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在线翻译:
szdaily -> Speak Shenzhen -> 
The hardest languages for English speakers
    2021-05-20  08:53    Shenzhen Daily

For English speakers, the toughest foreign language to learn is Chinese.

Every Chinese word must be memorized separately as you can’t guess its pronunciation from the script.

There are four tones in Mandarin: high pitch, rising pitch, falling low then rising, and falling — and if you think that’s difficult, there are nine tones in Cantonese.

In Mandarin, there is a whole poem, “The Lion-Eating Poet in the Stone Den” with just the syllable “shi” repeated in various intonations.

A country that’s enriched the world with sushi, karaoke and manga, Japan has many devotees, especially among gamers and geeks. But they are confronted with an extremely challenging language that uses imported Chinese characters cut off from their original meaning as well as two syllabaries — Hiragana and Katakana (you must learn when to use which).

What Japanese you speak also depends on your gender. There’s a “rough” language for men and a more “ladylike” language for women, but you must understand both.

Arabic, the most widely used official language apart from English and French, is also a big challenge.

The direction of reading and the cursive script are the two major hurdles for learners.

Classical Arabic — the language of the Quran — will make you understood everywhere, but colloquial Arabic may be more useful, because once the locals start conversing with each other, you’ll lose the plot.

Hidden behind a Cyrillic veil of mystery, Russian is one of the harder languages to master, so much so that even many Russians speak it incorrectly.

Any literature, music and ballet buff or aspiring astronaut — Russian is a mandatory subject at NASA — should study this language with over 500,000 words (some up to 38 characters long).

With nouns that are masculine, feminine and neutral, verbs that conjugate heavily and an extremely strict syntax, German may appear insurmountable to start with.

On the other hand, pronunciation and spelling is straightforward and once you learn the rules, that’s it.

For English speakers, Spanish and Italian of Latin languages are easier to learn than French and Portuguese.

Words to Learn 相关词汇

【爱好者】 àihàozhě buff a person who knows a lot about and is very interested in a particular subject

【不可逾越的】bùkě yúyuè de insurmountable unable to overcome

对于说英语的人来说,最难学的外语就是汉语。每个中文字都需要独立记忆,因为你无法从字的书写方式中猜出读音。

普通话里有四个声调:即阴平,阳平,上声,去声。如果这你就觉得难了,粤语中还有9个声调呢。

在中文里,有一篇名为《石室诗士食狮史》(后改名为《施氏食狮史》)的诗,全篇内容仅由一个音节“shi”重复各种声调构成。

作为一个因寿司、卡拉OK和漫画而闻名世界的国家,日本拥有许多“粉丝”,尤其是游戏玩家和电脑迷。

而这些人面对的是一种极具挑战性的语言。这种语言不仅使用了剥离原本含义的汉字,还使用了平假名和片假名这两种音节文字(你需要学习在何时用何种假名)。

日语怎么说还与你的性别有关。这里分别有一种“粗野”的男性用语和“优雅端庄”的女性用语。但这两种用语你都要理解。

阿拉伯语是除了英语和法语之外最多国家使用的官方语言。这门语言对说英语的人也是一个大挑战。对阿拉伯语学习者来说,阅读方向和弯曲的文字是两大主要的障碍。虽然不管在哪里,别人都能理解你说的古兰经上的标准阿拉伯语,但更为实用的可能是阿拉伯口语。因为一旦当地人开始与彼此交谈,你可能就陷入迷茫了。

作为一门隐藏在斯拉夫字母神秘面纱背后的语言,俄语是较难掌握的语言之一。甚至有许多俄罗斯人都会说错。任何文学迷、音乐迷、芭蕾舞迷和带有雄心壮志的宇航员都应该学习这种拥有超过50万个单词的语言(有些单词的长度多达38个字符)。俄语还是美国国家航空航天局的一门必修科目。

德语中的名词的阳、阴、中性,动词复杂的词形变化,以及极其严苛的语法句法可能成为很多初学者望而却步的理由。但从另一方面来说,德语的发音和拼写都很直接。一旦你学会了规则,你就学会了。

对以英语为母语的学习者来说,在拉丁语系当中,西班牙语和意大利语学起来最简单,比较难的是法语和葡萄牙语。

(chinadaily.com.cn)

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