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How hard is it to learn Polish?


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ChrzaszczThreads: 19
Posts: 136
Joined: Jul 4, 11 ♂ 		 Nov 9, 11, 19:42    #121
NKEmerald:
Chrzaszcz:
Don't call me 'smartass'. I was merely saying that speakers of their own mother-tongue don't find their language difficult. I was not quoting you.


I'm sorry, I didn't mean you. :(



Sorry NKEmerald! I'll read a bit closer next time!!!!!! :-)
pamThreads: 22
Posts: 463
Joined: Oct 11, 11  Gold Member MEMBER ♀ 		 Nov 9, 11, 22:26    #122
strzyga:
see Pam, you could learn Polish precisely from the very bad English some Poles speak :) they use Polish word order and expressions translated word-for-word, so there are lots of clues there.

stupidly enough i hadnt actually considered this before. i should have because i am doing exactly the same. now i will pay very close attention to my friends mistakes. thanks loads for help!
JimmuThreads: 2
Posts: 152
Joined: Aug 26, 11 ♂ 		 Nov 9, 11, 23:16    #123
I ask my wife to give me literal word for word translations of Polish phrases into English so that I can get a sense of how Poles put words together. She refuses. Maybe she's too proud to speak English poorly.
Lyzko  Nov 9, 11, 23:29    #124
...or more likely she can't-:)
KoalaThreads: 1
Posts: 433
Joined: May 4, 11 ♂ 		 Nov 10, 11, 12:07    #125
Czuję do Ciebie pociąg - I feel a train to you. (I find you attractive)
Zapłata z góry - Payment from the mountain. (Payment in advance)

I agree with your wife, literal translations would not be too useful most likely. Start learning from the basics (like any other language).
JimmuThreads: 2
Posts: 152
Joined: Aug 26, 11 ♂ 		 Nov 10, 11, 15:49    #126
Lyzko:
...or more likely she can't-:)

Huh?
Lyzko  Nov 10, 11, 17:04    #127
Or maybe she's shy because her English isn't really that good, Jimmu.

Then again, I don't know the woman so I'm only guessing here-:)
Lyzko  Nov 10, 11, 17:49    #128
On the other hand, I've noticed that many foreigners prefer to speak even their broken English with English-native speakers, assuming the latter won't understand much of the foreign language in question. This is however often simply NOT so, and the foreigner, i.e. European language speaker, merely winds up with egg on their face-:)
JimmuThreads: 2
Posts: 152
Joined: Aug 26, 11 ♂ 		 Nov 11, 11, 15:24    #129
Lyzko:
On the other hand, I've noticed that many foreigners prefer to speak even their broken English with English-native speakers, assuming the latter won't understand much of the foreign language in question.

This is not the case with my wife. There are some gaps in her knowledge (British and other regional slang drives her up the wall!) but overall her English is excellent with just enough accent to give her speech a hint of the exotic. It isn't that she can't, it's that she won't. She thinks it's a method with no value. End of story.
Lyzko  Nov 11, 11, 16:14    #130
Ahhemm, pride goeth (oft) before the fall LOL

Admittedly, there are some gaps in knowledge. So long as she owns up to them. Slang, by the way, is really Standard damaged on delivery-:) Furthermore, language competence is frequently relative.
TeffleThreads: 28
Posts: 2,105
Joined: Aug 26, 10 ♂ 		 Nov 11, 11, 16:44    #131
Jimmu:
British and other regional slang drives her up the wall


Not saying this is the case with your wife but IME Poles often do not properly differentiate between phrasal verbs, colloquialisms, slang and idioms.

In the past it has led a lot of Poles I know to regard, in particular, phrasal verbs as "not proper English"

My antidote is to sit with them and listen to the BBC news and count the number for phrasals used. Cue revision of opinion.

; )
Lyzko  Nov 11, 11, 17:09    #132
Ditto, Teffle-:))

Jimmu, as she's your wife, for cryin' out loud, of course her English is going to sound bloody "excellent". To another educated English-native speaking outside, then again, it might not. The scores of Poles et al. who've been built up as being "excellent" in English, often have tin ear to stylistic register and wouldn't know a misused phrasal idiom from a hole in the ground, sorry to be so blunt!
JimmuThreads: 2
Posts: 152
Joined: Aug 26, 11 ♂ 		 Nov 13, 11, 14:33    #133
Lyzko:
Jimmu, as she's your wife, for cryin' out loud, of course her English is going to sound bloody "excellent".

Well, in 10 years living in the US (which, despite what some of the yank bashers may say has quite a few native English speakers) the general consensus was that her English was excellent. And as far as "educated" goes, I worked for 30 years at a college where doctorates were pretty run of the mill. What I was asking her to do was the simplest word-for-word translation, and she insisted on giving me idiomatic interpretation. Your argument might be valid if she insisted on the opposite.
JimmuThreads: 2
Posts: 152
Joined: Aug 26, 11 ♂ 		 Nov 13, 11, 14:44    #134
Teffle:
Poles often do not properly differentiate between phrasal verbs, colloquialisms, slang and idioms

"This is the type of arrant pedantry up with which I will not put."
WC (more or less a quote)
Lyzko  Nov 13, 11, 16:38    #135
You may well be right, Jimmu. Trouble is today in America the average standard (excepting certain of the traditional Ivy Leagues, of course) in English had decreased sharply since the 1960's, well up through the 80's, concommitant with the rise of ever-changing technology. Most here under fourty think and therefore speak or write in almost a series of sound-byte English phrases. Compare a movie from before 1990, say around the 60's, with the latest typical special effects blockbuster of today to see what I mean.

