Language / Polish was chosen the HARDEST LANGUAGE in the world to learn... :D [1558]


To weed out those too stupid to learn? Like ....... YOU!!!!!

Fortunately I'm a lot smarter than you so cases weren't that hard to learn.

Work / Is it normal for companies/schools in Poland to be rude? [116]

Yes, this is normal operating procedure in private schools (not the only reason I don't work in them, but up there). My favorite is the one Harry describes where they don't respond and then get upset when you take another job.

There are a lot of reasons for this, some historical, some cultural, some milieu-based. This isn't the place to describe them all. There are also little signs that are perfectly obvious for Polish people which foreigners are oblivious too. They may think you know exactly what's going on (because a Polish person would) when you're clueless.

A few things to consider:

- Polish employers are very much bird-in-the-hand oriented. Being on the spot is more important than qualifications from abroad.

- Native speakers (regardless of qualifications) are generally regarded as being unreliable (showing up drunk for lessons if at all, not knowing how to teach, sleeping with students, etc) and a flight risk. There is an assumption that they will be unable to thrive in Poland. (This is one of the reasons for the first point).

- Never wait for them to contact you. _ALWAYS_ say that _YOU'LL_ contact _THEM_. I cannot stress this strongly enough. This is not rude at all and while they may protest it's not necessary, ignore that. Always end interactions by telling them the time that you will contact them. Then do it. If they don't respond to emails then call. Polish people like assertive behavior and this won't bother people. Being perceived as a little too pushy is far better than being perceived as not being pushy enough.

- Once here. Do not expect the boss to take much interest in you. Depending on the school, another teacher may or may not be assigned to help you. If none are assigned then try to befriend a teacher who can help you arrange various things. Be aware that you'll be expected to do things for them (like proofreading translations and the like) for nothing. You can also use a student for the same purposes but you'll be expected to give them private lessons for free.

- Once here, don't go through channels. You can pretty much ignore your immediate supervisor, if you need something go straight to the director of the school hunt them down like a fox (wherever they are, whatever they're doing) to get their permission or signature or whatever. Trust me, they won't mind, they're used to it (and it shows you know how to get things done).

Living and working in Poland is not easy for the beginner. It takes time to learn how to get things done and the challenges are many and substantial (and there's often not much help to be found).

On the other hand, once you do know how to get things done it can be a lot of fun and very rewarding.

Life / Do expats living in Poland speak Polish? [233]

One of the biggest barriers to real fluency in Polish is a basic lack of infrastructure on the Polish side.

It's easy for anyone with half-a-brain and a little determination to become functional in Polish while living here. On the other hand, just living here isn't enough for impressive fluency. And for the most part, classes offered for foreigners never get much past basic functioning.

This means the more dedicated will outgrow the courses offered for foreigners and won't be able to find classes for the really advanced leaving them to work on their own (a one way ticket for ..... not getting much done).

Or, think of this way. A Polish person with some basic classes who lives in the UK for 8 years without any academic guidance might be pretty functional, but they probably won't be able to give impressive public speeches in English and they probably won't do much reading in English either. On the other hand someone who's never left Poland but has a degree in English will be able to give a better formal speech in English and might read books in English but is still liable to have some bad usage "I don't know what should I do",

"this people" or might miss not understand some points of popular usage the one living in the UK has no problems with.

Foireigners in Poland are mostly like the former, functional but not eloquent and not looking for deep fluency.

Language / have a sip - Chcesz łyka? [56]

Seanus, 'chcesz łyką' is nonsense. It could only make sense if łyka were a feminine adjective.
Chcieć usually governs the accusative and the only accusatives ending in -ą are feminine singular (nouns ending in -ni and all adjectives).

łyk = facultatively animate masculine noun, that means that for the accusative, either

Chcesz łyk?

Chcesz łyka?

Are both technically correct, but the second is far, far more frequent and the first is liable to strike many natives as incorrect (although it technically is okay, just not idiomatic).

