I need advice - how long does it take to learn Polish?

Exactly Kevvy! You've got it. This is one reason Russians especially, and Poles also to a degree tend to sound rather "primitive, Me-Tarzan-You-Jane" when speaking English, French or even German:

Shopkeeper: Mister! Take please fast. Customers waiting.

US Shopkeeper: Pardon, sir! D'you mind expediting your purchase(s), there are other guests behind you.

20 years and not learnt polish how do you work? I think it's very important to speak the language of the country you live in, and how can you be here for 20 years and not know the basics? You make English people look ignorant

RIGHT ON, BUSTER!! That's tellin' him:-)

There's an old saying, first penned by Mark Twain: "To learn English takes one thirty days, French, thirty months,.....and German, thirty YEARS!!!"

The 30-40 Russians/Croats/Ukranians I've met is my only sample. They all achieved this. In my class the russians had been here 3 weeks, everyone else 2-10 years and they get 98% on the test and jump 5 classes.

Kevvy don't worry. The more exposure to the language the better you'll get. My tip with the family is try to have limited number of in a group to talk too. I enjoy speaking to my future in-laws in Polish with my fiancee as when I don't know a word I just say 'Jak sie mowi dreading po polsku?' and I have a new word. However, I absolutely hated it when we had 15-20 people sat round the table talking native speed. My tip is laugh when they do until you realise they're talking about you ;-)

I know this thread is old, but I'll just add my experience for the sake of the internet.

I studied Polish vocabulary off and on for a year before coming to Poland. Now, I've been living in Poland for three months.

When I first came here, although I knew a lot of words and could pick one out every once in a while when someone was talking, I still had no idea what they were saying. So, when friends were having conversations in Polish, I would just stand there awkwardly and wonder what was for dinner.

However, now I would say I've progressed a level, where I can listen to my friends talking and work my mind to try and figure out what they are saying. So my mind can grasp enough that it gets an exercise in listening to people talking. Often, I understand complete sentences, and can figure out the gist of what they're saying. However, it's still difficult for me to respond in a coherent manner due to the insane amount of declension required in Polish.

So that's been 1 year of independent study and three months in Poland. It depends on your exposure, though. I've been living with Polish people almost the whole time, not taking classes but studying some on my own, often speaking to them in Polish. I probably could have learned faster if I told them to ONLY speak to me in Polish, but I would rather not go through the initial phase where they're angry with me all the time. ;)


Quite right! While many Polish words are longer than English (a translator once told me that Polish documents tend to be 20% longer), the Polish manner of speaking is still much shorter and more abrupt. I feel like it unfortunately cuts down on the ability to express one's self, though.. When I watch an American movie with my friends and see the Polish subtitles that they're having to deal with, I feel like the translation is quite simplified and, while it communicates the necessary meaning, it seems to strip the sentence of some of its style.

But maybe it's just that the movie got a bad translation, or maybe that's inevitable with any translation in any language?

It's not abrupt, it's just how the language is. Polish doesn't see the sense in using ten words when three words will do.

Native speakers of Polish have a completely different idea of abruptness than English speakers do.

And what is that?

I think it's abrupt, and I even think Polish people like being abrupt. By that I mean that they try to use as few words as possible, and even enjoy it. I went to load some money on my phone card once, dropping by a Play store, and the man was quite short with me.

(translated into English)
"It doesn't work," he said. I swear I caught a slight smirk on his face as he relished how few words he had just spoken.

"What doesn't work?"
"This," he said, pointing at his computer. "It doesn't work."
"It doesn't work in this store in general, or.. what?"
"Computer! It doesn't work! It's broken."
"Oh.. so.. when will it work?"
"I don't know! Maybe one hour..? Maybe tomorrow..? Maybe few days!"
"O..kay.. well, thank you.."
"Next!"

Sounded pretty abrupt to me. ;)

You are right with the polish subtitles on films there would be one single word to a 5 word sentence

That's because reading speed is slower (for most people) than listening speed.

I didn't think reading speed was factored into providing translations for subtitles..?

I don't think reading speed is factored into it either, when I'm in England I have the English subtitles on as it's a little easier for my partner to follow the film (I have no idea how) but that is mostly word for word

It's exactly the same for English subtitles of the Welsh soap opera 'Pobol y Cwm'.

People read more slowly than they hear, therefore translating the whole dialogue is impractical.

I think you simply don't know Polish well enough to understand that it's a cultural difference. People here don't really see the point in using ten million words if they can use three - he was honest with you and he told you that it doesn't work and he doesn't know when it will be fixed. What more information do you need? Poles don't want or expect profuse apologies in situations like this.


To your American Anglophone culture, yes. To Polish Slavic culture, no.

The point was that he was "honest" to a fault, minimalist to a fault, in that he didn't consider that maybe he was using so few words that it wasn't communicating what he really intended to communicate - I didn't understand what didn't work. Why didn't it work? Did it not work in general at Play stores, meaning that there was some other way that I was required to load money on my account, instead of doing it in person? Did his internet not work, or was the system down, meaning I couldn't go to another Play store and do it there instead?

I know I know, I'm American and therefore have unrealistic expectations of customer service. It's all a bit irrelevant anyway. What is your Polish idea of abrupt, then, if not that?

