The best way for me to learn Polish

Hoi, hoi Serca!

Ik verstaa Vlaams bijnaa zo goed als Nederlands. Switching to English (regrettably!), do you find it's easier for Dutch speakers to learn Polish or Mandarin? Since practically all Dutch and Belgians speak a second and third language fluently, usually English or French and then German, is the jump to a Slavic language harder?

Tot gauw,
Marek

So what's a skąnzę? Schwanz?

Sounds like slang to me:)))))

i think she meant książę - a prince - juts switched two letters

mmmm yes... I switched two letters.. sigh sigh sigh...

Lyzko aka Marek : of course Mandarin is a very difficult language.
But somehow I managed to get it faster then I get Polish.
Seems like every word I learn is forgotten the next minute... but I will succeed.
I speak seven languages and studied Latin in school.
Polish will not be the language I break my teeth on .. no way ...

En ja, het vlaams is ook niet gemakkelijk eh ...

Do wizdenia...

S

Thanks, Serca--:)))))

Do you know f.ex. German as well as your native language? Just curious. LOL
Which others can you speak? I know a number myself, among them Polish, German,
Danish, Swedish, Dutch, (survival) Spanish and I have a fluent reading knowledge of
Norwegian.

Many Polish speakers find English a nightmare in reverse; we have MORE exceptions
than actual rules, almost zero correlation between often completely irregular spelling
vs. pronounciation and a staggering choice of vocabulary!!!

Ever seen an old movie from the early '80's called "Sophie's Choice" with Meryl Streep
as a young Polish-Jewish immigrant to America? In one line during the film she remarks
to her equally young English "tutor"/later romantic interest how English has sooooo
many words for one word in her language. "You have (reading from her first dictionary)
for "fast" 'fleet', 'rapid', 'expeditious', 'speedy', 'swift', I get dizzy just to think of it all.."

this was a really a bad example cause they used in the film - fast can be described in quite a lot of words in Polish: szybki, prędki, bystry, chyży, rączy, żwawy

.... or maybe Meryl's character was just plain illiterate, LOL
It has been known, though more rarely among Jews, this is true--))

as far as I remember Meryl Streep's character was a daughter of a polish professor, the film was sort of biased

Well her language obviously wasn't Polish....Polish is the one that has a million words for one English word....

no Davey it's not this way - quite often it is the other way round
often you see polish words (verbs) that correspond to prepositional constructions in English after all to get off a train is not the same thing as to get onto a train - in Polish these are two different entries in dictionary in English you find both at the same entry - so the abundance is quite illusionary

having said that Polish language can be modified by all those suffixes, prefixes etc (I mean it can be creatively extended - new words can be easily created by modification of older ones)

in English people need to use other devices most of the time to achieve similar goals (so there's plenty of meanings to one word for example but also completely new words are invented (new roots) etc. etc

dictionary comparison tells a story as well - there are more entries in English dictionaries than in Polish dictionaries - but simplistic reasoning here does not give you accurate conclusions

Marek,

I have seen "sophie's choice".. sublime movie.

I speak fluently Dutch (Vlaams), French, English and German. Spanish, Italian and Swedish are also on my list, but i don't use them often.

I studied Mandarin and Arabic, and new greek, but I have forgotten most of it.

It just seems to me that learning a Slavic language implies a totally different approach and a lot more memorising then any other language I learned..

Oh well, I will succeed. As any Polish child can learn it , why would I fail to do so?

groeten

S

I'm impressed, Serca! An interesting cache of languages you have. Welcome to PF, O kindred spirit (O Geistesverwandter!)--:))))))

I'm simultaneously "working on" Turkish, Hungarian, Albanian and trying (LOL) to brush up on my rudimentary Russian!

As a professional translator/interpreter, the only languages I could ethically work in are German, Polish, Swedish, Dutch and Danish.

I am impressed Marek.I play with languages, as others do with PC's.
But still, Polish gives me grey hair....

Hungarian... THE most difficult language in he world, beside Finnish. And Albanian... good lord... you are courageous.

I used to be a flightattendant for the German airlines, and I loved the flights to South-merica , as there always as mixture of all the languages I spoke. And felt like a fish in the ocean.

