How difficult is Hindi to learn?

It's difficult if you try to translate english-hindi word for word in your head . . .it's very easy if you hang around hindi speakers, or have someone to conversate with, and i daresay, if you start watching indian movies :biggrin:

.

P.S. I'm assuming you mean Hindustani and not proper Hindi

Reply 4

I speak Hindi. (well, more Urdu but they're in effect based on the same language)

For an English speaker to learn Hindi the same way French is taught in school would be impossible! (ok not literally but..)

Hindi is very very VERY different to modern european languages (as you can imagine). It has so many little little words that don't have meanings but functions.

Having said this, I'm not saying it'd be far too difficult to learn it. I remember I watched a funny YouTube video in which two white guys were speaking Hindi and I was amazed.

My advice would be to "pick it up". Learn bits formally, but not everything. Just keep asking native speakers how to say a certain/word phrase and keeping building it up like that.

Infact that goes for any language. Only then will you truly know the sociolinguistics of that language. Otherwise too much formal learning will result in constant self-correction of grammar and stuff like that which I think is not good.

Don't get me started on second language acquisition...lol

Reply 5

tazarooni89

20

I speak hindi. It doesn't seem particularly difficult, the grammatical structure is quite similar to Spanish, so I've found. I've tried to learn to read Hindi many times, but I just can't do it though :frown:

Reply 6

tazarooni89

I speak hindi. It doesn't seem particularly difficult, the grammatical structure is quite similar to Spanish, so I've found. I've tried to learn to read Hindi many times, but I just can't do it though :frown:

Learning to read/write Hindi is very very easy! It's very phonetic. Seriously I reckon I could teach you in a couple of hours. I'm not joking

Reply 7

tazarooni89

20

Cunning Linguist

Learning to read/write Hindi is very very easy! It's very phonetic. Seriously I reckon I could teach you in a couple of hours. I'm not joking

lol... maybe you're right. I always find myself learning a little, and then forgetting it next time I go to learn anything else :s-smilie:

All I know about written hindi is that the letters all seem to have a horizontal line running across the top of each word :s-smilie:

Reply 8

yeh there's the "washing line" where the letters hang off lol but that has nothing to do with the pronunciation of the letters, it's just a trait of the Devanagari script. Once you learn the concept of an abudiga, how it works, then all you need is to apply it to all the different letters and bang, you know how to read Hindi. Really is as simple as that.

It seems you don't have a high concentration span. It would be best to just learn it in one go. Not learn a bit, then come back to it etc etc.

Reply 9

tazarooni89

20

Cunning Linguist

It seems you don't have a high concentration span. It would be best to just learn it in one go. Not learn a bit, then come back to it etc etc.

You have most certainly got that right :biggrin:

Well to be honest, my "attempts" to learn hindi usually involve my mum teaching me a few letters, but then we get interrupted for some reason, and never finish...

Reply 10

In1Su

Alexii

I'm learning Urdu atm and once you've got past learning the script it's currently proving a relatively simple language to learn. I've found it interesting you can certainly find some words where you can see it's from the Indo-European language family. e.g. Maut is death, very similar to French to take one example.

Actually, "maut" is an Arabic word not a Hindi one (it has been assimilated).

Reply 11

burninginme

OP

How regular are the verbs in Hindi, is there much in the way of inflections? Is there a case system? Is there a gender system? While obviously different, is it's level of grammatical complexity any worse than a language such as Spanish, French, etc?

Reply 12

burninginme

How regular are the verbs in Hindi, is there much in the way of inflections? Is there a case system? Is there a gender system? While obviously different, is it's level of grammatical complexity any worse than a language such as Spanish, French, etc?

2 genders, masc/fem
Case systems - yes. But I wouldn't know how to describe it.. I haven't learn it formally. I think they say there's 2 case systems, nominative and oblique, but it's more complicated than that.
and yes I would say it's slightly more complicated than French & Spanish.
The phonetics is more foreign to an English speaker than French would be for example..

Reply 13

shruti.mishra

InquilabZindabad

It's difficult if you try to translate english-hindi word for word in your head . . .it's very easy if you hang around hindi speakers, or have someone to conversate with, and i daresay, if you start watching indian movies :biggrin:

.

P.S. I'm assuming you mean Hindustani and not proper Hindi

it's actually pretty easy to translate english-hindi word for word

Reply 14

InquilabZindabad

shruti.mishra

it's actually pretty easy to translate english-hindi word for word

You think so? I find it easy to translate whole sentences exactly but much harder to find words that translate exactly from english-hindi and vice versa.

Reply 15

xJessx

18

InquilabZindabad

It's difficult if you try to translate english-hindi word for word in your head . . .it's very easy if you hang around hindi speakers, or have someone to conversate with, and i daresay, if you start watching indian movies :biggrin:

.

P.S. I'm assuming you mean Hindustani and not proper Hindi

Hi, sorry for the stupid question but what's the difference between Hindustani and Hindi? Are they related? I just go through phases of wanting to learn certain languages and I've been watching Slumdog Millionaire lol :smile:

Reply 16

InquilabZindabad