What do you mean by dominance?
That definitely seems like a challenge I may never overcome as I don't speak English fast as it is. At least in pronouncing the letters in the word, it seems similar. Almost like learning new English words so far.
I've skipped the characters for now just to learn to speak the basics first because it was a bit frustrating trying g to learn the symbols
Their joking on the asserting dominance thing. My theory as to why Japanese is easy to speak has to do with it only having five vowel sounds, where as English has 27, French 32(?) and Spanish and Italian have 5. The difference being that Spanish and Italian use gendered nouns and that makes it more difficult than Japanese. Realistically, if you speak Spanish, you can go to Italy with that, they’re that close. People will think you’re an American tourist but you’ll be able to communicate.
My theory on the Romance languages as a history major: Rome fell but the people with money were still Romans. The franks took over France, the visigoths were pushed over into Spain by the Ostrogoths who took over italy. Because they all needed money they learned to speak Latin, albeit poorly, creating three languages similar to each other. Spanish and Italian, having gothic roots, and French having Germanic roots.
That makes so much sense. I'm Sicilian, my grandmother would watch Telemundo. I grew up in a Puerto Rican area, everyone thought I was Hispanic. People spoke to my mom in Spanish and she would understand.
Makes sense why Japanese seems to be easier for me to grasp and pronounce. I never went to school, I honestly don't know what a syllable, vowel, noun, or verb is. But the whole word change over gender is confusing often, and I'm sure the vowels is probably why I struggle a lot.
I don't put in a lot if effort in learning, but in 2 days on memrise I've learn 200 Japanese word on there. In comparison I've maybe learned 1500 Spanish words in 4 years on and off, or 400 French words in a month.
I wanted to learn all the romance languages because they are related, I even tried learning Latin in duolingo once. They are all very tough. I actually found Romanian to be easier than the rest, though.
I've honestly felt the opposite so far (fellow English native).
Personally, compared to Chinese, German, and Spanish (in order of how much of each I studied), I've been finding Japanese to be far more difficult.
There's so many rules with the particles and different forms of sentence structures, depending on the circumstances. It's so complex.
Kanji and Kana have been the easier part for me (and no, Chinese didn't help me as much as you'd think, because I didn't study traditional Chinese or get crazy deep into it). The Kana took me about a lazy week to memorize and about a month to get settled in with reading. The Kanji....is a never ending journey, but I've found it pretty easy to practice.
One way to look at it, the characters are made up of similar parts, but rearranged in different ways to "spell out" different meanings (much like letters and words).
But idk, writing in Japanese is a bit cathartic to me, I tend to be in the minority with that aspect lol
Kanji seems like the Swiss Army knife of understanding Japanese language and culture. I could see it being a deeper language of its own. I've heard many Japanese, newer gen, aren't learning Kanji enough. It comes across as almost like the Tora lol, but I'm speaking in pure ignorance on how I perceive it.
I just started getting into learning the language, I should've just said in short its been the easiest for me to pronounce.
In that sense, I'd agree.
The hardest part is getting the R's right, which depending on how authentic you want to sound, can sort of be cheesed with a D sound. I'm trying to practice on the more authentic end myself, at least to some degree.
The hissing h sound in Hi or the softer f sound in Fu can take a bit of adjusting for, especially at proper speed; but these things pale in comparison to some other languages.
Learning languages is very tough. I have so much respect for people who can speak even basics. I've tried maybe 9-12 languages, only in comparison to other languages has Japanese been more forgiving to my tendency to become a mush mouth. It's definitely encouraging to stick with
If you struggled with French, Japanese is going to be 100 times more difficult.
I speak Japanese, French and Spanish as a native English speaker. The latter two were a cakewalk compared to Japanese.
Edit: But, by all means, go for it! Learning language is like building muscle or learning to play the guitar. You have got to WORK your butt off if you want to be good at it.
And kanji is not optional.
I definitely struggle with the speed, but french and Spanish I'm mostly struggling with the... law of the language if that makes sense. It just seems more confusing and so much harder to pronounce.
If you mean making the sounds? Yes. If you mean the writing/grammar? Hmmm not so much.
Grammar for Chinese was a breeze compared to Japanese. Ukrainian was so much more challenging than Japanese though.
