Is it me, or are some language less “complex/deep” than others?

General discussion about learning languages
acorngalaxy
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Is it me, or are some language less “complex/deep” than others?

Postby acorngalaxy » Sun Nov 14, 2021 6:39 pm

It seems to me that Spanish, French and Russian are more “complex” and “deep” languages than Italian or Portuguese. Spanish is the language that I’ve been studying for the longest period of time, yet I find new words and expressions everyday in books, newspapers, tv shows etc. (excluding regional differences!)

Whereas for Portuguese and Italian, it seems to me that the language is more “standardised”- It’s weird that I don’t find many words to learn whenever I’m reading/watching/listening to media in these 2 languages. It can’t be the author’s style either- I don’t just stick to one source.

Whether that’s a good or bad thing, I don’t know.
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iguanamon
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Re: Is it me, or are some language less “complex/deep” than others?

Postby iguanamon » Sun Nov 14, 2021 9:45 pm

acorngalaxy wrote:It seems to me that Spanish, French and Russian are more “complex” and “deep” languages than Italian or Portuguese. Spanish is the language that I’ve been studying for the longest period of time, yet I find new words and expressions everyday in books, newspapers, tv shows etc. (excluding regional differences!)
Whereas for Portuguese and Italian, it seems to me that the language is more “standardised”- It’s weird that I don’t find many words to learn whenever I’m reading/watching/listening to media in these 2 languages. It can’t be the author’s style either- I don’t just stick to one source. ...

Since I don't speak, Italian, French or Russian, I can only address Portuguese. Your profile lists your Portuguese as being B1, I don't know what you are listening to, watching or reading in Portuguese at this level, but Portuguese is every bit as complicated, if not more so than Spanish. In grammar Portuguese has a personal infinitive and a future subjunctive in common usage that Spanish doesn't use. Brazilian slang is every bit as complex and varied as Spanish slang can be. While there are more hispanophone countries than there are lusophone countries, Brazil makes up for that by having plenty of regional variations from the Northeast to Gaúcho in the south with Carioca in Rio. One of the first words I ran up on in Portuguese that gave me pause was "machimbombo" in a book I read by Mia Couto from Moçambique. Then there was the word, "jagunço" that I first ran into in the novela "Gabriela". If you want to give your Portuguese dictionary a workout, read a book by Brazilian author Jorge Amado. At C levels, native literature and native series are as challenging as Spanish.

edit:link
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Hash
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Re: Is it me, or are some language less “complex/deep” than others?

Postby Hash » Mon Nov 15, 2021 2:34 am

I don't know much about Portuguese, but keep in mind that Italian is a modern "invention"!
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jimmy
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Re: Is it me, or are some language less “complex/deep” than others?

Postby jimmy » Mon Nov 15, 2021 8:00 am

the title might be correct. For me, it still might be earl to speak, but while it is clear to say that for a Kurdish one Arabic's pronunciation is very easy, I cannot be clearly so much sure when we apply the language. Because Arabic language's grammar is not as that easy.

All in all, I am sure in comparison to a pure Turkish one, I am more advantagous.

so the (exact) problem switches to "are there relations between languages that ensures some native speakers to more easily learn a specific language than one another native speaker?"

in my case,yes.
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ulum
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Re: Is it me, or are some language less “complex/deep” than others?

Postby ulum » Mon Nov 15, 2021 11:11 am

I'm a native Italian speaker and whenever I read a novel in Italian it's basically certain that I will find new words that I have never seen before.

Hash wrote:I don't know much about Portuguese, but keep in mind that Italian is a modern "invention"!


What is modern is its use as the national language of Italy but the language itself was already spoken in the middle ages.
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Jean-Luc
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Re: Is it me, or are some language less “complex/deep” than others?

Postby Jean-Luc » Mon Nov 15, 2021 11:42 am

Each language has some easy and difficult aspects. Mandarin has an easy grammar but four tones (more for Cantonese) when speaking and some homework to do for writing :D , Russian verbs have only 3 tense conjugations (but perfective and imperfective aspects...), Finnish has 15 cases (German 4, Estonian around 40).

I am currently learning Croatian, a difficult language due to the lack of materials (grammar only in native language, glossaries too "Serbo-Croatian", bilingual manuals missing...) but the most frustrating is, when learning grammar, you discover that the main rule could be different in a different area, that there are optional or double rules or conjugation, once learned at last, has to be modified due to some letters not compatible when side by side... And I am still diving deeper in the language (the good thing is diving in Croatia is a must!)

And of course, a language is more complex when distant from your language area !
Last edited by Jean-Luc on Tue Nov 16, 2021 7:53 am, edited 1 time in total.
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golyplot
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Re: Is it me, or are some language less “complex/deep” than others?

Postby golyplot » Tue Nov 16, 2021 1:38 am

iguanamon wrote:
edit:link


I studied Spanish for a while, but haven't studied Portuguese at all. I watched the video you linked for a while out of curiosity, and it was very interesting. It sounded like they were speaking Spanish except that I couldn't understand a word they were saying!
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Diomedes
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Re: Is it me, or are some language less “complex/deep” than others?

Postby Diomedes » Wed Nov 17, 2021 2:08 pm

acorngalaxy wrote:It seems to me that Spanish, French and Russian are more “complex” and “deep” languages than Italian or Portuguese. Spanish is the language that I’ve been studying for the longest period of time, yet I find new words and expressions everyday in books, newspapers, tv shows etc. (excluding regional differences!)

Whereas for Portuguese and Italian, it seems to me that the language is more “standardised”- It’s weird that I don’t find many words to learn whenever I’m reading/watching/listening to media in these 2 languages. It can’t be the author’s style either- I don’t just stick to one source.

Whether that’s a good or bad thing, I don’t know.


Iguanamom gave already a good answer, but perhaps I can help also.

If I understood well, you are saying that, in spanish (and other languages) you can find a greater variety of words and expressions in books, newspapers and tv shows than in portuguese (and other languages). And so portuguese seems to you more standardized than spanish, for instance.

Regarding portuguese, without knowing which kind of books, newspapers and tv shows you are referring to (and I'm curious about), I would say that (and you probably already know), nowadays, most media vocabulary is quite standardized, so it's not a surprise to me that someone would feel difficult to dive deeper.

I could suggest dozens of brazilian portuguese native resources to expand your options, but to know what to recommend it would be useful to know better about the media you are currently watching to. I'm affraid to recommend something way ahead of your current level.

Or perhaps you prefer a short answer: no, portuguese (no matter if brazilian or european) is at least as ebulient in terms of different words and expressions as spanish and french, even if some mainstream media may seem too standardized.
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Daniel N.
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Re: Is it me, or are some language less “complex/deep” than others?

Postby Daniel N. » Thu Nov 18, 2021 8:17 pm

Jean-Luc wrote:I am currently learning Croatian, a difficult language due to the lack of materials (grammar only in native language, glossaries too "Serbo-Croatian", bilingual manuals missing...) but the most frustrating is, when learning grammar, you discover that the main rule could be different in a different area, that there are optional or double rules or conjugation, once learned at last, has to be modified due to some letters not compatible when side by side... And I am still diving deeper in the language (the good thing is diving in Croatia is a must!)


You might check easy-croatian, and it has been mostly translated to French.
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Check Easy Croatian (very useful for Bosnian, Montenegrin and Serbian as well)


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