• UK at risk of being 'cut off from world' for not learning more languages
    245 replies, posted
[QUOTE=Conspiracy;32664686]It's really not so much that English is the language of the modern world, but just that it's become the lingua de franca for the time being. Learning English is something thats mandatory for the moment, but the lingua de franca was once Arabic. You never know when it can change, plus learning a second language is a good thing, you learn a lot about people through the way they phrase things. I'm not saying Britain will necessarily be 'shut off from the rest of the world' but there's nothing wrong with learning a second language in school, the coordinator of our schools curriculum is a British woman fluent in seven languages; and it makes public relations for the school that much easier.[/QUOTE] To be franc, we've come to the point where there won't be major battles that will drastically change the language we speak, so it's safe to say English will stay/become the language everyone speaks.
I hate people who don't know any more languages than their first language. People like this have IQ lower than 40.
My school has been teaching me Japanese since Year 3, and I still know barely anything in it. Watashi wa Spycrabz desu. Sushi. Kawaii. [editline]7th October 2011[/editline] That's about it.
English is just a blend of the North European languages, anyway. The reason it's spoken so much in Europe is because it's fairly easy to learn. If you consider general Language difficulty, nothing beats Spanish for being the easiest to learn, though.
[QUOTE=Garik;32652603]Pfft. most likely the easiest to learn. English.[/QUOTE] HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA. he said English is easy learn lmfaooo
[QUOTE=bluesky;32665302]HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA. he said English is easy learn lmfaooo[/QUOTE]English grammar is incredibly complex, how are foreigners supposed to know when to use "a" and "an" before a noun? Extremely complex if you ask me, you have to be born in England to understand that.
[QUOTE=Ond kaja;32665373]English grammar is incredibly complex, how are foreigners supposed to know when to use "a" and "an" before a noun? Extremely complex if you ask me, you have to be born in England to understand that.[/QUOTE]Even if you don't do that, it doesn't completely ruin the sentence. "A apple" gets the point across just as well as, "an apple," it just sounds retarded.
[QUOTE=Ond kaja;32665373]English grammar is incredibly complex, how are foreigners supposed to know when to use "a" and "an" before a noun? Extremely complex if you ask me, you have to be born in England to understand that.[/QUOTE] I can understand most people who have butchered their grammar. Hell from being on the internet where bad grammar is common.
I wanted to learn Russian in HS... but all they offered was French and Spanish. :\ I took French, wasn't too bad.
Number of English speakers in the world ~2 Billion. lol.
33% of Britain knows a foreign language, there are more than 300 spoken language dialects in London, and Chinese children are being taught English as a second language in China. What a load of crock shit. The industrial languages right now I would consider to be are Japanese, Chinese, and German. French and Spanish are only worth learning if you are going to be a [i]charity worker[/i] in countries like Africa or Mexico.
[QUOTE=Ond kaja;32665373]English grammar is incredibly complex, how are foreigners supposed to know when to use "a" and "an" before a noun? Extremely complex if you ask me, you have to be born in England to understand that.[/QUOTE] Our grammar is composed less of rules, more of loosely followed guidelines.
[QUOTE=Contag;32666783]Our grammar is composed less of rules, more of loosely followed guidelines.[/QUOTE]As a matter of fact, I was ironic. You use "an" when the following noun begins with a syllable, and "a" when the following noun begins with a consonant.
[QUOTE=Ond kaja;32667109]As a matter of fact, I was ironic. You use "an" when the following noun begins with a syllable, and "a" when the following noun begins with a consonant.[/QUOTE] You mean a vowel sound, and then an 'a' for consonant sounds.
I had 3 years of french, and the only words I remember are ta mère.
[QUOTE=Ond kaja;32665373]how are foreigners supposed to know when to use "a" and "an" before a noun? Extremely complex if you ask me, you have to be born in England to understand that.[/QUOTE] uh not really you use "a" for nouns that begin with consonants and "an" for nouns that begin with vowels you could have picked a better example, like our retarded tense structure
[QUOTE=DainBramageStudios;32668220]uh not really you use "a" for nouns that begin with consonants and "an" for nouns that begin with vowels you could have picked a better example, like our retarded tense structure[/QUOTE] I was ironic, learning articles in English is easy as hell. How exactly is your tense structure retarded?