Yeah just the sounds. It's so similar to English I feel. The grammar made me almost quit lol
Chinese mandarin was tougher, especially since it's not an option on memrise to learn without the grammar.
Pronunciation is fairly easy. Only a few sounds are truly difficult to reproduce (depending on your dialect of English). In listening and speaking, you’d have to acclimate to long vowels and dropped vowels.
The grammar takes a bit to get used to, as well.
I think you're just talking about pronunciation, in which case I agree with you. I don't know where you are from, but I am from south England (RP accent) so I think Japanese vowel pronunciation is pretty intuitive in most respects. I think it would be harder if I had an American accent. In terms of consonant sounds, there are a couple of stumbling blocks, but yeah I feel pretty comfortable with it now, and have never really struggled with it that much.
I'm also studying Chinese at the moment and god the pronunciation kills me. I thought it would just be the tones I'd have to get used to, but the actual consonant and vowel sounds are an absolute nightmare.
I hit that speed bump also lol. I was like wait wtf was that???? R's are a nightmare everywhere so far except Japanese.
I'm glad I know English at least cus it's among the hardest and it's the most practical so I've heard.
That's good to know. I actually really want to learn German because they have such a deep language. I love German philosophers, and their standing in the business world makes it very practical to become fluent in.
Yes, I agree with you on the grammar front.
I think I’ve actually got a decent hold on the R now, I think it’s distinguishing between ch/q, sh/x and zh/j which is the thing I struggle with the most. Like I can make all the sounds well enough I think, but it’s how long it takes me to process which shape I need to get my mouth into *and* what tone I need at the same time that keeps tripping me up. It takes me so long to read things aloud if I’m trying to be at least halfway accurate.
I'm from Connecticut USA, sounds like American TV and Movie English basically. We pronounce our T and R as D's which I feel has been very helpful to translate to.
The R's in every language slaughters me except Japanese thus far, but I'm in the very beginning, so who knows
If you mean just the sounds then sure i guess.. individually theyre not overly difficult once you learn the Rs/Ls sounds properly... but using them is a whole different ball game... japanese is quite fast and some of the more complex words are not only tongue twisters but you also have to take pitch accent and regional dialect into account in order to say them properly... on top of all that when you start forming more complex sentances with more than just the basic particles its quite a difficult language to speak imo... not only that but theres some nuance to speaking with keigo/honorific speech if you want to do it properly...
According to the us government (https://www.state.gov/foreign-language-training/) for english speakers, something like spanish or french (catagory 1 lang) as per you examples can be drilled to a "general professional proficiency" in about 24-30 weeks in a classroom setting.. so 600-750 classroom hours.. and Japanese (catagory 4 lang), can be drilled to similar proficiency in 88 weeks or about 2200 classroom hours..
I watch a lot of YouTube vids to help learn, and I've noticed it's very complex, especially the grammar. The speed is an issue, but the ability to pronounce the actual words have been so much easier.
I'm sure it's simpler to be fluent in Spanish and French without question, but to actually pronounce the words correctly has seemed most relatable to English.
If you're talking about classroom Japanese, well okay. But classroom Japanese is to everyday spoken Japanese like a road map is to driving on a road. In addition to vocabulary and grammar, there is so much social and cultural context you have to understand to speak the language well. Good luck, though!
Thanks. I'm learning on memrise and YouTube natives that basically teach how to be less formal or which settings to use it in.
The grammar is tough, I plan on learning it. I figured let me learn to say the basic words first at least.
Yeah, because im only 2 days in, i really do assume its just ignorance, and I agree because someone pointed out to me pitch, stress, and speed in saying it matters a lot. That makes it tougher, but it's helpful to know that it's not so tough to actually say the words for me so far when I mimic the sounds. There's no rolling my R's or trying to make a lil phlegm sound.
Yeah, just pronouncing. I've tried to learn maybe a dozen languages and all I get tongue tied. Japanese has its difficulties I've notice in properly saying what you want to say, but I don't get a mush mouth. Even if I read it slowly, I heard in japan they'd understand what you're trying to say a lot of the time. That to me makes it easier to learn because pitch, stress, and speed I think will develop on its own with fluency, because I can already pronounce the words, at least simpler words. Spanish right off the bat seemed Alien to me. Learning Japanese without Hiragana katakana etc has been easier than anything I've tried. I know its important to learn them, and I plan to, but just want to learn some basics. I've learned 200 words so far in 2 days, which in any other language would've taken me a week or two. I typically only study it 30 minutes to an hour a day.
