What Language Should I Learn??

SharpshooterTom

I want to learn a new language.

Its something that will give me a hobby over the summer and get me off the computer and maybe stop me thinking about my social life/depression. But I haven't figured what I which one I want to study/will be beneficial to me.

I already know some basic forms of German and French. So I could expand upon those.

I'm interested in learning an asian language, like Mandarin, Korean or Japanese but because I'm probably never going to live there or go there too often I'm not too sure how useful thats going to be. But Mandarin is becoming the global language along side English that EVERYONE must speak in 50 years.

I'm interested in learning a Scandinavian language, but because I'm not sure how useful it will be given nearly everyone speaks English there anyway.

I was born in England to Irish parents and lived there till I was 14, I speak with an English accent. I live in Ireland now currently, so I could even learn Irish, given my father and his father were both fluent in it. It would be seen as tradition. Infact I would be the first "son" in line not to know any of it. Would it be weird for someone with an English accent learning Irish? It would be wouldn't? :P

I could even try an eastern european language for a challange. But thats the thing, should I be prioritising learning a language that I enjoy, or a language that is beneficial?

Any suggestions??

retalivity

Mandarin, definitely

im invisible

COBOL

I'm having fun learning german
might as well get better at it before you start a new one

1ZRed

Irish?

Eathrin

Maybe try and actively learn a new language by living in it for a few weeks, take a trip somewhere in Europe.

FairytaleGirl

Mandarin is being pegged as the Language to Learn alright.

Spanish is a HUGELY spoken language in many countries ~(Mexico/Brazil/Spain/Parts of Portugal)

And its not a difficult language to learn at all.

Otherwise Id say go for sign language. It would be a real asset to you employability wise. Unique.

Zebra3

OP, which country do you think has the fittest birds?

Jen Pigs Fly

Swahili

aaronjumper

Binary. Or French.

Schism

FairytaleGirl wrote: »

Mandarin is being pegged as the Language to Learn alright.

Spanish is a HUGELY spoken language in many countries ~(Mexico/Brazil/Spain/Parts of Portugal)

And its not a difficult language to learn at all.

Otherwise Id say go for sign language. It would be a real asset to you employability wise. Unique.

And Spanish is reputably easy enough to pick up.

Micky Dolenz

French.

60% of their words are used in English. You only need to learn around 600 words and you can read French papers, have basic but good conversation.

John Doe1

Cuneiform

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cuneiform

christmas2012

russian

Scanlas The 2nd

Don't learn Mandarin, too difficult and you will never need it, not now or in 50 years. It's just fashionable now to say its the language to learn. My teacher told us in 2000 to learn it as it would very important in business. Guess what it's not.

Kamjana

Im learning Thai at the moment,i have been learning it on and off the last few years but this year i really want to do my best and learn it fluently.

fleet

Scanlas The 2nd wrote: »

Don't learn Mandarin, too difficult and you will never need it, not now or in 50 years. It's just fashionable now to say its the language to learn. My teacher told us in 2000 to learn it as it would very important in business. Guess what it's not.

Do you know how laughable that sounds to an Irish person sitting on his sofa, in Xi'an, with his Chinese girlfriend yabbering away on the blower in Mandarin?

The Chinese are coming lads (so long as they can keep sourcing cheap energy).

markie29

FairytaleGirl wrote: »

Mandarin is being pegged as the Language to Learn alright.

Spanish is a HUGELY spoken language in many countries ~(Mexico/Brazil/Spain/Parts of Portugal)

And its not a difficult language to learn at all.

Otherwise Id say go for sign language. It would be a real asset to you employability wise. Unique.

i would agree on spanish and its spoken in central america and every country in south america apart from Brazil they speak portuguese there.

SharpshooterTom

You see this becomes an issue of practically over what you like.

If I'm basing on what I like, German or Japanese would be up there. But Spanish or Mandarin are more 'useful'.

My father speaks Irish fluently, he was the oldest of 5 and him and his father are the only ones who could (his grandfather would have as well etc). So in theory I break the line because I was born in England. Would be weird for someone to speak Irish with an English accent? How common is it?

My dad says Irish is useless now (he says it with deep regret) and that its dying.

Spanish is incredibly useful and fun to learn. French and German are always useful for business. Personally, I would stick to European languages if you're learning a language for work - languages like Chinese and Japanese need much more work and take much longer to become proficient in. You could be fluent in Spanish in the time it takes to get to pre-intermediate level in Chinese. IMO.

