• Question: What is the most complex language ?

    Asked by anon-181162 on 15 Jun 2018.
    • Photo: Alexandra Hogan

      Alexandra Hogan answered on 15 Jun 2018:

      This is more a matter of opinion or personal experience, I think! If you were learning a second language, the difficulty might also depend on how related it is to your first language. However some languages are known for being very difficult to learn. Latin is one of them. Languages like Mandarin and Cantonese have different ‘tones’ or ‘pitches’, and some southern African languages have ‘clicks’. I only speak one language (English) but would love to learn another. What languages do you speak at home?

    • Photo: Claire Donald

      Claire Donald answered on 15 Jun 2018:

      I can only speak very basic French in addition to my native English so any new language is really complex to me. I agree with Alexandra that it will depend on the languages you already speak and how closely related they are. Something like Cantonese, Mandarin and Japanese which have characters rather than letters must be tough to learn and they are quite distinct from English.

      English can’t be that easy for some non native speakers either! With the likes of there, their and they’re; to, two and too; are and our; your and you’re, by, buy and bye; hear and here. What a nightmare!

    • Photo: Ashley Akbari

      Ashley Akbari answered on 15 Jun 2018:

      Lots of languages have a similar “phonetic alphabet” and so can be easier for people to learn if they know one of these similar languages already, other things like dialects, tones or inflections can make certain langues more complex also.

      So truly I am not sure if there is more or less complex languages, but learning a second language can be harder if not similar to your first.

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