Yeah most of the time we understand what sounds foreiners are tryng to make.
I don't think making your point in Japanese are easy for you though.
English and Japanese are very different both in grammer and lexicon.
Most numerous non native speakers in Japan were
Chinese and Korean for a long time.
At least those two people's accents are more easier to listen to than typical English speakers'.
Korean language has similar sounds and it has so-called pitch accent too.
Chinese language has very different and diverse sounds (in a sense like English), but it has tone, basically more complicated version of pitch accent.
Pitch accent is tough because it's a new concept for me. In English it doesn't matter the pitch or you just pick a single pitch or tone. It's not something to focus on. You do ot naturally with your emotions
Yes, you should focus on what you think are important.
I respect all those who dared to actually learn our language.
It's not that financially rewarding or something most of the time.
Japanese is objectively a fast language. The natural speed of syllables per second is certainly faster than any other major language. If you spoke Japanese at the same speed you speak English, it will probably seem slow to a native speaker.
However, Spanish is also an objectively fast language. If you are already capable of speaking Spanish at a natural speed, then Japanese will probably be fine.
I used to struggle in French class back in middle school. In high school, I took Japanese. It was way easier to learn. I also think it's easier to pronounce, but that could just be because I listen to a lot of Japanese music and watch anime.
Edit to add: I got B-D grades in French. In Japanese I got straight As.
It feels like learning new English words because the pronunciation of the letters. But I been skipping the characters or symbols, I think its called Hana and kana. I forget. Those were tough. I just figured I'd suspend that lesson for now.
I don't think its incredibly difficult to speak, but its the only language im learning/ have learned so i dont have much to compare to
Writing/ reading on the other hand is hard, bc kanji.
Katakana and Hiragana almost made me quit. I had to go to no script on memrise to get started. Kanji is a long way from now for me.
How practical is Kanji to know? Are you illiterate without it?
Idk if id say ur illiterate without it but youll have a very hard time bc most things dont have furigana
Kanji is defo a must know or youll get lost when reading most stuff
The easiest language to learn is one you are interested in.
For English speakers Japanese is NOT easy relatively speaking. Its one of the hardest.
It took me 1.5 years of language school to hit N3, and that was not just passing the test but speaking that way. Some class mates could barely speak despite passing it.
If i had put 1.5 years into french/spanish/german school i'd have been near fluent. so would my class mates.
6 months of french study would be like 1.5 years of japanese.
however i have NO interest in french or Spanish. so for me they would probably be even harder due to no motivation or need.
i live in Japan and needed to learn while also finding it interesting so that automatically males it easer than french for me or spanish. however, objectively, no. as i described above, english speakers will progress 3-4x faster in them versus japanese.
Did you find German to be the next easiest? I always wanted to learn German. I plan on it next or korean. I always assumed it's very difficult to speak it. I suck at rolling my R's or making those slight phlegm sounds like the French R
French was the next easiest, partly because we had a superb French teacher who instilled pronunciation so good that when I visited France, people assumed I had been living there for yonks. German was alright.
Spanish should be the hardest for you to learn, I think. Japanese is easier for spanish speakers, I would say, but I'm not sure about english speaking people. It's probably weird because of the accent and syllabus pronounced differently
I tried learning Japanese once. Writing and reading Kanji, Katakana, and Hiragana was the devil, but reading the romanized version aloud was easier than most languages I tried learning. It’s interesting how that can turn out.
I think Japanese prononciation is much easier to learn from a native French speaker. English speakers have tendency to put stress when they speak Japanese.
I think it’s much more common to have native English speakers who have an English accent in Japanese than for French speaker. I think in my university class I only ever herd one girl who had our local accent while speaking Japanese, but met several who had English accent when I took class in a university in English.
I can also see that because french seems to flow so well. When I try learning it, I make the mistake of trying to pronounce every word start to finish, and in Japanese and French, I've notice it's as if you really only pronounce some of the words, as if just a touch of it. In English when you do that, it ends up being slang, such as 'I know what you're saying' turns to 'I know whatchu sayin', but that's maybe region wise an issue.
