i genuinely have no idea if i should study italian or french. on one hand, french is probably more useful, especially since i live in the u.s. and could communicate with people from french-speaking canada. french also seems to have more speakers. however, i also have an italian study book and it seems easier to get the hang of for me than french, especially since i can’t yet differentiate what people are saying and the way things are spelled in french.
i genuinely love both languages but i don’t know which one i should learn, even if i’m the only one who can decide this. i have a study book for italian and busuu as a language learning app but i don’t have a french book yet. should i learn italian first and then go with french? learn italian and pick up bits of french along the way?
Do you live on the border to Quebec? Otherwise French is a rarity in Canada even though things are labeled in both languages. If you are in the USA, Spanish would seem the more useful language, in my opinion.
The most common languages I hear in Canada (nearer the 49th parallel), other than English are Hindi, Punjabi, and Mandarin
I love how everyone forgets the existence of New Brunswick
I know its officially bilingual, but do people speak Mich French there?
Yes… practically everyone is fluently bilingual and you will hear people start the convo in French and then switch to English, then back to French (or vice versa).
The Northern part of New Brunswick is almost completely French. You don’t hear much English in your day to day. But if you respond in English you’ll hear perfect English right back. Most of the radio stations here are French.
Nice. Sounds like it should be Brunswick de Nouveau
Nouveau Brunswick is how it’s called in French
I’d learn Mandarin but it’s very hard.
I learnt Spanish and use it every day, it is easy.
When learning a language it helps reading books and watching movies and shows in the language. Maybe thinking about which language has more books/movies/shows that interest you could help you decide.
Did you know? French, Italian, and Spanish are all Romance languages; they are part of a large family of languages that evolved from Latin over hundreds of years. That’s why they’re similar. While I don’t have the necessary citations on hand, learning a language might make it slightly easier to learn, or at least have a basic “I know a few hundred words” understanding of its sibling languages.
(I saw that other people have typed similar things but I already wrote it so I’m just gonna send it anyway.)
I’d go with Python.
Italian. Then you can watch the cartoon Pimpa from 1982 ❤️
German.
I will not be taking follow up questions.
Flutter
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Learning a language is easiest when you have opportunities to speak it. Which one are you more likely to use? A book might not be as effective as an app, like Duolingo or similar. Duolingo is free for a single language.
French phonetics is a bit more different from English, but both Italian and French are romance languages (based on Latin). Many English root words are Latin (also German, Greek, Dutch, and Indigenous languages). English also borrows loanwords from French and Italian, but pronunciations vary. I’d say both are relatively easy to learn as an English speaker (as is Spanish or Portuguese).
Grammatically, sentence structure is close to English. French introduces an extra word for negation which takes a little getting used to. “I cannot” becomes “Je ne peux pas” while Italian conjugates the verb to remove the subject “Non posso”.
One big difference with French is that there is a governing body that determines official French spelling and pronunciation. L’Académie Française was founded in the 17th century by the bad guy from the Three Musketeers, and is committed to maintaining linguistic purity. They tried for years to get French people to say “le courriel” instead of “email” but I don’t think anyone actually says that. Italy also has Accademia della Crusca, aka la Crusca, which had a similar function until the early 20th century when they were made more of an philology organization.
The benefit to both is that, once you understand spelling and diacritics, reading a word tells you precisely how to pronounce the word. The downside is that the languages have been basically stagnant for 350 years, so there are many strict, archaic phrases and sentence structures. English is notorious for homophones, homographs, and homonyms, which aren’t nearly as common in either French or Italian.
That said, reading from a book will never be the same as speaking with and listening to a native speaker. If you don’t have someone to practice with, there are online resources and probably local community options to find people who will help.
Just a small precision, courriel is from Quebec, and everyone* uses it cause it’s a great translation. It rolls off the tongue and was an excellent neologism from the Office Quebecoise du Francais. The académie wanted to use “mail” which is dumb and confusing and bring nothing to the language that just using “email” doesn’t already do. It is often a case study of how Quebec does some neologism better.
*Maybe a bit less in very colloquial speak, but still at least as common as using the anglicism.
Do you already know some French Canadians? The best and most fun way to learn a language is by talking with people. If you know someone who speaks a language you want to learn and they’re willing to struggle through talking with you, pick that language.
i don’t know any at all but i know some french speakers on reddit!!
Esperanto
Don’t sleep on Spanish if it’s being offered, it’s the 4th most spoken language on the planet and is heavily woven throughout the US.
I took it in high school but didn’t solidify it until adulthood, when we had Venezuelans marry into the family. And it’s a fantastic and fun language. Can’t recommend it highly enough.
i am indeed taking a spanish class!! :DDD
That’s awesome! ¡Diviértete!
Flip a coin or start both on Duolingo and see which one interests you more. This is only a hard decision in your head. If you’re not planning to move to somewhere where they speak either, this is just a hobby.
They are both romance languages so you’ll find mental handholds in either language that can help you with the other. Similar conjugations, spellings, irregularities, etc.
The French you’ll learn with internet resources or most text books will most likely be French French. As a learner, that will probably still make understanding the Quebecers an extremely hard task. It’s like somebody from a Louisiana bayou talking to a Scottish highlander. On paper, they are both able to speak English but there are accents and differences in vocabulary that increase the level of difficulty, even for native speakers.
