
The world’s hardest (for native English speakers) languages - sethg
http://www.economist.com/world/international/displaystory.cfm?story_id=15108609
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oscardelben
A very difficult language to learn is navajo[1], in fact it was used during
the WWII by americans to communicate and it was one of the few ciphers that
wasn't broke by enemies.

[1] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Navajo_language>

~~~
delayclose
Having no native teachers available increased the difficulty, and the WWII
usage was against non-native English speakers. That said, the Native American
languages that I know of are grammatically quite different from English.

~~~
oscardelben
In that specific case there were less than 30 people who knew that language in
the US during WWII, and the navajo language was also completely different from
other native languages.

UPDATE: I mean 30 people outside the navajo tribe.

~~~
eru
And they added a (simple) coding system on top.

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joe_the_user
It seems like "Whorfism" is always making a come-back with Geeks. I think it
appeals to a kind sci-fi imagination.

Chomsky's theory is usually presented as all languages work the same in the
brain. I think the later versions of the Chomskian theory are more like, all
languages allow one to accomplish the same thing - especially, all languages
have recursion (despite the counter-claims around the Peraha, I think that's
actually demonstrated pretty well).

~~~
houseabsolute
There's still a question of how hard you have to work to acquire them and what
other opportunities are foregone as a result.

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RyanMcGreal
>Imagine being a foreigner and having to learn that in English one tells a lie
but the truth.

This makes sense, given the idea that there is only one truth ("the" truth)
but any number of falsehoods (each being "a" falsehood).

~~~
astine
Things get interesting when one tells _a_ truth. Are we saying he lied through
omission? Or is the truth actually ambiguous?

------
cturner

        Perhaps the hardest language studied by many
        Anglophones is Latin.
    

When learning latin I was surprised at how similar the genative case is in
Latin and English. It would be like making an assumption about a platform by
using your knowledge of a separate and familiar platform, and then using
inference, and getting it right first time - eerie.

The pronounciation in latin is also easy, and the spelling, and the vocab has
similiarities that helps with learning.

I suspect part of what makes Latin more difficult to learn than some indo-
European languages is that it's very disconnected from practical
considerations. (see <http://www.frcoulter.com/latin/foster/foster6.html>) The
ability to learn like that is a practical skill in its own right though.

~~~
dkarl
I took four years of Latin in high school, and by far the hardest part
compared to other languages I studied was the sheer number of things to
memorize. Five noun declensions by five cases (more than that, really, but
only five to memorize) by two numbers made fifty noun endings. Verbs were even
more complex: four verb conjugations, four principal parts to memorize for
each verb, three moods (that I can remember), plus the active/passive
distinction. That's a hell of a lot of charts to memorize. There are patterns
in these charts, but lots of exceptions to the patterns. Plus all the various
ways the various moods and cases can be used. Here's a nice list of the ways
the ablative case can be used:
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ablative_case#Latin>

Compared to all this memorization, getting the feel of the language, even
though it was very alien to my mind, seemed easy.

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Spikefu
I'm amazed that the Pirahã language isn't listed. From what I've read it is at
least as hard as any language there, in large part because the Pirahã tribe
don't have any cultural concept of numbers, distant past, fixed color names
and a whole slew of other concepts that are usually considered essential for a
functioning language. Added to that is the difficulty in forming the basic
sounds of the language. It is tonal and can be whistled or hummed, dropping
consonants and vowels completely and using only tonal changes to convey
meaning.

~~~
dkarl
It's easy to talk around missing concepts. Language learners do it all the
time, figuring out how to talk around concepts that they don't know the words
for. It's a bit harder to learn all the subtle and idiomatic ways people have
of expressing things that they have a concept of but which aren't
grammatically encoded in their language, but that's only necessary for
fluency. It's _much_ harder to constantly be aware of things that a language
forces you to always know, but which you are used to thinking about only if
there is a special reason they are relevant, such as direction in Kuuk
Thaayorre, source of knowledge in Tuyuca, and fine degrees of hierarchy and
intimacy in Japanese and some other Asian languages.

Studying Japanese, I often resented the need to be aware of social hierarchy.
By contrast, I would love to develop my directional awareness, and I think I
would appreciate the discipline imposed by Kuuk Thaayorre! I naturally
mentally lay places out on a grid which is much straighter in my mind than in
reality. I "know" a place when my mind automatically fixes the mismatch
between grid orientation and reality.

By the way, is anybody besides me ridiculously linguistically impressionable?
The latest thing for me is getting my singulars and plurals mixed up, and
spitting out tiny sentence fragments that can be completed from context but
which sound childish in English, all because of the influence of my Korean
girlfriend. I got an 800 on my verbal SATs, and this is horribly embarrassing
and traumatic for me.

~~~
Spikefu
Given that even after several studies, linguists can't even seem to agree
whether or not the language has the concept of one and two, saying it's "easy
to talk around missing concepts" is glossing over just how hard this language
really is to understand.

~~~
dkarl
If answering that question was necessary to speaking and understanding the
language fluently, it wouldn't be so hard to answer the question. Mapping
concepts between two languages is much, much harder than simply speaking and
understanding both languages.