Maybe your wife DOES sound American, so American in fact that she might even be mistaken for a spy, like that Chapman dame, for instance. These days though, that no longer says very much:-:)
JimmuThreads: 2
Posts: 152
Joined: Aug 26, 11 ♂ 		 Nov 13, 11, 21:07    #136
Lyzko:
so American in fact that she might even be mistaken for a spy

Nah. While her English is good, she retains a hint of Natasha Fatale in her accent that would be a dead giveaway.
As far as declining standards, I remember hearing the same thing back in the 60s. Seems like standards are always declining, and yet 150 years ago most people couldn't write their own name.
TeffleThreads: 28
Posts: 2,105
Joined: Aug 26, 10 ♂ 		Edited by: Teffle  Nov 13, 11, 21:22    #137
Jimmu:
pedantry


Hardly.
Lyzko  Nov 14, 11, 20:04    #138
Basically right again, Jimmu old man!

However, we probably DIDN'T hear that complaint prior thereto, i.e. in the 50's, '40's or earlier. The late '60's especially were a demarcation point in world history. Permissiveness across the board as never before linked to more money all around than ever before allowing for the advent of a drug-induced culture from which we have never quite recovered. It became "cool" to be illiterate, "hot" to be vulgar and basically, American society was on the verge of a permanent nervous breakdown, important issues such as civil rights etc.. notwithstanding.

The first of many casualties was of course language. "Easy Rider" became a sort of icon and straight American males of all dimensions saw the acid freak Dennis Hopper ('Captain America') as their hero!!!

Pity us!
JimmuThreads: 2
Posts: 152
Joined: Aug 26, 11 ♂ 		 Nov 15, 11, 11:36    #139
"The children now love luxury; they have bad manners, contempt for
authority; they show disrespect for elders and love chatter in place
of exercise. Children are now tyrants, not the servants of their
households. They no longer rise when elders enter the room. They
contradict their parents, chatter before company, gobble up dainties
at the table, cross their legs, and tyrannize their teachers."

Attributed to SOCRATES by Plato, according to William L.
Patty and Louise S. Johnson, Personality and Adjustment, p. 277
(1953).
rozumiemnicThreads: 4
Posts: 1,019
Joined: Nov 16, 09 ♀ 		 Nov 15, 11, 12:02    #140
Lyzko:
the average standard (excepting certain of the traditional Ivy Leagues, of course) in English had decreased sharply since the 1960's, well up through the 80's

Lyzko:
concommitant

Lyzko:
under fourty

a joke right?
JimmuThreads: 2
Posts: 152
Joined: Aug 26, 11 ♂ 		 Nov 15, 11, 13:36    #141
Lyzko:
excepting certain of the traditional Ivy Leagues, of course

Dubyuh was Ivy League. I think that eliminates your exception. :->
Lyzko  Nov 15, 11, 14:03    #142
Indeed, Jimmu and rozumnniec, age has always criticized youth since the beginning, a no-brainer-:)

My point is however, NOT that the youth of today, in fact of any day, are all those things Socrates bemoaned so eloquently. One need only compare teenagers from before 1969 (Woodstock!) -onward to start to see me point.


TV-game show "You Bet Your Life" (1958) - teenaged boy interviewed as a contestant: Target group MIDDLE-CLASS AMERICA!!

Groucho: So, you're Leonard Fuhrman of Seattle, Washington. Is that correct?
Leonard: That's what they tell me. (audience laughter)
Groucho: Why did you decide to play "You Bet Your Life"?
Leonard: My dad, excuse me, my father thought it might be fun. Good for me too, you know, character and all.
Groucho: Hmmm, sure you're only sixteen? (audience chuckles)
Leonard: As sure as I'll ever be. I'm only joking, Groucho.

etc....


[Let's you and I fast forward over fifty years.]

TV-game show "Jeopardy" (2010) - teeanged contestant talking with Alex Trebeck

Alex: Ok, you're Noah Ellers from Union, New Jersey ,right?
Noah: Ye, uh, Yeah, uh-uh.
Alex: And next year you're attending Northwestern University, is that correct.
Noah: Yeah. I -uh, like, I'm not sure what I'm majorin' in. Maybe psych.
Alex: So why did you decide to play "Jeopardy"?
Noah: I thought it'd be cool. My dad thinks your an awesome dude. I'm like, wow, I can't believe I'm here (laughs!)

etc....

What have we here: Two random WASP teen males from the same United States, both from "middle-class" families etc.. separated merely by
a uniform school system that once stressed education and an in-bred propriety nurtured by mothers and fathers more interested in being parents than pals.

