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Is the English language the easiest language to learn for a non native speaker?

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It's one of the easiest to get a basic understanding of but one of the hardest to actually speak properly. Just look at how often native speakers screw up because there are so many complications in tenses and grammer; more than nearly any other language.

Reply 41

Blue Rose

No it's not. Its a hard language as it's highly irregular compared to other languages. So many exceptions to all the grammatical rules.

Reply 42

Susant

I'm not a native english speaker and I've achieved fluency at it to a level beyond most people of my age group.(it helps that I dabbled in writing I suppose) However, my parents sometimes require my help and from the mistakes I see them making it seems that they don't make mistakes in grammar, but rather vocabulary and pronounciation.

Basically, I'd say English is quite easy to learn to an understandable level (engrish basically), but difficult to master. :frown:

Reply 43

La Esmerelda

English is probably hard because of the silent letters. But its good that you don't need to learn verb endings, but with European languages, everything is said phonetically so it balances out.
Perhaps why people think English is easier to learn is because it is easy to learn. What with English being a Very Important Language in the world and everything being IN English-films, songs, teaching, signs etc, it'd be easier to learn english than any other language as you're always exposed to it!!

Reply 44

La Esmerelda

Checkmate121

english is very easy, 6 years ago , i only knew about "yes" "no", now not bragging but i can speak english and even understand some terms better than english people

Doubtful.

Reply 45

3105

I heard english was pretty easy from some german flight attendants I met.

Reply 46

nick_vivek

easiest language -- English

Reply 47

Daym

Most people in this country don't speak proper english, so it's just as easy to hear bad english as it is communicating with your local chavvys down the park.
So by this case, i'd say it's easy to learn, as we'll understand you even if you've only grasped the basic concepts.

Reply 48

Big Kabz

How many native speakers still say "would of" and also mix up "they're/their/there"

btw "yo blud mandemz gna get da chooong gyals numbaz" is NOT English.

Reply 49

MsAnonymous<3

^Yeah I came when I was 9ish and I don't even remember learning it! Within 3 months I think it was, fairly easy.

Reply 50

lankymanky

I've spoken with many non-English speakers including Russians, Swedes, Turks, Italians and Belgians who all have said that it's very difficult to learn because of the inconsistent rules and exceptions for spelling and pronunciation.

Reply 51

Pocket Calculator

Spelling must be a right arse to get used to. And the ludicrous irregular verbs. But when it comes to (the practically non-existant) cases and genders and all that, English wins hands-down. I've had plenty of Poles and Russians agree with me on that one, to my initial suprise.

Reply 52

YoSuis

I think lots of (native) english speakers put it about that english is extraordinarily difficult as an excuse not to learn any other languages...

Reply 53

Eien

English is like the opposite of Japanese - easy to access, but difficult to master to a level of proficiency where it can be used well, and naturally. On the other hand, Japanese looks extremely difficult to start with, especially with all the characters, and labyrinthine grammar, but it becomes a lot easier as you learn it - the pronunciation is logical, one character is always pronounced one way, and there are never deviations from this unless it is to add emphasis when speaking when angry, surprised, etc. Also kanji are more related than they initially appear, and once you know a decent amount, new words tend to be made up of characters you already know, making the learning process faster. Also, there are very few irregular words.
I found French pretty straightforward to learn as well with its similarities to English, and I find it's grammar more logical since there are fewer exceptions. The only difficulty really is remembering the genders of words, but there are certain rules of thumb one can use to determine the gender of words.

Reply 54

lilangel890

Nope. Because of things like I ran, not I runned. Also some of our spellings are buggered. There's not really a general rule to learn.

One good thing - we speak slowly!

Reply 55

rollover, pudding

Livilah

I am a native speaker, so maybe not the best person to answer, but I do know a lot of non-native speakers. English is very confusing because it has almost no rules. The pronunciation is different from word to word (cough, bough for example) and there is not just one simple way to do anything (house-houses, mouse-mice). Also, we had two words for many things, but no word for others. Without rules, you just have to keep guessing until it's right and eventually it will sound wrong when you make a mistake.
The reason that so many non-native speakers have such good english is a credit to the education systems around the world - it shows up our learning of foreign languages big time.

Reply 56

deadgenius

amani-puresapphire

in my opinion its the easiest and most srtraight forward of all the languages i speak

does anyone know if this is why its a universally spoken/used language?

No. Mainly because of the huge reach of the British Empire, and now because of the global dominance of America. Not because it's easy. If you want easy, I think Italian would be the universally spoken language. And it sounds so sexy, which is a massive bonus!

Reply 57

limonadita

As a non-native speaker, I've never found English difficult at all. All the grammar rules are pretty obvious and understandable but collocations make it a little bit complicated sometimes :biggrin:

I took me quite long time to get rid of tendency to translate everything word by word while speaking, though.

Reply 58

musicbloke

Lolly-88

I've been told by non native speakers that english is one of the hardest languages to learn. There are so many different pronouncations and there are many words which have several meanings, e.g. the word current can mean the present, flow of water, flow of electicity through a conducter, the dried fruit etc.

No, just no.

MB

Reply 59

LiamPhilip

To appear smart and clever when speaking Italian (for example), it is absolutely vital that you use the most obscure, unknown words you know; a technical use of the language (long phrases, complicated syntax, ecc.) is a sign of erudition and generally makes an impression.

English is, as I see it, the exact opposite: it's all a matter of saying everything.. with as few words as possible. This shows a sense of strong pragmatism.

Does that make English a harder language to learn? It's difficoult to say; some people find it quite easy to speak and write, others don't.