Language

Ikra0t

5

Is Arabic hard to learn?

In terms of learning, it takes longer than some of the european languages like french and spanish but in terms of pronounciation, it is difficult.

Reply 2

Bean_cat

15

It is known as one of the most difficult languages to learn - especially with the pronunciation as others have mentioned but also because of it's alphabet/lettering

(edited 1 year ago)

Original post by Bean_cat

It is known as one of the most difficult languages to learn - especially with the pronunciation as others have mentioned but also because of it's alphabet/lettering

Yeah, there’s about 4 ways to pronounce each letter of the alphabet e.g.
جَ ، جِ ، جُ ، جْ

And because of the alphabet it’s written from right to left and not left to write so it is hard in that aspect too.

Reply 4

Bean_cat

15

Original post by JA03

Yeah, there’s about 4 ways to pronounce each letter of the alphabet e.g.
جَ ، جِ ، جُ ، جْ

And because of the alphabet it’s written from right to left and not left to write so it is hard in that aspect too.

That's a really good point! It takes a while to learn how to write all the letters too

Reply 5

artful_lounger

Universities Forum Helper

21

Depends what your background is in languages and culturally.

According to my dad who is/was fluent in it (and French) it's not too bad once you know how to read the script, as the grammar isn't too bad and there are a number of cognates with European languages (due to loanwords going both ways). He said Chinese was much harder for him.

However there are a lot of dialects of it and I don't know if all are mutually intelligible.

Original post by artful_lounger

Depends what your background is in languages and culturally.

According to my dad who is/was fluent in it (and French) it's not too bad once you know how to read the script, as the grammar isn't too bad and there are a number of cognates with European languages (due to loanwords going both ways). He said Chinese was much harder for him.

However there are a lot of dialects of it and I don't know if all are mutually intelligible.

They’re not. I speak one of the North African dialects and I have a bit of a Saudi dialect - it does make the difference because I don’t necessarily understand people who are from the same place I am but I understand a lot of middle eastern people.

Honestly, each dialect is so different like the moroccan dialect is described as a mixture of french and spanish and it really depends on how many you know. So I usually write and read the Saudi dialect (I speak it a lot too) but I primarily speak my parents’ native dialect however, my mum can speak, read and write every arabic dialect and somehow be able to tell where someone is from based off their dialect.

(edited 1 year ago)

Reply 7

aa12556

9

Original post by artful_lounger

Depends what your background is in languages and culturally.

According to my dad who is/was fluent in it (and French) it's not too bad once you know how to read the script, as the grammar isn't too bad and there are a number of cognates with European languages (due to loanwords going both ways). He said Chinese was much harder for him.

However there are a lot of dialects of it and I don't know if all are mutually intelligible

Most people in China know Mandarin, because the education children receive requires knowledge of Mandarin.
Dialects vary from city to city, so you do not necessarily understand the person even if they come from the same province.

Reply 8

artful_lounger

Universities Forum Helper

21

Original post by aa12556

Most people in China know Mandarin, because the education children receive requires knowledge of Mandarin.
Dialects vary from city to city, so you do not necessarily understand the person even if they come from the same province.

I meant Arabic dialects :smile:

But I'm sure it also applies to Chinese! My linguistics lecturer (who is himself Chinese and specialises in Chinese linguistics) said that quite a few of would-be "dialects" of Chinese would by most linguistic metrics be considered languages unto themselves, but often for politic reasons they are labelled as "dialects" instead.

Then again a famous linguist (Uriel Weinreich) popularised the adage "a language is a dialect with an army and navy" which might have some truth in it!

Reply 9

aa12556

9

Technically, I think a language should their own writing system and words, while Cantonese has some of these features, I think a lot of dialects are accents, and others do not have a writing system, so they cannot be called languages.

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