Learning a New Language

[Ottoman]

I need either some advice from anyone who's had experience with this, or your opinions in general.

For some time, I've wanted to learn a new language. It would technically be my third, since I took high-school French, but I want to seriously learn one, and French is. . . meh. From what I've seen, Rosetta Stone seems like my best bet for software; the question is which language.

The only European one I might be interested in is German, but that seems like a cop-out. So, besides that: on one hand, I've always thought that Russian was pretty neat; however, my life seems to have taken a turn for the Japanese lately, and I kind of want to just roll with that.

As far as usefulness and so on, I can't determine if one really outranks the other, so. . . what do you guys think? Just for the challenge and reward of doing so, which should I (try to) learn?

[Metcarfre]

I've heard both are in high demand.

[Vigafre]

Between Russian and German, which would be of more use to you? Go with that one.

I'm having having a hard time thinking of any useful language that isn't a Romance language, though, so I'm not much help.

[Metcarfre]

Mandarin is also probably a good bet too.

As I've complained before, it's the first language of half of Vancouver.

[GreigKM]

I've heard both are in high demand.

... Except Russian which is quickly approaching the 'single place on the planet' kind of language (if it isn't already), and Japanese is already that. Seeing as the two dominate languages in the world are English (the current 'standard' if you will) and Spanish (the fastest growing language on the planet) I would suggest, as you seem to know English, Spanish. Other languages aren't necessary for most situations, don't think so? How many native English speakers speak Japanese or Russian? How many native Russian or Japanese speakers speak English? I'm not being mean, I'm not being xenophobic, the facts are that English and Spanish are the two most useful languages at current time. However, if you must go with one of the two, as Russia is having... 'personal problems', I'd go with Japanese.

[Myrph]

Or, instead of going for either of those, do the manly thing and learn Welsh! Much more useful and is a hardcore manly language to boot!

[AlexanderDitto]

If you already know French, Spanish will be extremely easy to learn, and will grant you linguistic access to the most countries on the planet for a single language. Aside from that recommendation, I would recommend you investigate the language most useful for your potential future employ. If you are planning to work in aviation, for example, French is helpful; industrial engineering, German; general business might be Chinese; electronics, Japanese, etc etc.

[goat]

In soviet russia, language studies you!

Russian is actually kinda useful when you realize that, for a geometric point of view, you can speak to nearly half the planet. True there aren't a lot of people in that half of the planet, but that's just nitpicking.

Seriously, though, Russian is easily the more useful of the two. The only people who speak Japanese are, for the most part, located in or near Japan. Russian is a common language to all of Russia and about 90% of the countries that used to be Soviet territories. Also, if you know Russian, you can usually communicate decently with people speaking similar languages, particularly Czech. If you pick up German (pretty much a bastard child of English, Russian, and Saxon), you're well on your way to getting Polish, Afrikaans, Dutch, Flemish and half a dozen other languages. With Japanese, you can kinda sorta read Korean and a little Chinese, but not much else.

Bonus: using your new Russian skills you can figure out what the bad guys in movies are actually saying.

If you use Greig's strategy, though, your best bets are Mandarin, Arabic or Spanish. (or stick with French)

[Dubious_wolf]

I just want learn Japanese so I can watch un subbed anime..... It'll probably never happen but still, it's a life goal. Personally I'd go with italian. It's close to spanish, so still functional, but more romantic, and sexy.

[the_lone_bard]

i say finnish.
but i have a hard on for finland.
seriously, you can't tell me finland isn't just better than australia in every way possible.
also, music. like 90% of metal (DECENT NON SCREAMO METAL!) is coming from finland/sweden so they would probably be the only two i'd learn.

as for you, go with russian, sure japanese is nice and all, but why? if your not going to japan it'd be in all honesty more helpful to know chinese than japanese.

[Vigafre]

i say finnish.
but i have a hard on for finland.
seriously, you can't tell me finland isn't just better than australia in every way possible.
also, music. like 90% of metal (DECENT NON SCREAMO METAL!) is coming from finland/sweden so they would probably be the only two i'd learn.

as for you, go with russian, sure japanese is nice and all, but why? if your not going to japan it'd be in all honesty more helpful to know chinese than japanese.

I only know one phrase in Finnish, and I learned it yesterday.

"Haistu Vittu Trombi Mies"

Guess what it means.

[2stepz]

I want to learn American Sign Language... or some form of Sign Language anyway. (and no, not just the typical american gestures.)

[the_lone_bard]

I only know one phrase in Finnish, and I learned it yesterday.

"Haistu Vittu Trombi Mies"

Guess what it means.

ei sinun todellakaan ole. Luota minuun, olen asiantuntija miehekäs hurrikaanit.

[Vigafre]

Based on what Google told me, you might have said:

"I/You don't have to. Trust me, I'm an expert on manly tornadoes/hurricanes."

[Spatial Coffee]

seriously, you can't tell me finland isn't just better than australia in every way possible.

It isn't, believe me. =)

And if someone is really thinking about trying to learn Finnish, don't. This is a very hard language to learn, and furthermore, there's only some 6 million speakers of it, so you would never need it anyway. Trust me, it isn't worth the trouble.

[korri]

I want to learn American Sign Language... or some form of Sign Language anyway. (and no, not just the typical american gestures.)

I also really want to learn ASL... It just seems so awesome, also it would allow you to talk to someone who might not be able to communicate otherwise. Sadly though, my entire ASL repertoire is the alphabet

[Ottoman]

Despite the slight derailment, in all seriousness, thanks for all your advice.

A lot of you are suggesting things based on their potential usefulness or how widespread they are. Of course, this makes sense, but if I were learning a language just for those reasons, I'd go for Mandarin or Spanish. More of my reason here is 'just for the fun of it', and I wouldn't enjoy learning either of those. Call me silly if you will, but there you have it.

So, anyway, I'll definitely take all your thoughts into consideration; thanks again!

[Jillers]

Esperanto.

[Metcarfre]

Russian has the best swears.

[korri]

In that case Ottoman, Russian. Russian sounds badass

[falconknight06]

I'm pretty sure that when I was taking German, I read that is was in the top five languages in the world or something like that. Also, German is pretty easy to learn for native English speakers as English is a Germanic language at its core.

This is based on personal experience. Between your two choices, I'd choose Japanese because of Anime.

[MyNameIsIe]

Russian! I'm actually more valuable at work because I can say "Hello. I'm sorry, this is not the balcony. This is the mezzanine. Thank you, and good evening." It comes in handy when I'm ushering ballets. Unfortunately, I only know how to say that, "I don't understand you" "I understand English, not Russian" and "Please bring me tea with lemon", though I'm hoping to study it seriously at some point. I suppose you want something that'll be useful for more than ballets and Russian markets though, huh?

[goat]

Russian has the best swears.

It really does. So good that there is even a Russian equivalent of Cockney Rhyming slang based entirely around dirty words (though not much rhyming).

As far as fun, Ottoman, Russian = waaaaay more fun. Letters are easy to pick up, grammar isn't too terrible, and it's fun to speak. The only things to watch out for are making sure you're using the right case for the right words and the pronunciations.

[TomBrend]

I think Russian is much more interesting language to be able to say you know, but Japanese is probably more useful. I started to learn German on Rosetta Stone, but stopped when I started working 70 hour weeks (I love overtime). It's an interesting language.

[tak197]

I know some ASL (forgot a lot of it from college, but I get practice every so often). Siobhan and I talked about studying Irish over the internet together, but that fell through pretty quickly, though I still want to learn.