Language / have a sip - Chcesz łyka? [56]


uh .... pick is not an infinitive here (just sayin')

Language / have a sip - Chcesz łyka? [56]

Because it's a finite verb. It has a subject (I) and tense (present) while infinitives don't have subjects on their own or tense. Most of the time in English the bare infinitive and the

"I just randomly pick a tense"

I = subject

just = adverb (modifying the verb or the following adverb there's more than one way to analyze that)

randomly = derived adverb (also modifying the verb)

pick = verb, 'simple present' tense

a tense = object

Language / Polish was chosen the HARDEST LANGUAGE in the world to learn... :D [1558]


Often, even educated native speakers without a background in linguistics or language teaching have strange ideas about the connection between writing and speech.

Some years (well, centuries) ago there was a difference and it was similar to the one described (and still exists in Czech roughly). But the difference disappeared a long time ago in Polish. I don't know of any dialect of Polish that maintains the distinction. If these native speakers do (and can accurately perceive it in blind tests) then they should contact a linguist to write it up and get it published.

Language / Polish was chosen the HARDEST LANGUAGE in the world to learn... :D [1558]

Leaving aside how often the vocative is used, it is pretty limited to proper first names and some nouns referring to people. Theoretically forms exist for other nouns but they're extremely rare outside of bad poetry.

It's also not considered a true case in some schools of linguistic thought (case being limited to changes that indicate some relation to another part of the sentence, whether the verb, a preposition or another noun).

The weirdest thing about the vocative in Polish is how it subsitutes for the nominative in some very limited circumstances (basically a few masculine personal names in diminutive form).

quick google examples

"Kiedy Jasiu czekał w sekretariacie, nauczycielka wyjaśniła dyrektorowi całą sytuację."

"Metamorfozę przeszedł także Stasiu Pieczonka"

Language / Polish was chosen the HARDEST LANGUAGE in the world to learn... :D [1558]

a) I'm not a poetry person (it's all assumed bad until proven otherwise).

b) I had no idea that Keats and Shelley wrote in Polish. Oh well, live and learn.

c) I'm was especially referring to contemporary usage, which none of the citations are examples of. Now you know ..... No, I didn't make that clear.

Okay, I'll try. Komputerze! Lodówko! Ściano! Ekranie!

... mmmmmm doesn't quite work for me.

Language / Polish was chosen the HARDEST LANGUAGE in the world to learn... :D [1558]

The dative does seem to be less used than some of the other cases. I've read (cannot vouch for accuracy) that some of the functions of the dative in other Slavic languages have been taken over by the genetive (with a preposition) in Polish. There are also fewer prepositions that take the dative than genetive, accusative or instrumental.

I'm willing to bet that in a large corpus study that the dative occurs a lot less than what I think of as the big three cases (nominative, accusative, genetive).

Work / Why Poland employers are afraid of hiring any foreign nationals? [171]

Any top notch English program needs both local teachers and native speakers of whatever language is being taught. Ignoring one side or the other is .... not good.

Students also benefit from both (if not at the same time then at different times). Ideally local and native-speaking teachers can complement each other as they tend to have different strengths and weaknesses.

Language / Polish was chosen the HARDEST LANGUAGE in the world to learn... :D [1558]



Actually Czech 'h' usually corresponds with Polish 'g'

hlavni = glowny, hlas = glos, kniha = ksiega etc

Language / Polish was chosen the HARDEST LANGUAGE in the world to learn... :D [1558]


Some reasons for this:

1. most beginning courses don't spend any time on intonation (incredibly important in spoken English and knowing about it will help your writing too). It's hard so it's left out. Other nuances like the count/non-count distinction and the meaning of articles are also left out. After a few years of learning, it's too late - most learners have fossilized bad usage so they have to unlearn a lot of what they think they know (and unlearning is harder than learning).

2. a lot of what is included in basic courses isn't real ..... English (any variety). It's a made up artificial version of the language that doesn't match anyone's real usage.

3. many learners take a 'who cares? it's only English!' approach. this is a direct result of mass learning by fiat - many learners just don't care and think any words they string together are fine as long as they're understood. To an extent they're right, but they shouldn't call the dumbed down pidgin that they use 'English'.


