Learning German?

[Mueti]

Originally Posted by Hs Vi Germania

I guess it is simplier than the Japanese language, though.

I actually imagine German to be a lot harder to learn grammar-wise than Japanese. As German is one of my two mother-tongues I can't really talk about it from a "student's" point of view but German grammar is way more complex than the Japanese one. What makes Japanese difficult is (a) the need to learn Kanji and (b) the totally different thought process the language is based on.


But leaving that aside - if there's still anyone who really wants to take German on, I'd gladly help out; be it conversation over vent or whatnot. Just pm me.

[Woopzilla]

I have to agree with the above. Although I'm in the same situation, I've never studied it. I was born and raised in germany and moved to england when I was 11. But now that I've not spoken or written german for such a long time I've become more aware of it's difficult grammar. I study Japanese too and I find it fairly easy grammar wise.

On another note, I feel having your german pronunciation down seems to help you pronounce japanese words easier... at least that's how it feels to me.

[-KarumA-]

Originally Posted by Woopzilla

On another note, I feel having your german pronunciation down seems to help you pronounce Japanese words easier... at least that's how it feels to me.

that is true, my country as well the accent we use to pronounce letters is the same way as what the Japanese do
*tries to imagine an American accented person speaking German* ooh dear God
Dutch language is a lot like German, if you can speak German you can pick up Dutch very easily as well, our language is just a little altered and less moaning about capitals and "der dem den" as article words lol


the hardest things about German language would prob be that all words are either female/male or non gender and that results in having a different article word in front of it but it also influences the grammar, also the hardest even would be that because words are used in different parts of a sentence that means their article word is different too: Der Mann, Dem Mann, Den Mann: Der Mann lauft, Die Katze ist von Dem Mann, Ich sehe den Mann

also verbs can be annoying in some cases because of special rules/exceptions

if you want to learn German and wonder how you can watch German TV shows etc.
Germans dub everything in German, English tv series etc. the whole deal
Ramstein would prob count as well, though I remember my friend who was a Rammstein fan and who thought the song Du hast was -> you hate lol while it is simply You have

[Hs Vi Germania]

Okay, probably you are right. I only saw it from my point of native speaker.
The Japanese has its difficulty maintainly in kanji. If you have learned the kanji, the grammar is perhaps not sooo difficult.

To the commentar above, the German pronunciation combines a lot of possibilities and you learn many forms of pronunciation and thus you have a good basic for learning and then, of course, speaking other languages.

And the gender problem: Oh yea.... How often do I hear wrong gender usings, even by Germans who are not really sure about it themself.

As Mueti said (wrote), if you have any problems with the German language, feel free to ask me.
I will help you as good as I can.

EDIT: And I would be pleased if you helped me with my English.

[Jinto]

In my oppinion native speakers are not the best choice when it comes to teach or explain the grammar and rules of their language (unless they are language teachers).
Native speakers will use the language without much thought. And that makes it actually difficult for them to realize the important key issues (with the language) that arise for the language learner.

Anyway, I think learning grammar and stuff is not the natural way of learning a language. The natural way of learning is hearing the spoken language and speaking it. Of'course the entry level should be easy and the learning curve must not be too steep.

I think a conversation with a natural speaker who can translate things on demand will be the most effective way to learn a language. It will not exactly teach grammar rules. But thats not so much a problem. I bet only few native speakers actually know all those grammar rules explicitly. They rather use grammar implicitly without being able to realize the rule or grammar code that stands behind it.

So, what I basically want to say is, that you could speak german very well without the explicit knowledge of the grammar. You just need the implicit understanding of the language. Means grammar rules can be just thinking patterns in your brain. Its just important to use the patterns often. That would be the natural way to learn a language.

Ich wünsche dir viel Erfolg bei deinem Vorhaben, ChibiDusk. (Nach 5 Jahren müsste doch schon etwas hängen geblieben sein...)

(Na, welcher Deutschsprachler hat sofort den nachgestellten Anredenominativ bemerkt? Ich behaupte jetzt einfach mal keiner. Das voran-/nachstellen des Namens als Anrede wird ganz natürlich im Sprachgebrauch verwendet, ohne das man sich einer entsprechenden Regel bewußt sein muss.)

[Takeru]

Originally Posted by zappater

Go to classes, 'cause there are so many things in German you need to think of when speaking. Really, some times it's even more stupid then English and English is stupid (at least compared to Swedish).
There are so many things that is diffrent in German than in any other lang. so you got no choice.

Now why are everyone complaining about German? It just makes things so much easyer to able to speak German, at least in Germany!

I find it interesting that you bring up that point since I am learning both Swedish and German on my own at the same time. (talk about getting things mixed up at the wrong times).

I agree, even as a native English speaker, that it can be rather asinine.
Japanese, German, and Swedish all make more sense than English to me at times.
Though Swedish took me the most time to get the pronunciation correct (with things like sj, tj, and kä).

[Woopzilla]

Originally Posted by Jinto

I think a conversation with a natural speaker who can translate things on demand will be the most effective way to learn a language. It will not exactly teach grammar rules. But thats not so much a problem. I bet only few native speakers actually know all those grammar rules explicitly. They rather use grammar implicitly without being able to realize the rule or grammar code that stands behind it.

So, what I basically want to say is, that you could speak german very well without the explicit knowledge of the grammar. You just need the implicit understanding of the language. Means grammar rules can be just thinking patterns in your brain. Its just important to use the patterns often. That would be the natural way to learn a language.

One other thing is that spoken german may not be strictly adhering to grammatical rules. When people talk is fast there little noticable difference in sound between der, den, dem or eine, einen, etc... Most words end up being cut and shortened to 'de' or 'ne' making mistakes easier to 'cover' in spoken german.

But this is probably not really useful until a certain level of fluency is achieved.

[Hs Vi Germania]

Originally Posted by Woopzilla

One other thing is that spoken german may not be strictly adhering to grammatical rules. When people talk is fast there little noticable difference in sound between der, den, dem or eine, einen, etc... Most words end up being cut and shortened to 'de' or 'ne' making mistakes easier to 'cover' in spoken german.

But this is probably not really useful until a certain level of fluency is achieved.

Same as in other languages.

I don't know -> Dunno. etc

Ich wohne in einem Haus. -> Ich wohn' in 'nem Haus.

[Woopzilla]

Originally Posted by Hs Vi Germania

Same as in other languages.

I don't know -> Dunno. etc

Ich wohne in einem Haus. -> Ich wohn' in 'nem Haus.

Well, in cases like 'dunno', 'wanna', 'gotta' etc.. it's more obvious that the person is talking in a slang way. 'Want to' and 'wanna' sound distinctively different. They can't really be used to hide lack of grammatical knowledge. But in english there isn't much need for that anyway since it doesn't have as many genders/cases/whatever.

But yea, I guess it can be done in any language that has as many small subtle changes to word endings as german.

It just feels like it's way more common when speaking german. Just about everyone I talk to says 'ne, 'nem, etc.

[Hs Vi Germania]

Originally Posted by Woopzilla

Well, in cases like 'dunno', 'wanna', 'gotta' etc.. it's more obvious that the person is talking in a slang way. 'Want to' and 'wanna' sound distinctively different. They can't really be used to hide lack of grammatical knowledge. But in english there isn't much need for that anyway since it doesn't have as many genders/cases/whatever.

But yea, I guess it can be done in any language that has as many small subtle changes to word endings as german.

It just feels like it's way more common when speaking german. Just about everyone I talk to says 'ne, 'nem, etc.

You are fully right. Maybe, we Germans are too lazy to speak words completely. ^^