While many beginner courses or introductory lessons to the language ignore Persian script, its important to supplement your learning with understanding the alphabet of your target language, to encourage reading and writing Farsi in the original written form. Lastly, brush up on your Colloquial Persian with Abdi Rafiees 3rd edition copy of this classic conversational sourcebook. Other languages may have unique and new sounds, compared with the sounds you know from your own language and alphabet. It technically belongs to the Uralic family, just like Hungarian and Sami (the indigenous language of Lapland). For scheduling 1-on-1 conversation sessions with native Persian speakers, you absolutely should have an italki account. Cognates are when a similar-sounding word has an identical meaning. There will be times where you feel like giving up, but keep persevering. As we highlighted in our introduction (remember that, it seems like ages ago, so you can skip back to the beginning of the article for a refresher if you wish) there are many reasons why a person may want to learn a new language. 1. Esperanto is a relatively modern language, as far as languages go. These new letters and the fact that Polish words also have more consonants than English words can mean that pronunciations are very difficult to grasp for a beginner, and can make spelling difficult. Today, there are many versions of the Persian language, depending on where you are in the world. Afrikaans is the native language of South Africa and is widely spoken all over the country. Finally, if you want an open-source tutorial that is accessible from anywhere, check out Perso-Arabic alphabet and script lessons through WikiBooks and the sites lesson plans. This problem is observed among many students, so they often turn to services like Thesis Rush, which helps with all kinds of writing theses, dissertations, or papers. Secondly, Indonesian is a phonetic language, so most words are pronounced the same way theyre spelled. Languages that are more closely related to English share certain qualities and characteristics that make them easier for English speakers to pick up. There is also a welcome lack of verb conjugation, which is great news for learners, especially since this means that the sentence structure stays simple and short. YouTube is a great resource for free lessons and video clips that will help you master perfect pronunciation and retention for the Farsi vocabulary that you compile through other lessons. There are many similar words and overlaps between the two languages, and many of our favorite English words are derived from the Dutch language. Resources for learning Spanish are also very easy to come by, since it is so widely spoken all over the world. Try one of the countless language learning apps, watch online videos of people teaching the language, or challenge yourself to read a chapter or an article in your chosen language. For example, the word frolic meaning to play and move around cheerfully (e.g. Recommended: 7 Easiest Language To Learn For Spanish Speakers Advertisements #1. The language changed and morphed over time, leaving us with the modern language and areas of native Persian speakers, including modern-day Iran. So, if youve ever taken German lessons, youll find it relatively easy. Portuguese vs Spanish How Similar Are They? Ethiopians also speak the Tigrinya language; however, most are from the Tigray area (specifically in Eritrea). You can't get much easier than this. Arabic grammar is notouriously complex, and Persian speakers will have just as much problem with mastering the grammar as do English-speakers. So the way it's written is the way it's said. Whilst Turkish has used the Latin script for almost 100 years, it is still a very difficult language to grasp for English speakers because of the sheer volume of learning and memorization of grammatical rules required. The grammar is similar to English, and many vocabulary words will sound familiar, like samme (same), ham (him) and op (up). For example, improving listening skills should be. is pronounced as Ay twah and Pouvez-vous? (Can you?) Read on to start your journey into the beautiful and intriguing world of the Persian language, and good luck! Fill in the form below and well contact you to discuss your learning options and answer any questions you may have. German 2. Persia was one of the most powerful empires on earth, rivaling those of the Greeks, Romans, and Egyptians. Continue with Recommended Cookies. When it comes to the verbs, Persian uses these words to denote tenses and the grammatical aspect of how the action will continue over time, such as the continuous imperfect (I was loving) or the bounded perfective (I loved). In fact, you probably already know how to order so much more. Frisian was once the primary language of what during the Middle Ages was known as Frisia. Danish is mostly spoken in Denmark, although its also a protected minority language in Germany. There are many Mandarin Chinese language resources available online. We mentioned Dutch above, but Afrikaans is like a grammatically boiled-down version of its parent language. This is because Japanese has long been thought to be one of the most difficult languages ever to learn, whether you are native English speaking or not. 120 words, extremely simple grammar. It is easy, there is many derivatives to the words. More tutorials, interactive lessons, and activities are found via ANU Persian Online, an official portal with many educational options. Just like Spanish, Portuguese has an advantage of exposure. Cognates are words in two languages that have the same origin and a similar pronunciation, spelling, and meaning. These two words look almost identical, but notice the very small differences of the and the . Similar in many ways to Norwegian, Swedish is yet another Germanic language that is a little simpler for native English speakers to learn. It is similar in many ways to other languages that native English speakers find easier to learn, such as Spanish and French. But its simplicity warrants an inclusion. There are some