Well the _sound_ of h in old Polish was probably the same (more or less) as the current Czech h, but I've never heard any speakers that distinguish ch and h. Also, Polish speakers tend to hear Czech h as Polish ch.

Supposedly there are some dialects in the east or southeast that still distinguish ch and h but again, I've never heard them.

This is different from the old ł cause I have heard some older or kresowy speakers with the old 'stage ł', although they tend to not use it 100 % of the time and alternate it with the modern, mainstream pronunciation.

Language / Polish was chosen the HARDEST LANGUAGE in the world to learn... :D [1558]

Actually the Ukrainian sound in question (Which does show up where Polish has 'g') is more like the gamma in Modern Greek before a, o or u (or g between vowels in Spanish as in hago). It's more of a voiced velar fricative.

Depending on the transliteration/transcription used, it's romanized as h or g.

see:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ukrainian_transliteration

and

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ukrainian_Latin_alphabet

and

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euro-Ukrainian_alphabet

Language / Polish was chosen the HARDEST LANGUAGE in the world to learn... :D [1558]


I'll take that bet. How much?

Language / Polish was chosen the HARDEST LANGUAGE in the world to learn... :D [1558]


uh ..... who counts milk? other folks in your therapy group?

Language / Polish was chosen the HARDEST LANGUAGE in the world to learn... :D [1558]

Piec radiów, what's the problem. The form pięc radio also exists but wouldn't be accepted by most authorities.

Language / Polish was chosen the HARDEST LANGUAGE in the world to learn... :D [1558]


In English,

radio, non-count = that which is broadast over the radio set
radio, count = electronic device used to listen to radio broadcasts

There's similar usage in Polish.


Well, the sources I've seen suggest 'radioodbiornik' or 'odbiornik radiowy' for radio(set), but some people do use 'radio' for the object and suggest that 'radiów' is the preferred genetive plural.


You're taking away the wrong message here. The right message is that for forms that are very rare but theoretically possible Polish speakers can come up with more than one possible way that's clear and unambiguous. They are not necessarily sure about which one is approved of by grammar authorities, who might argue among themselves as well.

In other words, 4 different ways for describing a phenomenon that is not likely to ever be needed is not a sign of linguistic inefficiency or poverty. It is a sign of richness and flexibility.

Language / Polish was chosen the HARDEST LANGUAGE in the world to learn... :D [1558]

One problem is that there are many, many words in English that can be used as count or non-count with a large or small difference in meaning.

In the case of space:

space, count = a particular place, reserved for something; part of a surface marked off on more than one side; (more rearely) an item on a list

space, non-count = a) a dimension (not the right word, but close enough) b) the cosmos beyond the earths atmosphere

Language / Polish was chosen the HARDEST LANGUAGE in the world to learn... :D [1558]


Technically they're not singular (which can only exist in opposition to 'plural') they're non-count, which means they have no number. They take singular verbs but can't be used with the indefinite article (required in some cases for true singular nouns).

Language / Polish was chosen the HARDEST LANGUAGE in the world to learn... :D [1558]


Not to pull rank or anything, but I am a linguist... It's not a collective singular (some popular teaching materials might use that kind of terminology but it's not really accurate here).

I do agree that 'spaces' (in the meaning of 'outer space') is not normally pluralized. If it were, it could only mean (for me):

a) different dimensions (as in SF)

b) different parts of the cosmos

'cosmoses' just can't exist in my dialect without some kind of SF meaning (I can imagine it as astrophysics jargon or something like that, but jargon and everyday usage are two separate things).

Language / Polish was chosen the HARDEST LANGUAGE in the world to learn... :D [1558]

collective usually means a group of things, government (in the American sense), family (a set of related individuals), herd (a group individual animals). They're all singular and can take the indefinite article and have plurals. Again singular is a meaningless concept unless there's a plural (that's a technical point of linguistics - no contrast, no category)

Space is more a substance like milk or air.