In Belgium, practically every person (especially the ones in Brussels) speak Dutch, French and English. Yes, that is one Roman language, one German language and one mish-mash of many different influences. On top of that, a large part have also studied Latin/Ancient Greek and some, myself included, also study Spanish, Italian and German. Add to that any other languages if they're immigrants (though then they usually lag behind in either Dutch or French because there's one of them they won't speak at home) and everyone can practically talk to anyone. I really don't see the issue so many people have with studying languages. Especially French. Unlike English, it fucking makes sense most of the time, especially pronunciation-wise. Dutch is probably the most structurally logical language out there, being relatively simple, spelling and pronunciation is consistent. (Rhyming and poetry is so very, very easy as well in it.) Though it does have its share of flaws, it was officially standardized relatively late (compared to, say, French) and thus has a lot less anomalies.
I'm doing French and Italian for my GCSEs (dunno why I thought two languages was a good idea..) I also do a Japanese lanugage club after school because I enjoy Japanese culture and I'm going there next year. Considering the amount of Japanese lessons I've had in relation to French/Italian ones... I remember a lot more.
[QUOTE=Niklas;32667370]I had 3 years of french, and the only words I remember are ta mère.[/QUOTE] Je ne parlé pas Francais. <-- Did done right? [editline]7th October 2011[/editline] [QUOTE=deltasquid;32669345]In Belgium, practically every person (especially the ones in Brussels) speak Dutch, French and English. Yes, that is one Roman language, one German language and one mish-mash of many different influences. On top of that, a large part have also studied Latin/Ancient Greek and some, myself included, also study Spanish, Italian and German. Add to that any other languages if they're immigrants (though then they usually lag behind in either Dutch or French because there's one of them they won't speak at home) and everyone can practically talk to anyone. I really don't see the issue so many people have with studying languages. Especially French. Unlike English, it fucking makes sense most of the time, especially pronunciation-wise. Dutch is probably the most structurally logical language out there, being relatively simple, spelling and pronunciation is consistent. (Rhyming and poetry is so very, very easy as well in it.) Though it does have its share of flaws, it was officially standardized relatively late (compared to, say, French) and thus has a lot less anomalies.[/QUOTE] I have yet to find a belgian person that doesn't refuse to either speak Dutch when they come from the French part, or French when they come from the Dutch part :v:
[QUOTE=mobrockers2;32669405]Je ne parlé pas Francais. <-- Did done right?[/QUOTE] no
[QUOTE=DainBramageStudios;32669514]no[/QUOTE] Je ne parle pas Français Better?
[QUOTE=Ond kaja;32669181]I was ironic, learning articles in English is easy as hell. How exactly is your tense structure retarded?[/QUOTE] we have 17 tenses that's about 7 too many.
[QUOTE=DainBramageStudios;32669550]we have 17 tenses that's about 7 too many.[/QUOTE] 10 is still a lot.
[QUOTE=mobrockers2;32669568]10 is still a lot.[/QUOTE] I'm including conditional in that subjunctive is used so rarely in english that I've ignored it, otherwise that would be 20+
past, present, future. All you ever need.
[QUOTE=mobrockers2;32669678]past, present, future. All you ever need.[/QUOTE] not really
[QUOTE=DainBramageStudios;32669688]not really[/QUOTE] I know, I'm kidding.
[QUOTE=Atlascore;32669785] The English aren't masters of their own language anyway, if anything they shouldn't be in charge of it, let's not forget things like "centre" and "reload" they both use "re" but the sounding of those two letters changes for literally no reason, why? Who the fuck knows, that shit literally does not fly in any other words in the language, except if they end with the letters r and e.[/QUOTE] We aren't in charge of it, no one is that is the joy of it being a non-prescriptive (I [I]think[/I] there is a real word for that) language. There is an explanation for why "re" changes, I think it is something to do with where it appears in the word.
Well, I was forced to learn English, Latin, French and Spanish. You lazy Tommies
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