shared cognates such as ' ja ' which means ' yes ' and ' veld ' which means ' field '. Even so, French is still one of the easiest languages for English speakers to learn. In terms of vocabulary, youll learn new Swedish words very quickly. Nevertheless the language is a beautiful one, steeped in history. Therefore, you should be able to master the basics and learn how to speak French in no time. And with the Sasanians, a new Persian dynasty emerging after 200 AD, Modern Persian was able to form. You say what you see. But whether you learn a new language in a quick and easy way also depends on your learning source. The grammar is fairly straightforward, without inflection, agreements between nouns and adjectives, and even no genders of words to memorize. Another language that uses a similar style alphabet is Hebrew, which is also consonant-only. There are also fewer singular and noun genders to learn than other languages, which makes it easier to learn. Norwegian grammar is generally pretty straightforward, so it wont take you long to take a hang of it. Practice little but often and you will likely find that things stick in your head much faster and more easily. What is Valenciano & Where is the Language spoken? You can also find some of your favorite movies and shows that you already know well and watch them in another language. Welsh, the language of Wales (Englands neighbor) is a beautiful ancient language spoken by around 29% of the population in Wales. The following are some of. This makes learning new vocabulary much easier because the letters are ones that you are already familiar with and you can figure out how to pronounce something with relative ease. You shouldnt have unrealistic goals though. Another popular language school is the International Language Institute, offering multiple levels of classes to learn Persian and Farsi in Washington, DC. Less than 22 percent of the U.S. population speaks a language other than . In comparison, a language that is not in your language family may be more difficult to get to grips with. The Norwegian sentence can be translated word for word in the exact order as it would be said in English. But generally, Portuguese is categorized as an easy foreign language for a reason. But since Norwegian and English have a lot of similarities, if you decide to take Norwegian lessons, you shouldnt come across too many obstacles. For instance, He comes from Norway translates to Han kommer fra Norge., Norwegian is spoken by around 5 million people, primarily in Norway. The latter fact will be a welcome discovery for those still reeling from the discovery that Arabic goes right to left! For instance, to change a singular word to plural, all you have to do is repeat the word or add an extra one. It is a beautiful language from a country steeped in history and, as such, many of the traditional ways of speaking still stand. You will have noticed that even the easiest languages on this list can take between 575 and 600 hours. Verb conjugations are logical, for example. There are some false cognates you should be careful about though. Get my exclusive language learning content delivered straight to your inbox. This makes it a very unique language to write, speak and hear. The change to New Persian was initially sparked by the rise of Islam and the Arabic nations of the area, including the adoption of Arabic script for writing, illumination for manuscripts, and a wider spread of poetry. The pronunciation of most Swahili words is fairly easy, and many are very similar to their English equivalent. Welsh is a reasonably difficult language to get to grips with for native English speakers, even those English speakers who have lived in Wales for their whole life! The most challenging aspect of this language for English speakers will likely be the pronunciation., In Belgium, Flemish, which is the dialect spoken in the Flanders region, is actually identical to Dutch. In fact, did you know that for most English speakers, Persian is one of the easiest Middle Eastern languages to learn? Ask them honestly whether they would mind helping you as you learn their language. Indonesian. For example, the word order in Swedish is also SVO. Therefore, from a linguistic perspective, Norwegian and English have quite a lot in common. Its also gaining global popularity, and more and more people are looking for online Swahili lessons. For average native Turkish speakers, is it less difficult to learn/pronounce other non-Turkic agglutinative languages like Korean and Japanese or the languages of the neighbors with whom the Oghuz Turks have historically interacted frequently, like Armenian, Arabic, Farsi, Bulgarian, and Greek If you are interesting in learning Korean, it is worth looking at the Rocket Korean language course, part of the Rocket Languages series. This means youll be able to read and pronounce most words correctly once you have learned a few ground rules. Sure, they will likely be dubbed, but it will be extremely beneficial as you will already know what is going on and you will have a chance to hear the language in a familiar setting. Nowadays, Latin script is used, which is why native English speakers find it a little easier. If youre looking to learn a language that will enhance your travel experiences and boost your employability, learning Spanish online is a great choice. That is a huge amount of time, and even then you will only be at intermediate, conversational level. But all the languages we mentioned today do have certain things in common. Nevertheless, it is very difficult for a native English speaker to learn Russian. This blog post is available as a convenient and portable PDF that you For example, it is spoken in Iran and called Farsi. German The Indo-European language is the source of many of its idioms and concepts; Latin, Greek, French, and English all contribute to its construction in various ways. Portuguese is spoken by around 234 million people around the world. The Hindi language is a relatively challenging one and takes hours to perfect to even an intermediate level. Creole, for example, both Haitian and