Second Language?

When it comes to prose I think French is very distinguished. Proust is pure prose. I understand he has a single sentence which is around 4 pages long! And, of course, he's a highly acclaimed writer.
One reason, amongst many, as to why I'd like to learn French is to read Samuel Beckett's trilogy. Not at all that I think there isn't excellent Beckett available in original English. I just like the idea of someone coming to a new language, experimenting in it and becoming comfortable in it like Beckett and multiple English writers did in the 20th century.
A final distinguishing factor is French is the mother language of the essay. There are renowned essayists in French like Montaigne, Voltaire, Diderot and more. I find the idea of reading a concise, unitary piece of writing delightful. Not that literary quagmires don't have their appeal (for instance Sartre's Being and Nothingness), but clarity and precision writings are good and generally by nature charmingly accessible.

Certainly French among the modern languages. But Latin would also be a good choice.

My native language is Portuguese. I also speak English, Italian, French, and Spanish.
Next month I will study Latin (because I need to know more about the structure of the romance languages).

For me
The greatest literatures from West are in:
Greek, Latin, Italian, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Russian, English and German (in any order).

About old languages:
- The best Greek literature is from the classic period. It was written in Ancient Greek, very different from the Greek spoken today.
- Latin is not spoken today as an usual language.
- So, we have nowadays: Italian, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Russian, English and German still spoken. That is the most pragmatic group of western languages for learning today.

A thing to consider: Inside that group of Western languages, the most spoken (as a native language) are:
1- English
2- Spanish
3- Portuguese
4- Russian
5- French
6- Italian
(in that order)

The greatest literatures from East are in:
Sanskrit, Arabic, Persian, Hebraic, Mandarin, Japanese, Hindi (in any order).
But nowadays, it would be more pragmatic learning Mandarin, Arabic, Hindi or Japanese (cause, in this group, they are the most spoken Eastern languages). See:
1- Mandarin
2- Arabic
3- Hindi
4- Japanese
(in that order)

West x East
Most spoken languages (as native language) in world are:
1- Mandarin
2- English
3- Spanish
4- Hindi-Urdu
5- Portuguese
6- Arabic
7- Russian
8- Japanese
9- French
(is that order)


Dead languages (Sanskrit, Aramaic, Ancient Greek, Latin) are good just for curiosity or deep studies of linguistic, but its learning is not pragmatic as an usual language.

I consider Literature and Philosophy very important subjects for all human kind. There are important and beautiful texts in English, German, Russian, Romance languages (as Italian, French, Spanish, Portuguese) and Eastern Languages (as Arabic, Mandarin, etc...).

Any language and any literature is good for learning. All cultures have things to share.
In this world we live today, there is no excuse for a person that lives, thinks and speaks just your native language.

Don't mind what is one person's native language. Learning a foreign language is an essential thing for anyone.

Do French, then you can read Endgame in French, which is in really simple French. Same for Les Enfents Terribles.

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Originally Posted by kelby_lake

Do French, then you can read Endgame in French, which is in really simple French. Same for Les Enfents Terribles.

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And L'Etranger. Gide is also very easy to read. And Colette.

to Brasil =) real good post. I liked it. very logical and convincing.
to all
First I wanted to say that German is not a romance language, unfortunately, it is germanic.
for most english speaking people (even if English is a second language) learning Romance languages is easy first because of writing, you have one common alphabet and common way of writing letters. unlike say Russian or Chinese, JApanese, Arabic.
Besides many words you will learn will have the same connotation, meaning and form (ok, I will say similar) to the English ones, of course phonetics is a thing that should be taken in consideration seriously.
I just wanted to say that due to the fact that many russian writers remain unknown beyond the country because they are hardly translated. many people know only about those who were translated, and that is all. but this doesnt mean that we have only Tolstoy, Dostoevsky and Chechov to be proud.
Russian literature has also very reach and beautiful poetry, A. Pushkin, A.Akhmatova, V. Mayakovsky, A.Blok, S. Esenin, they wont be understood in transltation... no matter how good the translation may be.
Good luck in studying languages =)

If you choose French, I think you'll find that it only gets easier when you get the fundamentals down. The English language was very much influenced by French at one point in time. Although, if you take any given English dictionary, which comprise the largest amount of words of any dictionary, a very little percentage of the words actually stem from Old English. Thus, the point I mentioned above will apply to other languages as well.

