Learning languages — some people take to it like a duck to water and others just don’t. We paired up with Sergio Afonso from Absolute Translations to bring you a list of the easiest languages to learn for English speakers.
Gone are the days of only being able to say hello and ask for the cheque. With this list, you’ll be requesting directions and making small talk with the waiting staff in no time.
Spanish
Spanish words exist in our everyday vocabulary, whether we were aware of it or not. While there are many significant grammatical differences between English and Spanish, the fact that they share many similar words makes it one of the easiest languages to learn.
Spanish is one of the most common dialects in the world with over 477 million native speakers spanning 20 countries and over 572 million people using it as their first or second language.
Portuguese
With the rise of the Brazilian economy, Portuguese is becoming increasingly popular. Lots of jobs and new opportunities are flourishing in South America especially Brazil, putting the language very much in demand.
If you know English and Spanish, Portuguese will be a lot easier to learn. Whilst English is a Germanic language, it does have its roots in Latin dialect, meaning that an English brain is likely to adapt quickly.
French
It may not be as easy to learn as Spanish or Portuguese, but French has seeped its way into English slang for decades — c’est chic, c’est la vie, voulez vous coucher avec moi c’est soir?
It is easy to pronounce (for the most part) but French grammar is a maze. There are 17 verb forms and only 12 in English. Not to mention that it gets harder when you count the silent pronunciation and accents.
But we love French culture, fashion, food and cinema. Having access to television programmes and films makes it easier to pick up conversational French and watching them is a great way to test your understanding of the scripts.
Afrikaans
Widely spoken in South Africa, Afrikaans comes from the same West Germanic family as English. This means several things for English speakers: no new verb conjugations, gender-specific grammar or pronouns.
Indonesian
In the linguistic community, Indonesian is known to be the simplest of the Asian languages phonetically and like English, is based on the Latin alphabet. Plus they don’t have hidden sounds or silent letters — you pronounce the worlds exactly as you see them on the page.
We have all the inspiration you need to make the most of you time at home. Try some online exercise classes we think you’ll love, or find out why beauty brands all around the world are issuing free hand sanitiser to those who need.
