perfectly...then I talk to a German and
get really depressed. But the difference is that way
less people are speaking German to communicate outside
of the country where it's spoken. German just has to
worry about becoming English, not a simpler German.
That's something I'd have to talk about over a pint,
it drives me crazy : )
Unfortunately my major is Global Studies and not
linguistics so I won't be able to add much outside of
experience to our boring conversation, but I'm excited
: ) Promise me that we'll do our introductions in
French? I just had my second French class yesterday
and I think I'll be able to do that much. Learning
French in German is definitely one of the more
confusing things I've done. Excuse my particularly
bad English in this unnecessarily long message, but
I'm...confused : )
-Ruby
Ruby,
Can't you see we're both always delayed?
Wow, how can I answer to all this? I was really
interested by what you said about the invasion of
non-native speaker's english in your own language.
Makes me think of a lot of different things. For
instance, I've always showed a taste (in French, of
course) for "refined language", especially when I was
a teenager, and up my early 20's. At the age of 20, I
stop my studies to work. I took what was offered, and
that's how I became a furniture mover, for a bit more
than one year. The guys I worked with were far, far
from being as educated as I was (which is quite
normal, considering that they had all left school at
least before 16). Though, I still kept in touch with
my friends from the uni, and to my horror,
progressively realized that my language was invaded by
my colleagues mistakes and rude way of speaking!
This sort of "new form of english" makes me think about
something else. Actually, it has a name, even if rarely
used: globish. Reminds me of the Greek Koinè
(translated, if I'm not wrong, by "the common greek",
kionè, meaning common). Maybe you've heard about
this. If not, you can find the info on Wikipedia.
Thing is, Ancient Greek languages were different
languages, and at a moment (around 3rd century BC if I
remember well), they merged into one, sort of
simplified (but not necessarily on all points), and
used as a Lingua Franca. This language did not erase
the other forms of Greek, but may sometimes have
influenced them. Doesn't it remind you something?
Looks like History is repeating itself.
So, to answer one of your questions, yes, I think that
another English language is going to appear. Look at
mine. I sometimes think in that form of new English,
which is mostly a mix of British, American and French,
on many different levels (phonological, semantic,
syntactic, etc.), which makes it mine, and I'm sure in
Europe this globish is being unified, but not by
British standards. And what you're doing is just
adapting to the situation where you are. You're
noticing it at the level of syntax, and thus spot it
easier as "faults", but you're probably doing it as
well as the level of pronunciation, maybe without even
noticing it. We've noticed with my friend Philippe, who
works in Wrocław, that when we speak in French in
Poland, our pronunciation is standardized (because
this is the one we use everyday with our pupils and
colleagues... adaptation). But if we begin to talk
about food, especially from Toulouse (or for him, to
talk about rugby), we begin to talk with the
Toulousian French accent!
This process with English is, as you noticed, getting
bigger and bigger. In a lot of countries (this is
particularly striking in Poland, and is explained by
historical reasons), there is a chasm between
different generations. Here, above 30, people just
don't speak English, but a lot of them speak Russian,
and the older speak German. In the liceum/gimnazjum (I
don't say "high school/primary school" for reasons I
shall explain another day) where I work, all kids can
speak with me in English (except those who are not my
pupils, cause, I don't allow them).
*
I'm not sure I understood that part about people who
were surprised that you could speak English very fast.
Did they know that you were American? If so, that was
really stupid of them, and of course, offending. If
they did not, well... how could they not notice you
were not a native speaker?
And if I understood well, you complain about you being
considered sometimes as a teacher/friend, is that it?
Ha ha!! Poor you, indeed!
One last thing, and leave you... So, where are the
Americans? He he, as a matter of fact, I've met one
this week-end, who lives in... Berlin! Of course, I
asked him if he knew you, but no, he doesn't. A very,
very nice guy. If you want, you can find his profile
on my friends list (Mark Leonard).
So, where are they? With this guy, we talked about being
a French in Poland, and an American in Europe in
general. That's a point I'd love to discuss with you,
because here is probably the key to your question. But
I think we'll talk about it in front of a pint, in the
BBC. Now, I'm a bit tired of writing on my pc.
Take care,
Franek
PS: ok, for our introductions in French, and maybe even more if you want. And I don't see why you apologize for your "particularly bad English", I can't make the difference after all with a "particularly good English. Just look at mine!!
I'm fighting the urge to rewrite what I said...but it's not that bad and it changes everything if I change stuff. Interesting stuff, though. whoa.
Reader: Why weren't you a linguistics major? Why?
Ruby: Good question, Reader! I don't know