I would go with either French or Russian, but I am also biased due to my minimal knowledge of the East.

Addendum: Native English speakers are quite fortunate. After all, the Italians excelled at the visual arts more so than in their literature, or at least such is my opinion, and the Germans with their music, both of which can be appreciated without a knowledge of Italian or German. French and Russian seem like the best choices if you take this approach.

Indo-European family: languages like German, Russian, English, Portuguese, Spanish, Italian, French, Latin, Greek, Hindi, Sanskrit, Bengali, Punjabi, Urdu, Persian....
In resume: Hindi (and other languages from India), Persian and all european languages are Indo-Europeans.

Subdivisions (groups inside Indo-European family):
Italic - Romance: Italian, Spanish, French, Portuguese, Catalan, Sicilian...
Germanic: German, English, Norwegian, Swedish...
Slavic: Russian, Polish, Slovak...
other groups inside Indo-European family:
Celtic,
Greek,
Indo-Iranian,
Armenian,
etc...

Not Indo-European (other families):
Altaic family: Japanese, Korean...
Sino-Tibetan family: Mandarin, Cantonese, Wu....
Afro-Asiatic family: Arabic, Hebrew, Aramaic...

etc... (there are other families and subdivisions)

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Originally Posted by sofia82

oh, Salam! chox mamnun. Man yakhjiyam. CHox sevindim.
Great job! So you know these regions! Wish you best!

Unfortunately, yes. If one does not speak a language regualarly, one will forget it. How long did you worked there? And you taught English as the second language?

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I lived in Azerbaijan for six months: three months of Azeri language training and three months teaching English as a second language in Bilasuvar. I returned to the U.S. early because of some personal issues, but it was a very interesting experience!

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Originally Posted by EricP

I lived in Azerbaijan for six months: three months of Azeri language training and three months teaching English as a second language in Bilasuvar. I returned to the U.S. early because of some personal issues, but it was a very interesting experience!

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Great! In six month you learned Azeri?

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Originally Posted by sofia82

Great! In six month you learned Azeri?

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My Azeri was far from perfect, but I could chat with neighbors, give directions to taxi drivers, watch Turkish soap operas, etc. :D I used to mix up the verb tenses fairly often, and I think I got overcharged frequently at the bazar, but I got by without any major problems. I lived in a house with a host family of seven, so I was able to learn a lot about the culture (although I never did learn to like Mugham music!).

Naah, you weren't overcharged, because there are no fixed prices. If it's like most countries, there's a price for the locals and a higher price for foreigners (especially Americans). Nothing wrong with that. You can still bargain, but you're never going to get the local price.

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Originally Posted by EricP

My Azeri was far from perfect, but I could chat with neighbors, give directions to taxi drivers, watch Turkish soap operas, etc. :D I used to mix up the verb tenses fairly often, and I think I got overcharged frequently at the bazar, but I got by without any major problems. I lived in a house with a host family of seven, so I was able to learn a lot about the culture (although I never did learn to like Mugham music!).

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This is great! Especially watching Turkish soap operas without problem, I myslef have problems with some Azeri words as our language is a little bit different from them and nowadays there are lots of Persian words we use in everyday speaking. This is a great chance to learn a language. I think if you wanted to learn Azeri or other language in your own country, you would not be able to talk like this. Which is the problem with my English even after graduation :D

Most people have problem with Mugham music, anyway :))

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Originally Posted by slobone

Naah, you weren't overcharged, because there are no fixed prices. If it's like most countries, there's a price for the locals and a higher price for foreigners (especially Americans). Nothing wrong with that. You can still bargain, but you're never going to get the local price.

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Yes, that's exactly how it worked at the bazars in Azerbaijan as well. The only problem was that most Americans and Europeans there were expats in the oil industry who made lots of money. I, on the other hand, was making what the average Azeri teacher made (i.e., not much). It did get better once the sellers got to know me and found out that I was a volunteer.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by EricP

Yes, that's exactly how it worked at the bazars in Azerbaijan as well. The only problem was that most Americans and Europeans there were expats in the oil industry who made lots of money. I, on the other hand, was making what the average Azeri teacher made (i.e., not much). It did get better once the sellers got to know me and found out that I was a volunteer.

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Oh! So you had to introduce yourself first then buy anything. Yes, you're right!