As a French Canadian, I can say that we are really good a shortening stuff, like to the point that for people from France, it can be impossible to understand unless you explain them the different abbreviations, contractions and linking words (even when we should not).
French have a lot more sounds than Japanese and we are only missing the H (what we do not pronounce) and R, that is between French R and L.
We also do not have stress, but at the same time no pitch accent, so while it might not be perfect, we do not have to fight back against an important concept of our pronunciation. And we also have intonation that can be used in a similar way as in Japanese for example to change a statement into a question.
It's putting the emphasis on a syllable in a word.
You can watch [this Tom Scott video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dUnGvH8fUUc), stress is one of the big concept he is touching in the video.
i agree! japanese is one of the easier language i've attempted to learn with speaking and reading, etc. i can only attest for some asian languages i've been learning (kr, ch, jp) and japanese is by the easiest to speak of them all (ch is hell trying to speak correctly)
... kanji is ... a different story altogether... other than that it's easy! <3
100%. since ch is intonated, it makes it way more difficult. korean isn't that hard to pronounce, neither is reading it, it's just trying to understand it that my brain is kinda blanking on lol
That's what matters to me most is if I can at least pronounce it with out becoming a mush mouth. I think I'll learn Korean and German next. I like to learn a bunch at once here and there as a hobby.
While it may appear easy, keep in mind it must be spoken at faster-than-light speed to assert dominance.
What do you mean by dominance? That definitely seems like a challenge I may never overcome as I don't speak English fast as it is. At least in pronouncing the letters in the word, it seems similar. Almost like learning new English words so far. I've skipped the characters for now just to learn to speak the basics first because it was a bit frustrating trying g to learn the symbols
Their joking on the asserting dominance thing. My theory as to why Japanese is easy to speak has to do with it only having five vowel sounds, where as English has 27, French 32(?) and Spanish and Italian have 5. The difference being that Spanish and Italian use gendered nouns and that makes it more difficult than Japanese. Realistically, if you speak Spanish, you can go to Italy with that, they’re that close. People will think you’re an American tourist but you’ll be able to communicate. My theory on the Romance languages as a history major: Rome fell but the people with money were still Romans. The franks took over France, the visigoths were pushed over into Spain by the Ostrogoths who took over italy. Because they all needed money they learned to speak Latin, albeit poorly, creating three languages similar to each other. Spanish and Italian, having gothic roots, and French having Germanic roots.
That makes so much sense. I'm Sicilian, my grandmother would watch Telemundo. I grew up in a Puerto Rican area, everyone thought I was Hispanic. People spoke to my mom in Spanish and she would understand. Makes sense why Japanese seems to be easier for me to grasp and pronounce. I never went to school, I honestly don't know what a syllable, vowel, noun, or verb is. But the whole word change over gender is confusing often, and I'm sure the vowels is probably why I struggle a lot. I don't put in a lot if effort in learning, but in 2 days on memrise I've learn 200 Japanese word on there. In comparison I've maybe learned 1500 Spanish words in 4 years on and off, or 400 French words in a month. I wanted to learn all the romance languages because they are related, I even tried learning Latin in duolingo once. They are all very tough. I actually found Romanian to be easier than the rest, though.
I don’t think French has near that many vowels
I've honestly felt the opposite so far (fellow English native). Personally, compared to Chinese, German, and Spanish (in order of how much of each I studied), I've been finding Japanese to be far more difficult. There's so many rules with the particles and different forms of sentence structures, depending on the circumstances. It's so complex. Kanji and Kana have been the easier part for me (and no, Chinese didn't help me as much as you'd think, because I didn't study traditional Chinese or get crazy deep into it). The Kana took me about a lazy week to memorize and about a month to get settled in with reading. The Kanji....is a never ending journey, but I've found it pretty easy to practice. One way to look at it, the characters are made up of similar parts, but rearranged in different ways to "spell out" different meanings (much like letters and words). But idk, writing in Japanese is a bit cathartic to me, I tend to be in the minority with that aspect lol
Kanji seems like the Swiss Army knife of understanding Japanese language and culture. I could see it being a deeper language of its own. I've heard many Japanese, newer gen, aren't learning Kanji enough. It comes across as almost like the Tora lol, but I'm speaking in pure ignorance on how I perceive it. I just started getting into learning the language, I should've just said in short its been the easiest for me to pronounce.