Louisianan are derived from the French language. This makes it easier to get to grips with if you already have prior knowledge of any of them. The Arabic alphabet was adopted for writing Persian words with slight adaptations after the Islamic conquest of 642 AD, which means that the literary tradition within the language has been fairly uniform for the past centuries. The most important thing that we want you to take away from this article is that even though some languages may be easier for a native English speaker to learn than others, it does not mean the harder languages are out of your reach. We have another popular Romance language for you to consider of course, its French. The word order, syntax, and structure of Portuguese when writing and speaking are similar to English and other Romance languages. For instance, polisi is police and baiskeli is bicycle., There are also some key differences, of course, but if youre looking to gain fluency in one or more African languages, Swahili is an excellent one to start with.. Hungarian is a language with a reputation for being notoriously difficult to learn. The multi-state system set up by Cyrus continued, including tax districts, infrastructure, communications, and transportation, all important to sustain such a massive expanse. This toneless African language is thought to be one of the easier African languages for native English speakers to learn. The 10 Easiest Languages to Learn for English Speakers. Indeed, the Empire of the Persians was one of the most expansive ones in the ancient world, spanning from the Balkan Peninsula in Eastern Europe to the Indus Valley in India at the height of its influence. Spanish is often the go-to language for English speakers because of its small inventory of speech sounds and user-friendly phonetic spelling system. Gaelic has two common types: Scottish and Irish. What is the easiest language to learn for French speakers? This Scandinavian language is grammatically easy and has only nine verb forms, including the passive, which is familiar to English speakers.It has a lot of Germanic-based vocabulary and unique speaking patterns, which are quick and soft. was designed with you in mind: Minimal grammar, easy rules and as a bonus, lots of things that resemble many other world languages. Although the lack of grammar rules might sound appealing, it can be a bit confusing, but its not hard to get used to. Some of them are phonetic, which means that reading and pronunciation shouldnt be a problem for you. So many languages are arguably easier to pick up than others for English speakers. What will help you to persevere even when it starts to get difficult? From that perspective, there are no easy and hard languages. Spanish also uses the same alphabet as English, and many of the words are pronounced just as they are spelled., Another benefit of Spanish for English speakers is that the sentence structure is not only similar to English, but its also not as strict as it is in English, which means there are often multiple ways a sentence can be put together.. But with so many different languages to choose from, how do you decide which one to spend your time mastering? There are also connectors that can make sentences long, meaning they are even more complex to understand and translate. But yes, Swahili is also categorized as a less demanding language to learn. First of all, English and Norwegian share a lot of . SHOW ME HOW! According to the Foreign Service Institute (FSI), linguists, and learners, all the languages we mentioned today are fairly easy to learn. With the languages on this list, you should be able to get started identifying your low-hanging linguistic fruits. When you are learning a language alone, it can be difficult to find the time to practice speaking it. Indonesian grammar has no concept of plurals or tenses and no grammatical genders. Swahili does share some cognates with the English language such as gereji which means garage and friji which means fridge. But although the country is surrounded by Slavic-speaking countries, Romanian is actually a Romance language and uses much of the same vocabulary as Italian, Spanish and French., For example,La revedere, which is used for saying goodbye, is similar to the Italian Arrividerci, and the apology Scuz-m is similar to the French Excusez-moi. Its also a phonetic language, which means most words are spelled the same way they are pronounced., Of course, there are a few trickier aspects to this language, including grammatical differences and letters with diacritics. But, overall, Romanian, which is spoken by around 30 million people, primarily in Romania and Moldova, is a surprisingly easy language to learn., Danish is a Germanic language spoken by around 6 million people, most of whom live in Denmark. Arabic is a Semitic language and is thus in no way similar to Persian. In addition to Farsi speakers in the Middle East, there is evidence of linguistic transmission all the way to the Western world. Other features of the script include that it is an abjad alphabet, which means that only letters for vowels exist and any vowels must be indicated with diacritics or specific consonant combinations. Although this may come as a surprise, learning Indonesian is considered relatively easy for English speakers. Ask yourself some questions: Why is it important to you that you embark on this learning journey? The Romanian language is a beautiful amalgamation of Russian sounds and Italian sounds, resembling each of them in different ways. For this reason, it is considered a macro language because its reach is vast and extensive. From this period, we primarily have the remains of religious Pahlavi or Zarathushti texts that described Persias new religion, Zoroastrianism. Although every foreign language comes with its own unique set of challenges, the reality is that some languages will simply be easier for fluent English speakers to become proficient in. What better excuse to go to Paris and brush up on your French skills whilst you sip coffee and eat croissants? Some of the easiest languages for Americans to