In search of the world’s hardest language
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Re: In search of the world’s hardest language
#2a lie and the truth is pretty easy. Lies are plural, truth is singular.
On the other hand, convincing a foreigner whose native language doesn't have articles, that articles are necessary... that is challenge.
Re: In search of the world’s hardest language
#3Malbolge, right?
Re: In search of the world’s hardest language
#4a lie and the truth is pretty easy. Lies are plural, truth is singular. On the other hand, convincing a foreigner whose native language doesn't have articles, that articles are necessary... that is challenge.
You can also tell a truth, as in 'an uncomfortable truth', though it's pretty unusual not to have some sort of adjective squeezed in there.
Re: In search of the world’s hardest language
#5a lie and the truth is pretty easy. Lies are plural, truth is singular. On the other hand, convincing a foreigner whose native language doesn't have articles, that articles are necessary... that is challenge.
It's not a matter of being "necessary", it's just the rules of this language.
Re: In search of the world’s hardest language
#6The article speaks about Latin, but so conveniently leaves out Sanskrit, ostensibly the mother of languages when you consider structure and logic. I mean, not even a mention, c'mon!!
By the way Sankrit itself means "perfect language" roughly.
Re: In search of the world’s hardest language
#7The U.S. Foreign Service Institute's School of Language Studies publishes this list of languages:
https://www.state.gov/m/fsi/sls/orgoverview/languages/
They break languages (note: that they teach) into four categories:
* Category I: Languages closely related to English.
* Category II: Languages that take a little longer to master than Category I languages.
* Category III: Languages with significant linguistic and/or cultural differences from English.
* Category IV: Languages which are exceptionally difficult for native English speakers.
Re: In search of the world’s hardest language
#8> “Ghoti,” as wordsmiths have noted, could be pronounced “fish”: gh as in “cough”, o as in “women” and ti as in “motion”.
Pet issue: 'ghoti' can never be pronounced 'fish' using English rules, because 'g(h)' is never 'f' at the start of a word; only with the preceding vowels does it sound like this, and even then only as an exception to another rule.
Re: In search of the world’s hardest language
#9a lie and the truth is pretty easy. Lies are plural, truth is singular. On the other hand, convincing a foreigner whose native language doesn't have articles, that articles are necessary... that is challenge.
You say _a_ lie and _the_ truth is pretty easy, but you're coming from the position that there is always one truth and there can be many lies.
Our culture expresses truth and falsehood as a dichotomy in which there is only one truth and many falsehoods. This is not real, though—it's just something that exists in your mind. You could choose to look at it another way, and if that was how you were taught and it was idiomatic in your language, then you would also say it was easy.
Here your intuition is not shaping your understanding of truth and falsehood—culture and language have shaped your understanding.
So whether you're learning to express truth and falsehood idiomatically in a language, or whether you're learning how to use articles or not use articles, it is only easy or hard depending on how your culture has shaped your perception of things.
Re: In search of the world’s hardest language
#10The U.S. Foreign Service Institute's School of Language Studies publishes this list of languages: https://www.state.gov/m/fsi/sls/orgoverview/languages/ They break languages (note: that they teach) into four categories: * Category I: Languages closely related to English. * Category II: Languages that take a little longer to master than Category I languages. * Category III: Languages with significant linguistic and/or…
There is also a Category V, which requires twice the study hours of Category IV (2200 hours) [1].
Last I heard, Category V was an unofficial level, and Korean was the only language in the category. It seems they made it official and shifted the languages around (interestingly, German is only language in Category II, now. And Japanese is considered more difficult than Korean.)
[1]: http://www.effectivelanguagelearning.com/language-guide/lang...