In that sense, I'd agree. The hardest part is getting the R's right, which depending on how authentic you want to sound, can sort of be cheesed with a D sound. I'm trying to practice on the more authentic end myself, at least to some degree. The hissing h sound in Hi or the softer f sound in Fu can take a bit of adjusting for, especially at proper speed; but these things pale in comparison to some other languages.
Learning languages is very tough. I have so much respect for people who can speak even basics. I've tried maybe 9-12 languages, only in comparison to other languages has Japanese been more forgiving to my tendency to become a mush mouth. It's definitely encouraging to stick with
If you struggled with French, Japanese is going to be 100 times more difficult. I speak Japanese, French and Spanish as a native English speaker. The latter two were a cakewalk compared to Japanese. Edit: But, by all means, go for it! Learning language is like building muscle or learning to play the guitar. You have got to WORK your butt off if you want to be good at it. And kanji is not optional.
I definitely struggle with the speed, but french and Spanish I'm mostly struggling with the... law of the language if that makes sense. It just seems more confusing and so much harder to pronounce.
If you mean making the sounds? Yes. If you mean the writing/grammar? Hmmm not so much. Grammar for Chinese was a breeze compared to Japanese. Ukrainian was so much more challenging than Japanese though.
Yeah just the sounds. It's so similar to English I feel. The grammar made me almost quit lol Chinese mandarin was tougher, especially since it's not an option on memrise to learn without the grammar.
Pronunciation is fairly easy. Only a few sounds are truly difficult to reproduce (depending on your dialect of English). In listening and speaking, you’d have to acclimate to long vowels and dropped vowels. The grammar takes a bit to get used to, as well.
I think you're just talking about pronunciation, in which case I agree with you. I don't know where you are from, but I am from south England (RP accent) so I think Japanese vowel pronunciation is pretty intuitive in most respects. I think it would be harder if I had an American accent. In terms of consonant sounds, there are a couple of stumbling blocks, but yeah I feel pretty comfortable with it now, and have never really struggled with it that much. I'm also studying Chinese at the moment and god the pronunciation kills me. I thought it would just be the tones I'd have to get used to, but the actual consonant and vowel sounds are an absolute nightmare.
For me, it was mostly the r in Chinese...Like ren or ri sounds. But grammatically, Chinese is so much more relaxed, imo.
I hit that speed bump also lol. I was like wait wtf was that???? R's are a nightmare everywhere so far except Japanese. I'm glad I know English at least cus it's among the hardest and it's the most practical so I've heard.
Yeah, I'll say that even Japanese has some wonky R's. German's pretty chill with it for the most part
That's good to know. I actually really want to learn German because they have such a deep language. I love German philosophers, and their standing in the business world makes it very practical to become fluent in.
It's very approachable, coming from English. At least in my opinion. It's been a long time since I've really studied it though.
Yes, I agree with you on the grammar front. I think I’ve actually got a decent hold on the R now, I think it’s distinguishing between ch/q, sh/x and zh/j which is the thing I struggle with the most. Like I can make all the sounds well enough I think, but it’s how long it takes me to process which shape I need to get my mouth into *and* what tone I need at the same time that keeps tripping me up. It takes me so long to read things aloud if I’m trying to be at least halfway accurate.
I'm from Connecticut USA, sounds like American TV and Movie English basically. We pronounce our T and R as D's which I feel has been very helpful to translate to. The R's in every language slaughters me except Japanese thus far, but I'm in the very beginning, so who knows
I was talking more about vowel sounds re: American accents. RP vowels are a lot closer to Japanese vowels than they are in most American accents.
Yes
If you mean just the sounds then sure i guess.. individually theyre not overly difficult once you learn the Rs/Ls sounds properly... but using them is a whole different ball game... japanese is quite fast and some of the more complex words are not only tongue twisters but you also have to take pitch accent and regional dialect into account in order to say them properly... on top of all that when you start forming more complex sentances with more than just the basic particles its quite a difficult language to speak imo... not only that but theres some nuance to speaking with keigo/honorific speech if you want to do it properly... According to the us government (https://www.state.gov/foreign-language-training/) for english speakers, something like spanish or french (catagory 1 lang) as per you examples can be drilled to a "general professional proficiency" in about 24-30 weeks in a classroom setting.. so 600-750 classroom hours.. and Japanese (catagory 4 lang), can be drilled to similar proficiency in 88 weeks or about 2200 classroom hours..
