Spanish: How useful and difficult is it?

Starchild · December 26, 2003, 10:23

I've got that itch again to pick up another language aside from my own uniquely accented English dialect. New Years self-improvement resolutions and all that jazz.

Spanish has taken my interest recently as, conviently(!) it's offered as course I can do in addition to my degree at university next year. So I have no excuse not to continue with it. The only other language they offered that piqued my interest was Russian (and mandarin, french, swahili, arabic.....).

How useful is Spanish in an international and European context? I know it would fulfill the requirement of a second EU working language allowing me to, well, work for the EU...and Spain is very nice these days I hear (

).

For an English speaker, how difficult is Spanish to pick up? I used to live in America and I kinda miss the dubbed Spanish chat shows.

GePap · December 26, 2003, 10:35

Well, in Europe I only see 30 million Spaniards that count- though if you follow the British tradition of vacations in sunny Spain, it would help.

World wide, I believe it is in the top 5 spoken languages in the world, ad unlike Mandarin, that does mean several countries.

As for how easy- as long as you come to accept masculine/femenine for nouns and a few other idosyncracies, it is not very hard0 things are spelled as they are pronounced, for one. And not many difficult new sounds, and worlds are not long collections of consonants.

Monk · December 26, 2003, 11:03

I know a guy who used to work in diplomatic circles around the world and taught himself six or seven languages. He said Spanish was the easiest and Danish by far the most annoying. If you want to work for the EU though, you should consider French and especially German. As relatively few people are fluent and comfortable with both German and English, that might be a niche for you... and if you get really skilled, you'll be able to understand the Austrians, too

Bosh · December 26, 2003, 11:17

I had a vastly easier time with Spanish than with French, Arabic or Korean (none of which I can hold a conversation in, unlike Spanish were I'm pretty functional). Like Monk says the spelling and pronounciation are very easy and the gramatical structure doesn't have anywhere near as many exceptions as English. For me the only hard parts tackling verb conjugatin (there's a lot of tenses and the stuff with the different forms of haber drove me nuts) and having different direct object and indirect object pronouns threw me a bit. Definately the most useful second language for an American, not so much for a Brit/Canuck.

Starchild · December 26, 2003, 18:46

I like German-accented English but actual German? My throat would collapse.

I like the feeling of speaking Spanish. And I want to be able to say "I apologise for my drunken friends" when vacationing in Spain. :-)

Al B. Sure! · December 26, 2003, 18:50

No es mas dificil a aprendes espanol si tu eres inteligente pero no pienso tu eres bastante inteligente para esto.

gracias

Nubclear · December 26, 2003, 18:53

While GePap is right, China (and India for that matter

) are becoming more and more important. Perhaps it would be best to invest in the future?

Al B. Sure! · December 26, 2003, 18:57

what are you speaking of Tassadar? Don't you know that there are only two languages in the universe: English and that language our servants speak, spanish?

Al B. Sure! · December 26, 2003, 19:02

¿Que tu esta hablando, Tassadar? Tu sabes que el mundo tiene solamente dos idiomas: ingles e la idioma de los esclavos: espanol.

Monk · December 26, 2003, 19:10

Quote:

Originally posted by Starchild
I like German-accented English but actual German? My throat would collapse.

Wih ask ze qvestions hir!

Starchild · December 26, 2003, 19:21

Do it again Monk. Talk all....German to me!

Thorgal · December 26, 2003, 19:38

Tu español hiede, Albert Speer.

Al B. Sure! · December 26, 2003, 20:10

hiede? No se esta palabra.

Chris Wilkinson · December 26, 2003, 20:17

Es una pena que no puedo estudiar español por el momento.

Nubclear · December 26, 2003, 20:20

Quote:

Originally posted by Albert Speer
what are you speaking of Tassadar? Don't you know that there are only two languages in the universe: English and that language our servants speak, spanish?

Thorgal · December 26, 2003, 20:22

Quote:

hiede? No se esta palabra.

¿Lo ves?

Significa apesta. "stink"
En realidad se te entiende bastante bien.

Imran Siddiqui · December 26, 2003, 20:24

Quote:

Don't you know that there are only two languages in the universe: English and that language our servants speak, spanish?

I don't know what you are talking about. My servant speaks French... of course she's one of those hot French maids

.

Bosh · December 26, 2003, 20:26

Yo pieno que tu no se muchas palabras

Chris Wilkinson · December 26, 2003, 20:32

Tengo que quejarse a la compañia que escribió el diccionario que tengo.

monkspider · December 26, 2003, 20:36

Spanish: it's useful if you like to order burritos, but it's harder than ****.

Imran Siddiqui · December 26, 2003, 20:38

You have to get another burrito place then

.

monkspider · December 26, 2003, 20:45

But I thought I was helping the local capitalist economy by ordering burritos from my local burrito vender?

Imran, a closet socialist? Treachery!

Imran Siddiqui · December 26, 2003, 20:47

Quote:

I thought I was helping the local capitalist economy by ordering burritos from my local burrito vender?

Bah, you help the capitalist economy by buying anywhere

. There is no local capitalist economy, it's an internationalist creed

.

Thorgal · December 26, 2003, 20:55

Quote:

Originally posted by Chris Wilkinson
Tengo que quejarse a la compañia que escribió el diccionario que tengo.

"Hiede" comes from "heder" verb. The infinitive form "heder" should be in your dictionary.

Verbs conjugation and personal forms are a little bit complicated in spanish.
But i think that in general, spanish is not too difficult.

Theben · December 26, 2003, 21:42

Quote:

Originally posted by Albert Speer
hiede? No se esta palabra.

He said your spanish sucko mucho.

Al B. Sure! · December 26, 2003, 22:13

what you expect? I learned it at a philly public school?

Oerdin · December 26, 2003, 22:38

I won't post in Spanish but that's only because last time I did Ming said he'd ban me if I did it again.

To anwser the question Spanish isn't that hard to learn especially if you've had an classes on another latin based language in the past. I'd taken French in Junior High then Spanish in College so Spanish seemed pretty natural.

My big problem is even here in southern California I don't use Spanish much so my vocabulary keeps getting smaller as I forget words. As Gepap and others can testify my spelling isn't always so hot either which is strange since Spanish is such a phentic language. Normally everything is spelled exactly how it sounds.

Al B. Sure! · December 26, 2003, 22:41

Quote:

phentic

I suppose phenotic isn't a phenotic word so I'll ignore your mis-spelling...

Oerdin · December 26, 2003, 22:44

So I dropped an O. I blame it on the merlot.