DEFTLEFTHAND

Faroese.

mikemac1

Russian

It's very interesting, I did a short course on it

Of course there is the alphabet issue but it's one to consider

1ZRed

Gnobe wrote: »

You see this becomes an issue of practically over what you like.

If I'm basing on what I like, German or Japanese would be up there. But Spanish or Mandarin are more 'useful'.

My father speaks Irish fluently, he was the oldest of 5 and him and his father are the only ones who could (his grandfather would have as well etc). So in theory I break the line because I was born in England. Would be weird for someone to speak Irish with an English accent? How common is it?

My dad says Irish is useless now (he says it with deep regret) and that its dying.

It wouldn't be any weirder than an Irish person speaking French or any other language tbh.

Well if you think about Irish being useless, just think if you were to learn mandarin but never got to go to china or utilise it (you couldn't really here or in England to its full potential) wouldn't that be a useless language as well?

It's your own choice to make. I'm a fluent Irish speaker and I'm starting to appreciate it more now than when I was at school and the way I see it, I'm more Irish than a lot of people who can't speak their country's language.

But if you feel you would like a more mainstream language learn French. It's relatively easy to learn and sounds way better than German!:p

Vicar in a tutu

Learn Latin. or gibberish.

UrbanSea

I've wanted to learn Arabic for a while but it's supposedly ridiculously hard

Ficheall

The languages on my list to learn are Spanish and Norwegian. Spanish, because it's easy when you have French, and Norwegian because it sounds pretty, and more importantly - Scandinavian women are fierce attractive, as a rule. Finnish and Icelandic are beautiful sounding languages, but seem to be much more difficult than the other two.

Scanlas The 2nd

I'm learning Spanish and Italian at the moment. Hope it doesn't get too confusing. Also trying to become fluent in German, though I could hold a conversation in German 10 years ago, it's faded since then.

snubbleste

the language of Love.

cocoshovel

Whatever language you have a genuine interest in. If you dont, well you probably wont succeed.

Havermeyer

If it hasn't already been mentioned, I'd recommend Esperanto.

biko

Klingon

Wibbs

fleet wrote: »

The Chinese are coming lads (so long as they can keep sourcing cheap energy).

No they're really not. Cheap energy is the least of their worries, though a big one. They're sitting on the biggest commodities boom in world history* and facing a demographic shift that no economy has been able to navigate without going south(they're growing older before they're growing richer), never mind the governments hidden debt percentages. The future facing China's inexorable rise is anything but certain, it's more certain to go wallop in a spectacular fashion.

Mandarin? Great if you've an interest and fair play, or like you are living and working there or have a Chinese partner, but as a useful language in the sense it's being touted, I hardly think so. In any event, the buyer in a transaction chooses the language and the buyers for Chinese goods are outside the country(hence a fairly big push behind English as a second language in China itself).






*In 2010 the electrical stats for China showed sixty million apartments that used no electricity for over 6 months. That's unoccupied living space for a couple of hundred million people, yet the government is talking about building 20 new cities in the next decade. I find it - well not quite laughable, but quite puzzling, with a side order of amusement - that a fellow Irish person of all nationalities doesn't get a sense of deja vu on steroids.

SharpshooterTom

1ZRed wrote: »

It wouldn't be any weirder than an Irish person speaking French or any other language tbh.

Well if you think about Irish being useless, just think if you were to learn mandarin but never got to go to china or utilise it (you couldn't really here or in England to its full potential) wouldn't that be a useless language as well?

It's your own choice to make. I'm a fluent Irish speaker and I'm starting to appreciate it more now than when I was at school and the way I see it, I'm more Irish than a lot of people who can't speak their country's language.

But if you feel you would like a more mainstream language learn French. It's relatively easy to learn and sounds way better than German!:p

I like German culture though so thats why I find it interesting.

Irish though? Well I do live in Ireland now (for the past 12 years) my father speaks it fluently so it could very interesting. I wonder if I would freak some Irish people out speaking it with an English accent.

Gnobe

Gnobe wrote: »

I like German culture though so thats why I find it interesting.

Irish though? Well I do live in Ireland now (for the past 12 years) my father speaks it fluently so it could very interesting. I wonder if I would freak some Irish people out speaking it with an English accent.

Why don't you just speak it with an Irish accent? I have an English accent when I speak English now, but if I speak Irish, I sound Irish.

SharpshooterTom

Mayson Old Advisor wrote: »

Why don't you just speak it with an Irish accent? I have an English accent when I speak English now, but if I speak Irish, I sound Irish.