@Jimmu, sure Bush '41 attended Yale much like the rest of that ne're -do-well ilk. I never once suggested money doesn't talk, only that such talk has scarcely ever been so loud and vulgar as now.
winpalmeraThreads: 1
Posts: 2
Joined: Apr 3, 12 ♂ 		 Apr 7, 12, 00:47    #143
Merged: How hard is to learn Polish for people who have a natural gift for languages?

Is it easier for people who already learned one language, and who are naturally skilled? I mean, does it take less effort? Or maybe, considering that Polish is a pretty hard language, it takes a lot of effort anyways?
I would like to learn because I'm half Polish so it would be nice to learn the language of my ancestors, you know, and then I think it sounds good, it's a language I like a lot and I find it interesting, like you never get bored while listening to it, if you know what I mean
InWroclawThreads: 14
Posts: 168
Joined: Mar 10, 12 ♂ 		 Apr 7, 12, 00:59    #144
As an Englishman, I find Polish exceptionally difficult. The way sentences are constructed and the way words change are completely different to what I am used to and I am 99.9% sure I will not ever be even remotely fluent. However, some lucky people have a knack with language learning, and can gain any number of them easily. I think it's probably the case that if you have experience of learning other languages, particularly of the same family, you'll be fine. (The last hope for me is Polish For Dummies which I will pick up when I'm back in London soon. he said naively...)
Lyzko  Apr 8, 12, 22:06    #145
InWrocław, if it's any consolation to you, for Poles it's the same with English! Furthermore, they're most gratified if you can speak even a little of their language, if for no other reason than Poland and the Poles have long felt unfairly marginalized by the rest if Europe, despite their sizable contributions. It's the "I'd rather be a French peasant than a Gypsy king!" syndrome. The Italians, often swarthy and for a long time poorer than Poland, were still looked up to by the Germans and even the French because the Italians had the Renaissance. Had Poland proven similar achievement to her neighbors, she would have been the envy of the West instead of the butt of crude and stupid jokes:-)
scottie1113Threads: 11
Posts: 873
Joined: Mar 13, 07 ♂ 		 Apr 8, 12, 22:58    #146
winpalmera:
Is it easier for people who already learned one language, and who are naturally skilled? I mean, does it take less effort? Or maybe, considering that Polish is a pretty hard language, it takes a lot of effort anyways?


Maybe, but i don't think so. I studied Latin for two years in high school, then French for the remaining two. My university degree is in French, and I'm still pretty good in it, although a bit rusty. I also studied Italian for a year, picked up some Spanish in San Diego, and learned some Japanese when I lived there as a high school student, though not in a Japanese school.

Polish is by far the most difficult language I have ever tried to learn. I teach English, and my Polish students and friends tell me that they frequently make mistakes, sometimes while speaking, but more often when writing. When I ask them how that's possible, they tell me that Polish is difficult.

Difficult, yes. Impossible, no. Get a couple of good books, including a good dictionary, and find a Polish native speaker to help you. As one of my Polish friends says, the only hard part about learning Polish is the first 20 years. :)
InWroclawThreads: 14
Posts: 168
Joined: Mar 10, 12 ♂ 		 Apr 8, 12, 23:09    #147
Lyzko, thanks, I do try my best to speak a few words but it's unfair on the Poles I speak to as they try to fight off their laughter when I'm heard pronouncing words hilariously badly, like the Englishman pretending to be the French policeman in the BBC sitcom (situation comedy show) " 'Allo 'Allo! "

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qnn2eOBbBM0

I could tell you anecdotes which would I hope reassure you that thinking/intelligent Brits have the utmost respect and gratitude to Poland and Poles, but it would probably be off topic :o)
Lyzko  Apr 9, 12, 23:17    #148
English too will have an odd accent in Polish too. It cuts both ways, mate:-)
Zman  Apr 9, 12, 23:32    #149
I personally know one yank, one brit and one dane who speak perfect polish. Somehow they managed. Most people here do not even know they are foreigners until they admit to that. So, yeah, it is possible to learn polish, for sure it takes time and commitment.
El Gordo  Apr 10, 12, 01:42    #150
scottie1113:
my Polish students and friends tell me that they frequently make mistakes, sometimes while speaking, but more often when writing. When I ask them how that's possible, they tell me that Polish is difficult.

No,Polish is not that difficult.They make mistakes because they are under educated and because recently the standarts in public speak became really low.Few days ago I even caught couple of mistakes on Kultura channel.So what can you expect from an average Pole?As for writing,I agree that average Pole's skills in this matter are in terrible shape.That's because people don't read enough.I used to read a lot as a kid and now when I make an error using U instead of Ó or H instead of CH,I notice it immidiatelly as it litteraly doesn't look right to me.It makes a very bad impression on those who can write correctly and I caught myself thinking low on this person.Of course knowing that the author is a foraigner I would cut him some slack but I expect Poles to speak and write Polish according to the rules.It's not that hard.On a side note it always shocks me when I am asking American person what some word means (and I am not talking slang or something) and he/she says "I don't know".You would have to try very hard to find a word in Polish I don't know the meaning of.

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