Btw, what course in Polish would you suggest, kwowing that I am an auditive and visual learner?
I like repetitions to acquire my language knowledge.

By the way, my boyfriend's dad is also called Marek.

thnx

S

Nice, and surprising, to see that some people outside Sweden know Swedish. :)

"Surprising"

Jaha, men varfor det daa? I mean, why is it surprising to learn the language of the country one is visiting, albeit in my case only for a short while?? I've always subscribed to the slogan (call it a heresy if you like): BROKEN ENGLISH, INTERNATIONAL LANGUAGE OF MISSCOMMUNICATION!!

Hanging out in Goteborg when still in my twenties, I'd ask people who would speak to me or who were curious about my fluent Swedish, "Talar du engelska eller svengelska?" Usually, it was the latter (...but noone dared admit it)--:))

Marek

svengelska .... nej, det är mycket roligt....

ok.. any suggestions for a good course in Polish, with lots of excercises.. almost "elementary school system"?

tack.

S

Any suggestions?...

Javisst, du. Owszem pana. Ja, selbstverstaendlich. etc......
Probably, aside from PF, is to try getting into contact with your local Polish consulate and inquiring as to Polish language instruction. Once you've done that, try learning as much onyour own as you can.

Don't wish to be too forward once again, but the Poles are far more intent on foreigners learning their rich and inimitably textured mother tongue than are the Swedes as a whole. There are always exceptions though, of course. I found that even if the average Swede's English wasn't even anywhere nearly fluent/perfect, they would usually INSIST on speaking English, although the partners' Swedish far surpassed their English.-:)))

The Poles are blessedly different in this respect. They encourage everyone to speak Polish, at the very least while in Poland.

Lycka till och om du skulle ville behova naagon hjalp, bara hor av dig har vid PF!!

Marku

I didn't say it was strange, but surprising.

I talked to a woman here in PL a couple of weeks ago that spoke Swedish, she had been working in Sweden. It was not very strange, but still surprising.


Probably because they want to make it more comfortable for you, if you speak English better than Swedish.

Owszem, proszę Pani. if serca was an aristrocratic brat you should say Owszem, wielmożna Pani. ;)

a najprościej Pewnie, że tak/mam. Sure I do/have.

man what a bad Danish the Swedish language is :P

jeg forstaar noget

and btw Spanish is a very funny form of Portuguese ;)

Yeah right.

SzwedwPolsce,

It might be more "comfortable", but usually the language-trained visitor to Sweden knows Swedish better than the run-of-the-mill Swede knows English, therefore, it is then no longer comfortable for the stranger, but annoying and more than a trifle embarrassing for the Swede who labors under the delusion that they are making great impression.

whooops, "making A great impression". Gosh, am starting to write English like a Pole--:))) LOL

I don't think that's representative for the Swedish population. But all kinds of people exist in all countries. You are very welcome to come to Sweden and speak Swedish, I think most people would appreciate it.

Skål!

Of course all people don't know English well. But I don't think people will have big problems when visiting Sweden.

ec.europa.eu/education/languages/pdf/doc627_en.pdf

"The common observation that Swedes are good linguists has been confirmed by a new Eurobarometer study: "Europeans and Language."
The study reported that 81 percent of Swedes speak English, which is a higher percentage of any nation that does not have English as its national language. Dutch were ranked second-best in English, with 80 percent speaking the language, while Danes were third, with 78 percent. The average for the EU was 41 percent who speak English."

"Skaal!"

Tack, detsamma. Point well taken. Anyway, as regards Polish, try looking into those sources I mentioned and let us know how you've made out thus far, allrighty? -:))

Marku

Oczywiście, będę się starać.

No, świetny! Tylko pilnie staraj się a powodzenia.

The administrators saw fit to delete my provious post, as usual, so I simply posted again. This time with mostly English.

Some people will go to any lengths in the name of "fairness".

Marek

Aug 7, 09, 20:23 - Thread attached on merging:
What is the best way to learn Polish?

I have recently become fascinated with Polish Culture and would like to learn the language so I can learn more. What is the best way for me to go about doing this? The only words I know are Jak się masz.

Try to meet some Polish people who can give you some language classes if you want to learn the language and find out about the culture.

That's why I'm on this forum. I'm hoping I can meet pple here who can help. :-) Do you speak Polish?