learn include Spanish, French, and Italian. With many languages not connected to the Latin alphabet, you'll need 1,100 hours of practice to proficiently speak Category III languages, according to Rosetta Stone. In Afghanistan, it is called Dari, and in Uzbekistan and Tajikistan, it is known as Tajik. Language families are languages that are grouped because they are related in some way through descent. And The Easiest Language To Learn Is. With 24 languages to choose from, Rosetta Stone makes it easy to learn as many languages as you'd like. It is a vibrant, fluid, and ancient language, that ignites passion and intrigue in researchers, teachers, and those who want to learn how to speak it. The reason it is so simple to pick up is because of the similarities it shares with English. Start with PersianPod101 for basic lessons and vocabulary, Lingua Boost Persian for experience in real life conversations, and Persian PodGap for culture, literature, and interviews. As you likely expected, Arabic uses Arabic script. Like Norwegian and Swedish, it has fairly straightforward grammar rules and a lot of vocabulary that will be familiar to English speakers., For example, Gode tidende sounds a lot like Good tidings, and the word dyre, which means expensive, is similar to the word dear, which is used in English when something is considered too pricey. Physical and cultural differences, Youll find all of this straight after the list! And of course, France exists! Amazon and the Amazon logo are trademarks of Amazon.com, Inc, or its affiliates. 1 Language and diplomacy 2 Easiest (about 600 hours of study) 3 German (750 hours) 4 Malay and Swahili (900 hours) 5 Hungarian (1,100 hours) 6 Greek (1,100 hours) Spanish is considered relatively easy for English speakers: it has 1000s of similar words (fant stico!) In fact, Italian vocabulary is widely used in English, and youre probably already familiar with more Italian words than you may realise, from those relating to food, such as gelato and panini to others like diva, solo, finale or fiasco.. Yes, that is systems, plural. This means you will have to work hard to memorize the way words are written. Instead, think of it more as a head start if you decide to pick up the other one. Different languages may use breathing and throat noises as part of their words which can be difficult to master for those new to the language. We will cover the basics of the Persian language, its origins and cultural history, and some of the best ways to approach learning it for the first time, including great resources that are available now. Can you guess what English word this resembles? Some shared cognates include katt which of course means cat, busk which means bush, and our personal favorite (because it is so simple but looks so much more pleasing to the eye than our boring spelling) sn which means snow. It is the former two that are most commonly used. And that will make your learning process a whole lot easier. Another member of the Germanic family of languages that is considered easy to learn is Swedish. Italian 3. Now we come to the language of Iran, and what modern native speakers use to communicate. These minuscule differences can transform the meaning entirely. 2023 Enux Education Limited. Because it is a part of the Indo-European language tree, such influence is common, but not everyone knows the origins of certain words. Over 2000 of them are commonly used, so you need to know at least all of those. Language vs Dialect: Whats the Difference? For conversation and community-based lessons, opt for Mondlys courses that help you get fluent quickly and easily! However, a welcome difference between Polish and other Slavic languages is the fact that it uses an alphabet that you will be more familiar with: the Latin script. For example, several common borrowed words in English that come originally from Farsi words include the following: Overall, Farsi and the Persian language are spoken by millions of people, both within Middle Eastern countries and across the globe. First of all, Indonesian is one of the few Asian languages that use the Latin alphabet. Italian 7. How far away the country that the language belongs to (both physically and culturally) can also be an influencing factor in how easy or difficult a language can be to learn. Under Xerxes, Persia took over large parts of Northern and Central Greece in the 480s BC, and the Empire was only shaken by the conquest of Alexander the Great by 330 BC. However, the script involved with learning the Persian language is simpler than you might imagine, once you understand the basics. Though Persia does not exist as a nation today, per-say, it does live on in the Middle Eastern countries that were created because of it. The letters can be learned and memorized, as can pronunciations, but the tone can take a little while for native English speakers to get right, especially if you have no native Mandarin speakers around to hear your tone and correct you if needed. Lastly, brush up on your Colloquial Persian with Abdi Rafiee's 3rd edition copy of this classic conversational sourcebook. Similar to the Rosetta Stone, the inscription features three languages for the same text, including Old Persian, Babylonian, and Elamite, and gives historians and linguists a great look into what the original dialect of Persia was like. 10 Hardest Languages to Learn for English Speakers. Some people even think it is one of the sexiest languages in the world. Swedish 5. You might be surprised to find out that Finnish is a very unique language. In addition, Swahili, Farsi (Persian), Pashto and Kurdish are languages that an Arabic speaker can get the hang of without much effort. The total number of learned Farsi speakers and native Farsi speakers alike equals about 62% of the population of Iran, or over 30 million people. An example of this is the Russian words and . It was only during Alexander the Greats 330 BC campaigns into Persia that the states began to fall apart, and the Empire of the Persians finally disintegrated into the control of other political and dynastic factions, like the Ptolemies.