But this is again a cultural thing. If I asked for a phone top up and got told that it doesn't work, I'd know instantly that the machine was broken - I don't need to know the why and why not, I only need to know that I can't get it.


Again, cultural. A Pole would know that probably he had no idea himself, therefore there's no point in asking. If he knew, he probably would've told you the entire story of why it doesn't work and why the company is useless.


The thing is that even the idea of customer service is different here. People don't necessarily like the Anglophone way of doing things, and they often perceive it as being very insincere.


Abrupt is when someone makes it seem like your presence is a problem. It's often non-verbal clues that give it away rather than verbal ones.

Hubertus, your ideas aren't unrealistic, it's that much of Europe understands customer/shopkeeper/employee relations very differently, that's all. Germany once not all that long ago referred to herself as a "service desert" (eine Service-Wueste), because the smile/nod and even polite hello and goodbye were but as rare as diamonds in the sand:-) Here in the States, in most high-quality establishments, any employee who mouths off regularly to or even slightly disrespects a customer/diner etc.. will be censured for such infraction and possibly fired. We tend to take customer complaints of workers much more seriously than in many European countries.

True, customer service is an American thingy. Poles, they are abrupt. It's not good or bad, it's in their DNA. If a Pole has a hard time assimilating into American Culture that's the main reason.

Even Delph's replys accentuate the differences between American English and British English. The Brits are much more literal (I think that's the way to describe it) Americans are more conversational, so the Polish abruptness doesn't bother the British as much. American conversational mannerisms bother a lot of foreigners.

I think most Europeans see the "American way" as a manipulation of psychology in order to gain a profit: Americans are insincerely nice, just so they can make money. And I can see why they would despise this.

But as much as I hate dishonesty, I think it did good for me when I worked in customer service. I think it's a good thing to encourage someone to try and help others, and that's what my job did - in order to be good at my job, I had to show that I cared about other people, and the best way to show it was to really feel it. Working with customers in a place where customer service was held as very sacred helped me to learn how to be more helpful to people in general. Sure there are some workers at different establishments who will give you the cheesiest one liners and the biggest fake smiles, and it makes you cringe a bit. But for me, I think I learned a lot from my work experience.

As for the American conversational mannerisms that result from this attitude.. I'm not too aware of them, except for having to say something like "Would you like a cup of tea?" instead of just "Want tea?" I always thought that was a result of British "fancy-pants" formalities, though. Do foreigners really get annoyed at this kind of thing, when someone says it to them? Or is it just about having to learn what exactly to say that frustrates foreigners?

If people are stupid or if they act stupid they are stupid. If people are nice or pretend to be nice they are nice.


Foreigners think that if you are trying to be nice you're insincere. Americans aren't insincere, they're just trying to get along.

America is essentially all about PR, Meathead! Compare for instance British books on history, as one example, with American. Brits seem to try and educate, whereas Americans try and sell. Case in point, an English-authored book on European history comes right out and states point blank ".......Europe was a hotbed of simmering tensions throughout her long and convoluted development, barbaric Germans vs. the industrious Celts, the ancient Greeks....." vs. an American textbook on the subject of Europe's early history post-Charlemagne: "The might German Empire of Karl the Great showed that rare tenacity and industriousness for which the Teutonic Germans have remained so well known. The bellicose Vikings and fearsome Picts revealed a degree of the extreme not found as much among their Continental cousins...."

I've yet to read any competent US-history of Europe which devotes but a few paragraphs, if at all perhaps, half a chapter to Poland!

In brief, Americans want to spare the feelings of those countries, such as Germany, upon which we depend so much for trade and industry. The English seem by in large to tell things as they see them ^^

Yes, the English are more discriminating. It reflects their culture. How Americans perceive the world reflects their cultural outlook (a lot of people from everywhere living together and because you don't know how your neighbor is going to react you play nice, stay optimistic and ignore the bad stuff. Kinda like Homer Simpson).

Can all posters please keep to the thread topic

My ambition is to become fluent in Polish within two years and I will be fluent in two years. Bet!

I teach Polish and from my experience it depends on your mother language, internal motivation, learning stategies you use. Anyway, if you are motivated to speak and write Polish, if you are ready to study on regular basis, have a look here: youtube.com/watch?v=TmHZep-gzvY

Merged: How long does it generally take to learn Polish?

How long does it take on average to learn Polish compared with other languages? If you are serious about it? Any native English speakers who are fluent in Polish, how long did it take you and how did you do it?

According to The Foreign Service Institute (FSI) it takes 575-600 hours to learn languages similar to English like Norwegian and 1100 hours to learn harder languages like Polish, which is still easy comparing to Arabic or Chinese (both of them) - 2200 hours. The most difficult is Japanese.

It's time to achieve level 3 of ILR scale which is circa C1 of European scale.

effectivelanguagelearning.com/language-guide/language-difficulty

Oh right, thanks so much!

Really, there is no way to answer this, learning a language is such an individual thing. You probably know people who can almost just listen to a language and pick up the vocabulary and grammar, some people have to repear things 100 times and still don't really understand the grammar or use it correctly. Get as much exposure to the language as you can and practice.

@InWroclaw


en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_language

Do you see how many words in English come from Romance languages?

Yes, this is very true. But for the average person who's not gifted but not slow. I just meant on average how long has it taken different people. Not even to become fluent but to have a good command of the language.