I learned Mandarin while growing up and hearing my parents speak it. I never went to school for it.

I agree that if you learn the language while not submerged in the culture and people, you will never get the accents right. I know you guys know what Im talking about.

English IS the hardest language to learn. I learned that from my English teacher in High school. Its a proven fact.

BTW all the years growing up in the culture and I still cant read or write it.

 

I'm sorry but you have it backwards. I speak both Russian and English fluently, i was born in the Soviet Union and came to America at age 5. So I was taught both langues at an early age. English is without a doubt harder to learn then Russian. Russian is NO different then spanish or french or italian... different words mean different things, the main thing is sentence structure and conjugation. And the english language does not follow any familiar pattern.

One can learn how to speak english and be understood rather quickly, but it's the sentence structure and spelling and grammar that they will never master. For example; the plural of mouse is mice, explain to me why house does not turn into hice? Why is it that we went to the movies rather then we goed to movies? My parents and grandparents have been living in America for 20 years now and they still can not speak the language well.

 

I'm still waiting for NFR to wager me for everything that I've got. Impossible not to have accents when learning a foreign language in different country or at an older age.

 

I think you've disproved your own point in your post Russian.

If you speak English fluently then you will know when to use than and then, i.e "English is without a doubt harder to learn THEN Russian"

You'll know that one should never start a sentence with a conjunction "AND the english language does not follow any familiar pattern."

You'll also maintain consistency in the subject of a sentence and not swap from singular to plural "ONE can learn how to speak english and be understood rather quickly, but it's the sentence structure and spelling and grammar that THEY will never master."

I'll ignore your lack of punctuation as I suspect that it is due to laziness rather than ignorance.

 

Mingster, I am a WASP who was born in the UK and migrated to Australia as a child in the early 1960s.

My children are most definitely of mixed race, and physically, my wife and I, consider them to be very attractive. Whilst I am sure your friends consider this to be beneficial I suspect that this is because they are ABJs who do not intend to live in Japan, and who have a Californian mentality. In far too many ways Californian culture is a microcosm and bears no relationship to the harsh reality of a lifetime of living and working, as opposed to visiting and holidaying, in Asian cities.

If my children ever went to live in Japan they would be treated as second, nay third or fourth class citizens, and would never have the career opportunities available to them that pure bred Japanese would have.

I am sure that you understand the Asian prejudices against mixed marriages.

Finally, to continue the points above, and those I made in my earlier post, I am confident you are also aware of the challenges Japanese executives experience when posted overseas. In most cases they have to either cut short their postings or send their school age children back to Japan, in order to ensure their children are able to complete a Japanese secondary education as a prerequisite for tertiary entry.

 

Actually, that used to be the rule, but it no longer applies. The MLA has modified its rule regarding this. Nowadays, many English professors and authors write with the modern rule.

 

I would also note that being "fluent" in a language does not mean that your sentence structure and spelling has to be PERFECT!

The dictionary definition of fluent is "Able to express oneself readily and effortlessly".

 

I speak English fluently, and Hakka (a chinese dialect sounding like a mix between Mandarin/Cantonese), I also speak Cantonese, but I wouldnt say I'm fluent at it.

I have no take on the matter, as in the way I was brought up, my surroundings...these languages came to me naturally. However I'd tend to think chinese was harder to learn, due to the fact that there is no set alphabet for starters. I mean, to even begin to read a newspaper properly you have to know up to 2,000 characters (I'm illiterate in chinese, so i wouldnt know ).

Also, I remembering hearing from an interpreter (UN one i think) who knew something ridiculous like 27 languages fluently, he commented that English was by far the easiest to learn, and he found chinese and arabic the most difficult to grasp.