Language / Polish was chosen the HARDEST LANGUAGE in the world to learn... :D [1558]


Not in everyday, mainstream usage it doesn't. Specialist vocabulary takes on different meanings and can generate new forms that aren't part of mainstream usage.

If you go around speaking to non-specialists saying things like:

"That movie is set in outer spaces." or "That new telescope can see further out into the cosmoses than ever before."

People will understand you, but you'll sound weird and the great majority of native speakers (let's say 98% give or take a few points) won't produce those sequences naturally.


Okay, usually a collective singular noun is made up of a set of potentially discrete individuals of the same class.

family = individuals of the same species
team = players on the same side
herd = (usually fourfooted) animals (usually) of the same species

furniture is an odd duck, kind of a collective, but made up of individuals of different classes (chairs, tables, beds etc) it's more a cover term like 'mammals' but for hard to determine reasons remains stubbornly non-count for native speakers.

space in the classic sense doesn't necessarily refer to celestial bodies, but the matter between them. ('outer space' might refer to celestial bodies and the matter between them and cosmos might, but the plain word 'space' even in the SF meaning doesn't. The planets and stars etc are _in_ space (like islands in an ocean) and not part of it.

I'm not a semanticist and I'm rapidly reaching the end of what I can confidently say on the subject without working out a theoretical model or doing some checking on references and I don't have the slightest intention of doing either :)

On the other hand, the very well known (in linguistics) Polish born Australian semanticist Anna Wierzbicka has written a lot on the boundaries in English between individual items and collective and substance nouns that address a lot of these issues. If you're interested look her stuff up. She's not the easiest read in the world but she's far from the worst writer in linguistics (that would be Chomsky, Noam who's writing is disorganized, opaque and aimed only at those who follow his work obsessively).

Language / Polish was chosen the HARDEST LANGUAGE in the world to learn... :D [1558]

I see a problem here in that people are trying to carry over the gender of the singular into the plural and Polish just doesn't work like that.

Basically if a language has both gender and number there are a few ways they may be distributed, in Polish different criteria apply for determining gender in the singular and plural.

In terms of government, adjective and verb agreement, Polish has four genders in the singular and two in the plural.

singular:
masc. animate
masc. inanimate
neuter
feminine

plural
masculine-personal
non-masculine-personal

The distinction in the plural is between noun phrases that include the following semantic features:

+human
+male
+adult
+plural

and those that don't.

That is if a noun phrase modified by an adjective or a noun phrase used as the subject of a verb contains all those features then it's masculine-personal (męskoosobowy) and if it doesn't, then it isn't. There are some borderline cases where different people disagree but that's the broad rule.

Slight complication: sometimes the genetive plural is substituted for the nominative but that's a question for a different post.

Food / Do you call it kiszka or kaszanka? [55]

If I remember right (no guarantee that I do) in Wrocław, kiszka refers to a kind of kebab. I seem to remember a ton of kiszka stands in and around the train station.

Language / Polish was chosen the HARDEST LANGUAGE in the world to learn... :D [1558]


I'm pretty sure that all the plural toponyms ending in -ce in Polish are actually neuter (or feminine?) at any rate, the expected genetive plural is - zero.

Language / Polish was chosen the HARDEST LANGUAGE in the world to learn... :D [1558]


Odd. Is it related to szewc (cobbler)? Is it an old alternate plural?

Judging by ghits, it does appear that the alternate form 'Szewc' is also in common usage.

History / The Gustloff - one of the worst maritime disasters that seemed to never have happened [66]

Recently saw a (not very good) fictionalized German movie based on this incident.

imdb.com/title/tt0991156/

It should be available in dvd rental places in Poland (and was shown on Polish tv). In German, so not for the Polish challenged.

History / The Gustloff - one of the worst maritime disasters that seemed to never have happened [66]


That's pretty much always the case. Generally soldiers prefer shooting at civilians (since other soldiers are more likely to fire back).

History / Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, Serbia- segmented. Who is next? Poland? [90]


define illegal (especially since AFAICT almost all of them had yugoslav citizenship).