Russian or French? Learning another language besides Polish

Hey.

I am thinking about adding an other language to my mind. But I am not sure if I should go for French or Russian.

I am able to read and write Russian letters ( but that's it ) but I also have done some French basics long ago, at school.

Both cultures and languages are interesting to me, but I am really not sure what to learn.........

I live in the UK and France is next to us of course, so it would be easier to drive over there and practice, but Russia,Kasachstan,Ukraine,Mongolia make up a huge part of the world and have more natives in general...

I am really not sure what to learn.. I am not learning via school, I learn via internet and might visit one or the other language class...at some point !

Can you help me out ? Both languages are pretty useful, I just fought as a European, I might get on learning French?

V/R
Lab

I'd go for Russian, but that's only my point of view! Russian, like German, is of immense practicality in the sciences - the future of any nation. While a number of Russian scientists do insist on trying to discuss their work in English, this is usually a mistake! Plenty though, will readily use their native tongue, thus adding to the comprehensibilty rather than the lack thereof when at international conferences (..seconded normally by a battery of interpreters)LOL

Russian's also close to Polish morphologically, though lexically and orthographically, it diverges considerably:-)

I will say this:
I was learning both French and Russian. After some time I still love Russian but I hate French. It may be due to my maturity since I was a teenager when I started learning French but I never even thought about trying to learn that language again.

To me my emotional reaction to a language is very important and I could never learn one that I don't like. Just try and see which one gives you more pleasure.

Learn Russian, French will be soon replaced by Arabic anyway.

If not in France, there is still a good chance that it will survive in Québec.

In addition to wanting to learn Polish? Or have you given up on that idea ;)
I would think it would be quite difficult to learn more than one language at the same time unless you are one of those linguistically gifted people.

French is an official language in more countries than is Russian, so if you are looking at the 'usefulness' of the languages, then I would go for French. Russian i think would be harder to learn ( 6 cases ) looking at it from a Brits point of view, but as you are German then you are already familiar with cases, and maybe you wouldn't find it quite so difficult as me for example.

Maybe look on the internet for French and Russian grammar forums and browse those for a bit, it might help you to make up your mind.

@Chemikiem

I will always learn some Polish.

But I am usually learning more than once at the same time. In my family everyone speaks Russian, my grandmother is as fluent as a native speaker and even worked as a translator in the soviet union. ( All of them had to learn it at school ). I had Russian friends and always understood one or the other Russian word, while I always had struggles learning French. I still learn much faster than most, but even I need motivation, same as you and other people.

To me, Russian makes more sense.

1. Because I can already read and write Russian, why not using this knowledge to actually learn the language?
2. Russia is spoken in quite a few countries. Russia,Belarus,Kazakhstan,Kyrgyzstan,Tajikistan and in many other countries it is used as a second language like for example Armenia,Mongolia or Estonia. And so far, I can myself visiting countries where Russian is an official or even secondary language rather than visiting African countries where French is spoken a lot ( of course I will visit France, but I've been there a lot and always could use my basic French and some German to communicate ).

3. Because I feel like I have way more connection to Russian speaking folks. I could always find friends along the Russians, while I could mostly find hate along the French ( I know it sounds generalizing, but this was my experience so far ). Besides that, my family says they are pretty sure I have some Russian ancestors more than I have French ancestors. ( but this might not be a reason to learn a language ).

4. Russian has similarities with Polish and I found quite some Poles who claim to speak some Russian.
5.I've always been interested in Russia,Ukraine,Kaz & Belarus. The chance I might even live in a Russian speaking country or even a country that uses Russian as a second language is quite high.

So now I decided to continue my Russian studies. It just seems to be more effective for me, and it definitely is a useful language, especially in times of permanently changing politics and Russia being one of the superpowers. Who knows..maybe all of us have to learn Russian in a couple of months :-)))

V/R
Labrador.

You will have a good head start then and plenty of people you can turn to for help!


Sounds like you may have answered your own question..........

.


So you aren't a complete beginner then, seems like a better idea to expand on the knowledge you already have of Russian than to try to learn French which you admit you struggled with.


A lot of African countries do have French as an official language, but it is also an official language in Canada, Belgium, Switzerland and Monaco for example, so you aren't just limited to trips to France!


A lot of them do, especially older Poles. A few Polish friends of mine speak some Russian as they learned it at school.
I think German was also taught too at one time.


There you go then!


Problem solved :-)

@Chem

Yeah, sometimes it just needs a good self-analyse to get an answer.

Thanks for your help !

V/R
Lab

No problem , happy studying ;)

Reason enough to learn Russian: youtube.com/watch?v=ozYao1Mju7A

Amen, Lab! Again, Russian is much more valued as well as valuable today for a Westerner such as yourself:-)