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I had two years of Spanish in high school, and find that French is completely different from Spanish and English. Spanish is closer to English, though, and easier to learn. BTW, after being on the “kids are f-ing stupid” subreddit, I’m not convinced that kids learn faster than adults now, lol.
I find that the pronunciations come more naturally in Spanish. In French, there are a ton of silent letters.
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Originally Posted by herenow1
That is true. Not a lot of Russians know English, but it is common for French people or German and Spanish people to know English.
They may have gotten more exposure to English due to school, but a lot of French and Spanish people struggle with English.
I find that the pronunciations come more naturally in Spanish. In French, there are a ton of silent letters.
They may have gotten more exposure to English due to school, but a lot of French and Spanish people struggle with English.
The English tourism industry in Spain is HUGE, I've been myself many a time and pretty much every Spaniard I've met while there (admittedly its people involved in tourism, taxi drivers, hoteliers, shopkeepers, resteraunteur's, bar staff, waiters etc) have spoken great English, its one reason why, despite having Spanish members in my family, I am struggling to learn Spanish - every time I speak it in Spain the locals answer me in English for ease, its very kind of them but doesn't really help me with my learning.
The English tourism industry in Spain is HUGE, I've been myself many a time and pretty much every Spaniard I've met while there (admittedly its people involved in tourism, taxi drivers, hoteliers, shopkeepers, resteraunteur's, bar staff, waiters etc) have spoken great English, its one reason why, despite having Spanish members in my family, I am struggling to learn Spanish - every time I speak it in Spain the locals answer me in English for ease, its very kind of them but doesn't really help me with my learning.
That is exactly what I find in Italy. The first time we went there I remember trying to talk to my husband’s cousin in French, as it was then the second language there. Most older people here, like me, would have learn it at school in Australia even though it is has never been much spoken as a community language.
But now in Italy, English is taught right from the start of school and the cousin’s daughter is studying at a language immersion high school. Whereas here, a country which is a language graveyard, a huge shortage of language teachers has led to a decline in the teaching of all languages. Only about 10% of students study a language at high school.
German is the easiest language to learn for those whose native language is English.
This unfortunately isn't true, even though German and English are quite closely related. Most English-speakers find Spanish and Italian significantly easier to learn than German.
I find that the pronunciations come more naturally in Spanish. In French, there are a ton of silent letters.
They may have gotten more exposure to English due to school, but a lot of French and Spanish people struggle with English.
I am learning both French and Spanish on the Duolingo app. Spanish is pretty much pronounced the way it is spelled, and French is not. I mostly wanted to learn French because I was living somewhere that everything, packaging, signs, what have you, are in both English and French, but my goal was to learn to read it more than speak it.
However, to my surprise, I am picking up a lot of the pronunciation, too. And it's a great brain exercise to switch between languages.
It all depends on where in Europe you intend to travel.
Most all younger Europeans can speak conversational English. The Dutch and those in Scandinavia often speak better English than Americans--almost.
If I lived in New England, I'd be looking to speak French.
In the rest of the U.S., Spanish is best. But I can tell you that Spanish in Spain doesn't sound exactly like the Spanish in Florida or Texas or California. In Puerto Rico, they speak New Yorican--little of each.
We travel to Europe once or twice a year. Rural Italy is somewhere we've found few English speakers. And in Paris, many young adults that can speak English won't speak it.
After English, Spanish is the second most useful language to know, French may have higher status for mostly historical diplomatic reasons but in practice, Spanish is far more useful
As others have already mentioned , there is no single language besides English that is relatively widely spoken throughout the entirety of the continent , however there are some languages that are widely spoken in a number of different countries and on that note ( since German and Russian have already been referenced ) I may as well put forth the Shtokavian dialect of Serbo-Croatian as being rather useful to learn in this regard .
Besides being spoken by the majority of people in four different countries , I do believe it has a certain degree of mutual intelligibility with Bulgarian/Macedonian as well and thus may come in handy should one choose to visit those countries .
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