~~~
Spikefu
Right, and that's part of the problem. The whole culture and language are so
alien to most people that it is incredibly hard to map concepts.

As far as I can tell the only non-native speaker who is actually fluent is
Daniel Everett. Given that the language is the subject of a fair amount of
linguistic interest because of its uniqueness, it's pretty amazing that he is
the only one.

Not only that, but even with a natural aptitude for languages and desire to
learn, it took him 7 years of living with them to get to that point.

------
julio_the_squid
I find this really interesting from the perspective of programming languages.

The languages that add on information not required in English reminds me of
type declaration for variables versus languages where you don't have to
declare a type, for instance.

What computer languages are the hardest to learn (for a C speaker?). How does
the design of the language influence the thoughts one has or can easily
express in that language? (We know it does matter, Whorf or no Whorf!)

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diego_moita
> "The leading expert on the !Xóõ, Tony Traill, developed a lump on his larynx
> from learning to make their sounds".

I remember that when I began speaking English coloquially my maxilar muscles
and tongue would get very tired. That was when I realized that English is way
more oral than my native nasal Portuguese.

> A truly boggling language is one that requires English speakers to think
> about things they otherwise ignore entirely.

Portuguese and Spanish have 2 different verbs to entail the meaning of the
verb "to be"; they are the verbs "ser" and "estar", with very different
meanings. Depending on where and how you use it can mean very different
things. E.g.: "estar" sick means that you have a temporary desease like
stomach sickness, a cold or a flu; "ser" sick means that you either have an
incurable genetic desease or you are a psycopath.

Also, when it comes to the grammar I totally agree: English grammar is a
blessing, a wonder of simplicity. Portuguese and Spanish have lots of tenses
for past and future, each with a different verb conjugation.

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hristov
This is an interesting article. It makes me want to share a little known fact
about my own native tongue. It is actually the only language in the world that
has a voice exclusively used for sarcasm.

I am wondering if those Whorfianist theories are correct and that feature of
the language makes me and my co-patriots especially sarcastic.

~~~
RiderOfGiraffes
I'd be interested to know what language that is so I can learn more about it.
Thanks.

~~~
hristov
The language is Bulgarian, and I was referring to the re-narrative mood.
Although I did overstate it a bit, the re-narrative mood can also be used to
express extreme doubt in what you are saying or that you have obtained the
information very indirectly. But I would say that most of the time it is used
to express sarcasm at least up to some extent.

~~~
RiderOfGiraffes
Благодаря

(That and the very basic greetings are the only Bulgarian I retain - I will
have to go and investigate the "re-narrative" in my copious free time.
Thanks.)

------
chrismoos
Hungarian is pretty difficult for me as a native English speaker.
Spanish/French aren't bad.

~~~
hristov
Hungarian is even difficult for other Eastern Europeans. I have yet to meet
anybody that speaks Hungarian, that is not actually Hungarian.

~~~
saturdayplace
Amerikai vagyok, de Magyarul tudok beszélni. A nyelv lego-hoz hasonlit - kis
kockákkal építsz szavakat. Szeretem.

I'm American, but I can speak Hungarian. The language is like legos. You build
words out of little blocks. I love it.

------
tokenadult
A very interesting article. I appreciate the submission, but wonder why you
replaced the original title "Tongue twisters: In search of the world’s hardest
language," as I see that in the submitted article?

~~~
sethg
I’m not convinced there’s any absolute scale for how hard a language is. If a
native English speaker would beat his or her head against the wall trying to
learn Japanese, then a native Japanese speaker with comparable intelligence in
comparable circumstances would be just as frustrated trying to learn English.

~~~
wheels
There's relative difficulty, which is often a function of distance within the
linguistic tree, e.g. Germanic to Sino-Tibetan, but there definitely is a
character of language difficulty which is absolute.

For example, comparing English and German:

\- English has simple plurals. In regular cases you add an _s_ or _es_ , and
the number of exceptions is limited. Chair, chairs. Book, books. Jacket,
jackets. In German plurals are, for all practical purposes, completely
irregular: Stuhl, Stühle. Buch, Bücher. Jacke, Jacken.

\- English does not generally have gendered nouns, nor an equivalently complex
replacement.

\- English does not have cases, nor an equivalently complex replacement.

\- As a result of those two, the English words _a_ and _an_ correspond in
German to ein, eine, einen, einem, einer and eines.

\- English has almost the same tenses as German, but let's take the verb _to
run_ in the present tense: I run, you run, he runs, we run, they run. In
German, _laufen_ : Ich laufe, du läufst, er läuft, wir laufen, ihr lauft.
Rather then two forms, there are five.

\- English does not have formality encoded in its grammar.

It's pretty hard to say that German isn't objectively harder than English.

~~~
mechanical_fish
_English does not have formality encoded in its grammar._

No, instead it's in the vocabulary. ;)

Many of the most basic words of English exist in more formal and less formal
versions. Compare _horseman_ and _equestrian_ , or _eat_ and _dine_ , or
_smell_ and _fragrance_ , or _hug_ and _embrace_.

