How to Learn Any Language 48
How to Learn Any Language 48
German
Germany didn’t leave us a world of colonies where people still speak German, but they may as well have. In addition to being the principal language of Germany, Austria, and one of the three main languages of Switzerland, German is, surprisingly, the language most natives will try first on foreigners when they come visiting in Hungary, Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia, Poland, Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia – in fact all the way from Germany’s eastern border with Poland as far east as Moscow and from the Baltic Sea in the north clear down to the Mediterranean. English may edge German out by the time of the next scientific poll in Eastern Europe, but that leaves a tremendous number of German speakers across Europe and elsewhere. Germany’s reunification, reestablishing Germany as the central European power, can only intensify the German language’s importance.
German grammar is far from the most difficult, though you’ll be hard to convince when you find yourself trapped in one of German’s unending dependent clauses. You can wait through lunch for the German noun after a loop-the-loop adjectival clause that might translate literally as “the never- having- definitively- researched- the- mating- habits- of- the- Asian- armadillo- Dr. Schultz,” and you can wait even longer for the German verb. It’s something you get the hang of, though, and remember, German is family. Its kinship with English will be a boon throughout.
There are three genders in German and officially four noun cases, but they’re easy. In only one case does the noun itself change endings, the rest being taken care of by the preceding article, adjective, or other modifier.
German offers dividends to those interested in science, philosophy, opera, and getting a good job in international commerce.
Italian
Everybody who’s ever wrestled with Latin deserves to pick up an Italian grammar book just to relax. Italian is easy Latin, a delight to plunge into. There are three different types of verbs, but noun cases have been eliminated. Unlike French, Italian pronunciation is church bell clear, and you can read Italian off the page and be understood after mastering the regular rules governing the sounds of letters. There are no orthographical booby traps such as the English tough, weigh, night, though, and the dozens of other deceptive spellings we Americans can be grateful we never had to learn as foreigners.
Opera, art, wine, cuisine, history, and archaeology are some of the motivators for learning Italian. Italians are nicer to foreigners trying to learn their language than any other people whose language is a major one. A passable attempt to speak French in France is likely to bring little but grudging comprehension from the French. A passable
attempt to speak Italian in Italy will likely lead to an explosive exclamation, “Ahh, you speak our language!” followed by an offer of a free espresso.
Dutch
It’s easy to dismiss Dutch as a slim shadow of its big language neighbour, German, and of possible interest only to those Americans eager to ingratiate themselves with an aging aunt in Amsterdam with a valuable art collection. Not so fast. In addition to the Dutch spoken in Holland, there are millions of Belgians whose language may be officially called Flemish but is actually nothing but Dutch going under an assumed name. You’ve also got millions of educated Indonesians who speak Dutch as a historical echo from the four hundred years of Dutch colonial rule. Moreover, Dutch is the mother tongue of Afrikaans, the language of those white South Africans whose ancestors were the Boers (boer is the Dutch word for “farmer”). Afrikaaners not only understand Dutch but look up to Dutch much as an Alabaman looks up to someone who speaks British English.
Dutch is much simpler for Americans to learn than German. There are only two genders (oddly enough, not mascuine and feminine, but common and neuter). Verb endings don’t change as much in Dutch as in German, and its word order is more like English than German’s is.
You need not pretend Dutch is a beautiful language. The Dutch themselves joke about the coarseness of their language. It’s got more of a guttural sound than Arabic, Hebrew, Russian, and Farsi. If you want a concert in Dutch guttural, ask the next person who speaks Dutch to say, “Misschien is Uw scheermesje niet scherp genoeg.” It means “Perhaps your razor blade is not sharp enough,” but that’s irrelevant. That short sentence explodes with five gutturals that cause the speaker to sound like the exhaust pipe of a Greyhound bus through a full set of gear changes!
When you learn Dutch, you can cash in on at least forty percent credit when you decide to take up German.
Russian
Russian is the world’s fourth language in number of speakers after Chinese, English, and Hindustani. It is extremely difficult to learn to speak Russian correctly, but the Russians have learned to be patient with foreigners who speak incorrect Russian. Journalists and others fascinated by discussing recent history with Soviet citizens suddenly free to talk to foreigners get a lot of joy out of knowing Russian. The much touted commercial advantages of learning Russian, however, have so far fallen far short of expectation.
The jobs with gargantuan salaries promised to Russian speakers as a fruit of the resurgence of free enterprise in the Soviet Union are few and shaky as the early enthusiasm of foreign investors gives way to wait and see attitudes. Long range, Russian remains a good bet for those willing to learn a language for career advantage. And in the meantime you can enjoy reading Chekhov and Dostoyevski in the original.
The Russian alphabet may look formidable, but it’s a false alarm. It can be learned in twenty minutes, but then you’ve got to face the real obstacles, such as three genders;
six noun cases with wave upon wave of noun groups that decline differently; a past tense that behaves like an adjective; and verbs that have not just person, number, and tense, but also something called “aspect” – perfective or imperfective.
Knowing Russian yields a lot of satisfaction. You want to pinch yourself as you find yourself gliding through a printed page of a language you may have grown up suspecting and fearing. Russian, like German, crackles with good, gutsy sounds that please you as they leap from your tongue. Russian is a high gratitude language. The new immigrants from the Soviet Union, though they speak one of the major languages of the world, don’t expect Americans to know it. They’ll be overjoyed to hear their language from you.
One advantage of choosing Russian is the head start it offers in almost a dozen other Slavic languages, should you suddenly want or need one.