The ten languages described in this article are easy to learn. We can learn some relevant language knowledge from this article, which is also useful for those who want to choose a second foreign language.
The easiest language to learn 1.frisian
It is the native language of the frisians of the Netherlands, spoken by less than half a million people. But it is English’s closest sibling, a unique language in the tiny north sea Germanic classification. It could be said that in the 8th century Old English and old frisian diverged and began to develop independently. Despite the geographic and historical differences between the two languages, the similarities between them are almost uncanny, with nearly the same vocabulary, structure and sound. In linguistics has a saying: “‘ goodbutterandgoodcheese isgoodenglishandgoodfries.” (‘ good butter and cheese is good English and good frisian). When these sentences are spoken out loud, the English and frisian versions are interchangeable.
The easiest language to learn 2. Esperanto
Esperanto supporter Leo Tolstoy said he learned esperanto in four hours. Most linguists list esperanto as the easiest language to learn, especially for speakers of indo-european languages. Although esperanto is not the official language of any country, the man-made language is recognized by the French academy of sciences and UNESCO and is now spoken by an estimated 2 million people worldwide. Esperanto was created in the late 19th century as a national-and politically-neutral language designed to make learning easier. Why is this artificial language easier to learn? This is because it has a regular spelling system, simple phonetic and grammatical rules, and is designed to exclude irregularities. Words are constructed in bricks, using regular prefixes, roots, and suffixes. Compound words are logically formed, such as birdokanto(birdsong),akvobirdo(waterfowl),akvomelono(watermelon) and so on.
The easiest language to learn Italian
The most romantic of the Latin languages is Italian. Italian has many Latin roots, so it shares many cognates with English such as foresta(forest),calendar (calendar), and ambizioso(ambitious). Like Spanish, Italian’s shallow orthographic depth makes it an easy language to read, especially since it has only 21 letters and is easier to read than English. Italian phonemes such as ace or ghi are easily grasped by English speakers. In addition, the sentence structure in Italian is very rhythmic. Most words end in vowels, which adds musicality to spoken English. It’s easier to understand and more fun to say.
The easiest language to learn is Swedish
Swedish is also a Germanic language and shares many cognates with English, such as konferens(conference, conference),midnatt(midnight, midnight), and telefon(telephone, telephone). English speakers will also be familiar with Swedish syntax, such as the subject-verb-object sentence structure, and verb conjugations that have the same forms and rules as English grammar. What is more, Swedish verbs in general to maintain normal does not change, so the verb is very simple, such as “ispeak/youspeak/hespeaks” (I/you said/he said these three words is translated into Swedish jagpratar/dupratar/hanpratar. In terms of pronunciation, Swedish is a famous “singing” language. Once learners have mastered the four extra vowels and the unique Scandinavian “sje” sound, Swedish is a melodic language that is easy to understand and fairly easy to imitate.
The easiest language to learn is Portuguese
The grammar of Portuguese is similar to that of other Latin languages. An interesting and simple feature is the form of the question, which in Portuguese is only expressed as a tone, not as a rearrangement of phrases. As long as the rising tone is used at the end of the sentence, we ‘releavingnow becomes a question, which is a natural language habit for English speakers. In Brazilian Portuguese, you can also end a sentence with the ubiquitous question tag n? Oe? To form. Although the Portuguese nasal vowel is not easy to imitate at first, the ear accustomed to English can easily follow its rhythmic tone. With Brazil’s economy now ranked sixth in the world, mastering the Portuguese language is increasingly a valuable personal asset for professionals.
The easiest language to learn 6. Norwegian
This northern Germanic language has a consistent pronunciation and simple grammar for English speakers. The syntax and word order of Norwegian is very similar to that of English. Verbs are especially simple. The rules are especially simple. Add the suffix “e” to the past tense and “s” to the passive voice. Norwegian has a logical system of “stress” in intonation, placing the stress on the first or second syllable of two similar words like “desert” and “dessert” in English. One disadvantage of learning Norwegian is that it is not easy to find opportunities to use it. Norway has a first-rate education system, and all schools throughout the country are taught in English from primary school onwards. Norwegians are close to fluent in English.
The easiest language to learn 7. Dutch
Dutch is another west Germanic cousin of English, and its structure and syntax are familiar to English speakers. In terms of pronunciation and vocabulary, Dutch is parallel to English in many ways, such as groen(green, green) or deoudeman (theoldman). In addition to the many familiar Germanic words, the Dutch language also has many foreign words from the French language, such as drogeren and blok. Although some vowels in Dutch are new to English speakers, Dutch sounds have the same form of stressed syllables as English, so Dutch words can be more or less intuitively pronounced. Dutch is similar to German, but Dutch does not have the case in German and its grammatical system is not that complicated. Many linguists believe that Dutch is the easiest language for English speakers to learn.
The easiest language to learn 8. Spanish
One of the characteristics of Spanish for language learners is its relatively shallow orthography, which means how words are written and pronounced, which means that reading and writing Spanish is relatively easy. Spanish is also easy for native English speakers to pronounce, with only 10 vowels and diphthongs (English has 20) and no unfamiliar phonemes, except the playful “n”. In terms of grammar, Spanish is less irregular than other Latin languages. Spanish is also an attractive second language for English speakers because of its international status. Spanish is the official language in countries on three continents, and as Latin America’s economy grows, it will become a valuable professional skill. In a survey by The Daily Telegraph, 37 percent of employees said Spanish was a useful language worth mastering.
The easiest language to learn is French
We have William the conqueror to thank, and thanks to the Norman conquest he left us excellent, colour, identity and some 8,000 other words from French. Linguists estimate that French influence about one-third of modern English, ranging from 11th-century court language to modern terms such as jenesaisquoi, apres-ski and bourgeois. English has more in common with French in terms of vocabulary than any other Latin language. This means that language learners will find French words more familiar and easier to recognize and understand. Advanced learners may struggle with the 17 forms of nouns and verbs in French, while general conversation is easier to learn.
The easiest language to learn is Afrikaans
South African is a west Germanic language like English, but the difference is that its structure doesn’t make your head spin. A major feature of the South African language is its logical and non-inflected structure, especially in grammar. South African has neither the swim, swim, swum of English nor the sex that many Latin languages have (like French unhomme,unefemme). Another feature of the South African language is that it has many words of Germanic origin in its vocabulary, which makes it familiar to English speakers. It’s easy to learn South African vocabulary by pointing to something and asking, “watisditinafrikaans?” How do you say this in South African?