Many of these apparent redundancies derive from the period when Britain was
ruled by native French speakers, who tended to use a lot of French- or Latin-
derived words.

I certainly wouldn't claim that spoken English doesn't encode plenty of
formality:

    
    
      *Sir, would you care for an aperitif?*
    
      *No, I ain't hungry.*
    

Though American culture tends to be deliberately sloppy about who speaks
formally to whom, especially compared to what I know of German culture.

~~~
tmd
This is so far my favorite feature of the English language. Formal forms in
the grammar are a relict of feudal type of thinking and in modern times they
are not only redundant but also harmful. Need to choose between formal 'you'
and informal 'you' leads to lots of awkward social situations. If you apply
informal 'you' to someone older and who you don't know well it is usually a
conversation breaker. If you use formal 'you' when speaking with a coeval it
may look like you're patronizing him. Women sometimes get offended because
they think you consider them older than they really are, and so on.

Also, when you start addressing someone using formal forms it is very hard to
switch to informal 'you'. Using these forms affect human thinking and after
you have already addressed someone formally (because it was in a professional
situation for instance) you are not likely to become friends. In some cultures
there is a special complex social protocol for switching from formal 'you' to
informal one. This ceremony is sometimes called using a German word
'Bruderschaft' and for some peculiar reason it often involves kissing and
drinking alcohol. This, rather unfortunate, photo captures such situation:
<http://imgur.com/pmf57.jpg>

As I find it significantly easier to develop social relationships in English,
I often wonder whether this lack of formal 'you' contributes to the economical
prosperity of the English-speaking countries (and esp. the even less formal
US).

~~~
chokma
> As I find it significantly easier to develop social relationships in
> English, I often wonder whether this lack of formal 'you' contributes to the
> economical prosperity of the English-speaking countries

But then, the formal 'you' contributes to professional relationships. Think of
it as a safeguard against overstepping an invisible line of proper conduct.

It is really more difficult to say "Sie Arschloch" than "Du Arschloch" because
the formal 'you' clashes with vulgar language one would use around drinking
buddies.

try{ assert ! relationship.isCustomerOrBoss() say."You asshole!" }
catch(VulgarLanguageException e){ say."That's not acceptable." }

------
xiaoma
"For sound complexity, one language stands out. !Xóõ, spoken by just a few
thousand, mostly in Botswana, has a blistering array of unusual sounds. Its
vowels include plain, pharyngealised, strident and breathy, and they carry
four tones. It has five basic clicks and 17 accompanying ones. The leading
expert on the !Xóõ, Tony Traill, developed a lump on his larynx from learning
to make their sounds. Further research showed that adult !Xóõ-speakers had the
same lump (children had not developed it yet)."

------
genieyclo
Strange Amharic wasn't mentioned, it has a unique script and long alphabet
that is similiar to Indic ones, except for the various stress sounds and
"clicks" you put on different letter sets. I'm betting that these stress
sounds would be difficult for native English speakers to pick up

------
nate
A linguist once told me that Icelandic was the hardest.
[http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8...](http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&q=hardest+language+icelandic)

------
plaes
A short story about "The origins of Estonian Language"

<http://www.hiiumaa.ee/douglas/keel.htm>

------
patrickgzill
Would have liked to have heard about Farsi or other Arabic languages.

Also, would point out that Greek and Latin are not "cousins" to English, more
like great-grandfathers, given the large amount of borrowing from both.

~~~
kyro
Arabic is a hell of language to learn. Even as an Egyptian born in a semi-
Arabic speaking house, and in the middle of trying to teach myself the
language, I'm finding Arabic really difficult to learn. My two main problems
are: a) Many words are not actually written as one word, and so you might have
2 or 3 separated strings of letters that are meant to be read altogether as
one, which is ridiculously confusing - and - B) Arabic is commonly written
with the vowels omitted. Most Arabic words have a set of unique root
consonants, usually 3 or 4 consonants, that help you identify the word you're
reading. So they'll eliminate the vowels because the root consonants and
modifiers should be sufficient for word recognition. This probably makes
reading script faster as there's less to process, and I'm sure it does, but as
a beginner, it's tough.

~~~
miked
_Arabic is a hell of language to learn. Even as an Egyptian born in a semi-
Arabic speaking house...I'm finding Arabic really difficult to learn._

You're not alone. The US Defense Language Institute teaches many languages,
mostly to native English speakers. Of the languages they teach, Arabic takes
the longest.

It's a shame the article didn't list the number of weeks the DLI spends on
each of the languages. It "only" covers a few dozen languages, but course
length would be an excellent proxy for language difficulty for English
speakers.

~~~
cenazoic
As a data point, I attended DLI in 1991-1992 for Russian. At the time the
basic Russian class lasted for 47 weeks..5 days a week, 8 hours a day. If I
remember correctly, Arabic was 63 weeks.

DLI 'ranked' languages according to difficulty...categories (cats) I-V.
Russian was a III. Arabic was cat IV. The only two cat V languages were
English (for non-natives) and Japanese.