Why would you do that? When foreigners speak English they speak it in their respective accents. Unless you're Jan Molby or something, its rare for a person to speak with the local dialect when learning the language.

3ndahalfof6

Ferengie it is the business language of the universe.

Naomi00

fleet wrote: »

Do you know how laughable that sounds to an Irish person sitting on his sofa, in Xi'an, with his Chinese girlfriend yabbering away on the blower in Mandarin?

The Chinese are coming lads (so long as they can keep sourcing cheap energy).

Eh, same could be said for an Irish person in any country speaking any other language.

1ZRed

Gnobe wrote: »

I like German culture though so thats why I find it interesting.

Irish though? Well I do live in Ireland now (for the past 12 years) my father speaks it fluently so it could very interesting. I wonder if I would freak some Irish people out speaking it with an English accent.

When I speack French I actually sound legitly French regardless of my accent (can't say I even have a strong one to begin with but still!:p)


And if you were to learn Irish it would sound weird to me up or down because it would be "book Irish" whereas I have the far superior Gaeltacht Irish:p
I'm only fcuking with you, it won't sound weird because you'll learn how to pronounce the words properly.
Do you think I go around saying Bon-jouR and tres bi-en when I speak French?:)

Gnobe

Gnobe wrote: »

Why would you do that? When foreigners speak English they speak it in their respective accents. Unless you're Jan Molby or something, its rare for a person to speak with the local dialect when learning the language.

They speak with their own accents because making the sounds of the new language is difficult. Most people at least try to sound native, even if they don't manage it. It shouldn't be hard for you if you've lived in Ireland for ages and your dad is Irish. I speak two other languages fluently and I don't have an English accent in either of them.

Naomi00

Gnobe wrote: »

I like German culture though so thats why I find it interesting.

Irish though? Well I do live in Ireland now (for the past 12 years) my father speaks it fluently so it could very interesting. I wonder if I would freak some Irish people out speaking it with an English accent.

No there's lots of people with English accents that learn Irish at school etc, it's not weird at all.

Gnobe

Gnobe wrote: »

Why would you do that? When foreigners speak English they speak it in their respective accents. .

A french lady complained to me once that if we wanted to learn french, we could mimic the french accent. If we wanted to learn spanish, spanish accent. But if/when she wanted to learn english, they'd no idea what accent to go for since something like british was so different from american
not entirely accurate and doesn't allow for regional stuff I suppose, but could have had a point

SharpshooterTom

Naomi00 wrote: »

No there's lots of people with English accents that learn Irish at school etc, it's not weird at all.

Really where? There weren't many English accents at my school here!

Rhyme

nummnutts wrote: »

If it hasn't already been mentioned, I'd recommend Esperanto.

Came here to post this.

Get to it.

cynder

Flash, flex or cold fusion.


Or perhaps ancient Greek...

On a serious note, sign language....

Pick a language that you'll enjoy the most, you might end up struggling to find motivation for another language otherwise. Are there any cultures you find very interesting in that you'd like to learn about their history and such? Say French for example, I studied literature in which I was able to learn more about France's history.Russian would be interesting. What about Arabic? Could get a job with the M15 then! I hear Korean is the easiest of the East Asian languages.

Burky126

Funnily enough I was thinking the same thing.I've always wanted to learn a language on my own at my own pace and I've some time to do it! Going to try Swedish for a bit and see how I get on,already learning some interesting things like for example gift is Swedish for poison and marriage.What a people!

pconn062

I thoroughly recommend learning German, especially if you have some experience of it in school. I have been learning it for about 4 months now and it's challenging but very rewarding. There are a lot of words that are similar to English and if you can get over the tricky grammar, it's a very easy language to fall in love with, making it easier to learn. Viel Glück!

FullRetard

1ZRed wrote: »

Irish?

might get you a job in the civil service if thats what you want otherwise I'd go for a more practical one like german or whatever the Han chinese speak

Naomi00

Gnobe wrote: »

Really where? There weren't many English accents at my school here!

There's lots of English people in my school (just finished 6th year)

I've never really noticed accents when people speak Irish, if you pronounce the words properly it's not a problem.

byte

Would sign language not be difficult too, due to the likes of Irish, British and even US sign languages being different (I'm not sure to what degree).

Ficheall

byte wrote: »

Would sign language not be difficult too, due to the likes of Irish, British and even US sign languages being different (I'm not sure to what degree).

Learning one would make it much easier to learn others. As with most languages, I suppose, but to a greater extent as sign language seems more intuitive than other languages.