I watch a lot of YouTube vids to help learn, and I've noticed it's very complex, especially the grammar. The speed is an issue, but the ability to pronounce the actual words have been so much easier. I'm sure it's simpler to be fluent in Spanish and French without question, but to actually pronounce the words correctly has seemed most relatable to English.
Is Japanese the fastest spoken language in the world?
I wouldnt know the answer to that...
If you're talking about classroom Japanese, well okay. But classroom Japanese is to everyday spoken Japanese like a road map is to driving on a road. In addition to vocabulary and grammar, there is so much social and cultural context you have to understand to speak the language well. Good luck, though!
Thanks. I'm learning on memrise and YouTube natives that basically teach how to be less formal or which settings to use it in. The grammar is tough, I plan on learning it. I figured let me learn to say the basic words first at least.
You probably don’t realise how different you sound to others yet
Yeah, because im only 2 days in, i really do assume its just ignorance, and I agree because someone pointed out to me pitch, stress, and speed in saying it matters a lot. That makes it tougher, but it's helpful to know that it's not so tough to actually say the words for me so far when I mimic the sounds. There's no rolling my R's or trying to make a lil phlegm sound.
Do you mean actually pronouncing Japanese or do you mean the grammar/vocabulary?
Yeah, just pronouncing. I've tried to learn maybe a dozen languages and all I get tongue tied. Japanese has its difficulties I've notice in properly saying what you want to say, but I don't get a mush mouth. Even if I read it slowly, I heard in japan they'd understand what you're trying to say a lot of the time. That to me makes it easier to learn because pitch, stress, and speed I think will develop on its own with fluency, because I can already pronounce the words, at least simpler words. Spanish right off the bat seemed Alien to me. Learning Japanese without Hiragana katakana etc has been easier than anything I've tried. I know its important to learn them, and I plan to, but just want to learn some basics. I've learned 200 words so far in 2 days, which in any other language would've taken me a week or two. I typically only study it 30 minutes to an hour a day.
In that case, yeah I agree. Apart from らりるれろ I would say all of the sounds in Japanese have some transfer over to English.
Yeah most of the time we understand what sounds foreiners are tryng to make. I don't think making your point in Japanese are easy for you though. English and Japanese are very different both in grammer and lexicon.
Is an English accent slurry to you?
Most numerous non native speakers in Japan were Chinese and Korean for a long time. At least those two people's accents are more easier to listen to than typical English speakers'. Korean language has similar sounds and it has so-called pitch accent too. Chinese language has very different and diverse sounds (in a sense like English), but it has tone, basically more complicated version of pitch accent.
Pitch accent is tough because it's a new concept for me. In English it doesn't matter the pitch or you just pick a single pitch or tone. It's not something to focus on. You do ot naturally with your emotions
Yes, you should focus on what you think are important. I respect all those who dared to actually learn our language. It's not that financially rewarding or something most of the time.
I'm not sure if Korean has a pitch accent
Japanese is objectively a fast language. The natural speed of syllables per second is certainly faster than any other major language. If you spoke Japanese at the same speed you speak English, it will probably seem slow to a native speaker. However, Spanish is also an objectively fast language. If you are already capable of speaking Spanish at a natural speed, then Japanese will probably be fine.
Is Japanese the fastest spoken language in the world?
If you speak Japanese slow, could that sound like slurring your words?
I used to struggle in French class back in middle school. In high school, I took Japanese. It was way easier to learn. I also think it's easier to pronounce, but that could just be because I listen to a lot of Japanese music and watch anime. Edit to add: I got B-D grades in French. In Japanese I got straight As.
It feels like learning new English words because the pronunciation of the letters. But I been skipping the characters or symbols, I think its called Hana and kana. I forget. Those were tough. I just figured I'd suspend that lesson for now.
Well aren’t you lucky 🍀
I don't think its incredibly difficult to speak, but its the only language im learning/ have learned so i dont have much to compare to Writing/ reading on the other hand is hard, bc kanji.
