Comment on We all took foreign languages in school and none of us can actually speak those languages
frog@feddit.uk 2 weeks agoGood job. English is a very hard language that barely uses logic.
It really is illogical lol :3 I tried teaching my parents before and trying to explain why all 3 Es in mercedes or all 3 Cs in pacific ocean make different sounds like “they just do”
Though my native language is quite hard for non-native speakers as well
English is one of the easiest languages in the world to learn.
Me, an English teacher: nods somberly
Chinese and Arabic speakers laugh at me when I say this.
Why? There’s plenty of strange things in English, inconsistent grammar rules, weird pronunciations, and pointless words for simple ideas.
Like there’s umpteen words to describe different kinds of meat, pork, beef, veal, mutton. In Chinese you can get away with saying just the animal + meat, 猪肉, 牛肉, 小牛肉, 羊肉 (pig meat, cow meat, young cow meat, goat meat).
English has stupid rules around pluralisation. There’s been arguments that the origin of the word should dictate how it’s pluralised, and other arguments that a “true English” pluralisation rule should apply, but then incorrect usage slips into common vernacular and suddenly it’s perfectly okay to pluralise a Greek word with a Latin plural suffix. Then you end up with the plural of octopus being octopodes, octopuses, and octopi!
The long and the short of it is that all languages have weird-ass quirks in them that don’t necessarily make any sense but feel natural to their native speakers. It’s a prime example of how intuitiveness isn’t actually real a thing.
You can get away with lots of things in English too! Just curious, do you speak another (than english) second language ?
I speak Japanese, and can still read German and understand most of it. German’s the secondary language I studied.
I’m a native Swedish speaker so technically English is my second language, and the others came after.
Have you tried French?
lugal@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 weeks ago
All languages have their difficulties. English pronunciation and spelling is a mess but grammar is easy for example. My native language has 3 genders and 4 cases for example and there are languages with more.
TabbsTheBat@pawb.social 2 weeks ago
7 cases in the standard version of my language, 8 in the dialect I speak :3
lugal@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 weeks ago
You didn’t mention genders so I guess you have none which leads me to Uralic or Turkic languages maybe?
TabbsTheBat@pawb.social 2 weeks ago
Oh if we’re doing a guessing game then…
3 genders technically, though the 3rd one (neuter) is super rare, so it’s basically 2 in practice :3
Wizard_Pope@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Yeah same. 6 cases, 3 genders and also dual form because why not.
Kanda@reddthat.com 2 weeks ago
Just have to memorize all these irregular verbs. It’s so easy.
lugal@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 weeks ago
You think English has many irregular verbs? Don’t make me laugh. Compared to which language exactly?
lugal@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 weeks ago
You think English has many irregular verbs? Don’t make me laugh. Compared to which language exactly?
Kanda@reddthat.com 2 weeks ago
It’s not a competition in being the least coherent system
bbboi@feddit.uk 2 weeks ago
I wish for spelling reform, but that’ll never happen.