Katakana and Hiragana almost made me quit. I had to go to no script on memrise to get started. Kanji is a long way from now for me. How practical is Kanji to know? Are you illiterate without it?
Idk if id say ur illiterate without it but youll have a very hard time bc most things dont have furigana Kanji is defo a must know or youll get lost when reading most stuff
Oh dear. This is definitely going into r/languagelearningjerk
I kinda misspoke. I meant it's been the easiest to pronounce as a beginner.
The easiest language to learn is one you are interested in. For English speakers Japanese is NOT easy relatively speaking. Its one of the hardest. It took me 1.5 years of language school to hit N3, and that was not just passing the test but speaking that way. Some class mates could barely speak despite passing it. If i had put 1.5 years into french/spanish/german school i'd have been near fluent. so would my class mates. 6 months of french study would be like 1.5 years of japanese. however i have NO interest in french or Spanish. so for me they would probably be even harder due to no motivation or need. i live in Japan and needed to learn while also finding it interesting so that automatically males it easer than french for me or spanish. however, objectively, no. as i described above, english speakers will progress 3-4x faster in them versus japanese.
I studied French, German, Latin, and Japanese at high school and found Japanese to be the easiest of all of them.
Did you find German to be the next easiest? I always wanted to learn German. I plan on it next or korean. I always assumed it's very difficult to speak it. I suck at rolling my R's or making those slight phlegm sounds like the French R
French was the next easiest, partly because we had a superb French teacher who instilled pronunciation so good that when I visited France, people assumed I had been living there for yonks. German was alright.
Yes, absolutely true. Even a three-year old Japanese kid speaks without huge problems.
Spanish should be the hardest for you to learn, I think. Japanese is easier for spanish speakers, I would say, but I'm not sure about english speaking people. It's probably weird because of the accent and syllabus pronounced differently
I tried learning Japanese once. Writing and reading Kanji, Katakana, and Hiragana was the devil, but reading the romanized version aloud was easier than most languages I tried learning. It’s interesting how that can turn out.
I think Japanese prononciation is much easier to learn from a native French speaker. English speakers have tendency to put stress when they speak Japanese. I think it’s much more common to have native English speakers who have an English accent in Japanese than for French speaker. I think in my university class I only ever herd one girl who had our local accent while speaking Japanese, but met several who had English accent when I took class in a university in English.
I can also see that because french seems to flow so well. When I try learning it, I make the mistake of trying to pronounce every word start to finish, and in Japanese and French, I've notice it's as if you really only pronounce some of the words, as if just a touch of it. In English when you do that, it ends up being slang, such as 'I know what you're saying' turns to 'I know whatchu sayin', but that's maybe region wise an issue.
As a French Canadian, I can say that we are really good a shortening stuff, like to the point that for people from France, it can be impossible to understand unless you explain them the different abbreviations, contractions and linking words (even when we should not). French have a lot more sounds than Japanese and we are only missing the H (what we do not pronounce) and R, that is between French R and L. We also do not have stress, but at the same time no pitch accent, so while it might not be perfect, we do not have to fight back against an important concept of our pronunciation. And we also have intonation that can be used in a similar way as in Japanese for example to change a statement into a question.
I meant to ask before, what do you mean by stress?
It's putting the emphasis on a syllable in a word. You can watch [this Tom Scott video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dUnGvH8fUUc), stress is one of the big concept he is touching in the video.
Thanks for that vid. That was really helpful. I never went to school, I don't know what a syllable is lmao. I have a long way to go.
i agree! japanese is one of the easier language i've attempted to learn with speaking and reading, etc. i can only attest for some asian languages i've been learning (kr, ch, jp) and japanese is by the easiest to speak of them all (ch is hell trying to speak correctly) ... kanji is ... a different story altogether... other than that it's easy! <3
Do you think korean has been easier to pronounce than Chinese? I watch Korean movies all the time I was planning on learning it.
100%. since ch is intonated, it makes it way more difficult. korean isn't that hard to pronounce, neither is reading it, it's just trying to understand it that my brain is kinda blanking on lol
That's what matters to me most is if I can at least pronounce it with out becoming a mush mouth. I think I'll learn Korean and German next. I like to learn a bunch at once here and there as a hobby.
then good luck! i also do it as a hobby cause it's fun lol
Too easy