First, let's determine which languages ​​are popular today.

Of course English, which is unanimously considered the language of international communication.

Then Spanish, because it is spoken not only in Spain, but also in most countries of South America, and it is also one of the official languages ​​of the United States.

We must not forget about French, and not only because it is the official language of Canada, as well as English, as well as the main language of many African countries, but also because this beautiful and melodic language has many fans who study it just like that, “for the love of art."

German, despite the limited territory of application (officially - Germany and Austria), still does not give up its position and has a huge army of students or masters of it, apparently due to the fact that Germany has had a huge historical and cultural influence on other countries, and continues to flourish in economically and politically.

Let's not forget about our own Russian language, after all, it is spoken not only in the largest country in the world, but also in the former Soviet republics, as well as by emigrants who have left this very country and republics in all other developed countries. Let's include it in our list also in order to compare its complexity with other popular languages.

Now let's face it and admit that actually the first person on this list should be Chinese, which is statistically the most widespread language in the world, because it is spoken by 1.213 billion people, which, you agree, is a lot.

First, for the sake of fairness, we wanted to add the national language of India to our list - Hindi, which takes an honorable 3rd place in the list of the most common languages, after Chinese and English. But, unfortunately, it is of little interest to anyone outside of Hindustan. This situation arose due to the active role of the English language, which in the century before last became lingua franca- the language of international communication. That is, in India you can communicate freely in English, and you will always be understood.

Therefore, we include in our analysis Arabic, spoken in many countries in the Middle East, North Africa, South and Central America.

So, let's start analyzing the complexity English, Spanish, French, German, Russian, Chinese and Arabic. Let’s immediately make a reservation that we will analyze them from the position of a Russian-speaking person, and we will take into account data about the Russian language itself from the position of foreigners studying it.

1. The simplest of the above is considered... English language! There are no genders, cases, or word agreements; its grammar is quite simple. The words in it are short, as a rule, the verb and noun are denoted by the same word, verbs acquire a suffix only in the third person. Native speakers are calm about the mistakes of foreigners, because many people learn English as a second language. It is in English that 80% of the world's information is now stored, the bulk of technical and scientific literature is also printed in it, in addition, English is considered the language of the Internet.
For those who are just starting to learn English, it is important to understand that it is a language of structures, a language with a fixed word order. You just need to remember that the structure of each sentence is the same: “subject + predicate + minor members”, and in that order. You should also remember that every sentence must have verb. Well articles of course - they are the ones that cause the greatest difficulties for Russian speakers. In general, you can learn English quite quickly for everyday communication, but to master it... it takes more than one year. As they say, English is easy to learn, but hard to master.

Read more about the English language.

2. In second place you can put Spanish. Its vocabulary is similar to English as they share the same roots - Latin. Its spelling is simple - as it is written, so it is heard. The word order here is not as rigidly fixed as in English; auxiliary verbs are not needed. In addition, this language is brighter, richer and more interesting in terms of word formation - for example, diminutive suffixes are actively used (which simply do not exist in English). The tenses are at the same level of difficulty as in English, but the past is a bit messed up. In general, for a Russian person Spanish is easily perceived by ear, much easier than English, this is due to similar phonetics. Read more about the Spanish language.

3. French is also not very complicated, many of its words are similar to English and Russian, which is due to history. French is widely used and it is quite easy to find opportunities to learn and speak it.
The hardest thing about French is pronunciation and reading. It is difficult to get used to the fact that several letters in a word may not be read at all, and those that are read may be pronounced differently from how they are written. In addition, the pronunciation features of abbreviated forms are related and studied in parallel with basic grammar.
What about grammar? Verbs are conjugated by persons (there are both you and you) in different tenses and moods. In the traditional grammar system, there are 3 present tenses, 3 future tenses, 6 past tenses, 2 types of imperative mood, 2 types of conditional mood and 4 types of subjunctive mood. French is also distinguished by the abundant use of negative and restrictive phrases and the frequent use of the infinitive as a subject.

Despite its apparent complexity, the French language has many fans, even fans, and learning it is actually not that difficult. You can read more about French.

4. If you love long words and capitalized nouns - your language German. German is easier for people with a technical mind, it is quite schematic and predictable, its sentences are similar to an electrical circuit, where each subsequent link is connected to the previous one. It also looks like a spreading tree with many branches - rules and exceptions to them. You definitely can’t call it a poor or boring language!
German is difficult in its grammar, it has 4 cases and three genders of nouns, which, of course, are in no way related to the real qualities of the objects they denote (all articles are declined). According to Mark Twain, “In German a girl has no gender, although a turnip, say, has one.”
The German language also has a rather complex syntax, and the words in it can be very long, because... are formed by combining different words and adding suffixes and prefixes to them.

Despite the fact that its sound is considered a rough language, many people hear its lyricism and see its ornamental beauty. Although, let’s be honest: teaching him is not an easy task. As I said Richard Porson, "Life is too short to learn German." But, of course, this is an exaggeration. Read more about the German language.

5. Russian- this is certainly a rather difficult language. Even the Russians themselves have to learn it all their lives, and at school only a few get an “excellent” rating in it. Russian has 6 cases, while German has only 4, in general its grammar is very confusing, with many exceptions, exceptions to exceptions; The word order is not fixed, there are no articles, and the meaning is often conveyed by intonation.
Punctuation in Russian is quite confusing, but logical, but contains many rules.
It is difficult for foreigners to perceive Russian by ear due to its excellent phonetics - a large number of hissing and whistling sounds and a rolling “r”. Most people in the world consider Russian to be even more difficult than Chinese. Many people give up learning “tourist set” immediately after they try to pronounce "Hello" - Hello. Combination "hello" And "vstv" in one word is unpronounceable for most people.
Russian is a very emotional language. Its lexical content is rich and flexible - indeed, in no other language will you find so many diminutive and abusive words! For example: girl - girly - girl - little girl - wench - lass - damsel, and all of these are derivatives from one root. Compare English: girl - littlegirl, and that's it!
Much in Russian is not subject to logical comprehension, since it conveys mood and emotion.
For example:
- Do you want some tea?
- No, probably not.

So think about it, foreigners, whether we want tea or not.

6. Arabic no one will call it easy, but let's figure out how difficult it is. The first thing a beginner encounters and what scares him is the Arabic script, the Arabic script. However, the fear of the Arabic script is false, since it has only 28 letters that are connected to each other in print and writing. However, many letters have four different spellings, depending on their position in the word. Another difficulty (although essentially just a lack of habit) is the direction of writing from right to left. But stress in Arabic words is placed very simply and logically without any exceptions.
So what's so complicated about it, you ask? Firstly, the pronunciation of Arabic sounds corresponding to a particular letter is quite difficult for both Slavs and Europeans. This mainly concerns the reading of vowels, since it is believed that they are not there, but there are "vocalization". Arabic has 28 consonants and only 3 vowels - a, and, y- each of them can be short or long. But vowels are not reflected in writing. In addition, there are sounds there that have no equivalent in Russian. At the same time, words are read the same way as they are written.
Arabic grammar is also not encouraging - the verb usually comes before the predicate and the object. A verb has three numbers, so nouns and verbs must be learned in singular, dual and plural. The present tense has 13 forms. The noun has three cases and two genders.
You also need to take into account the fact that Arabic is the language of a completely different culture (for Russian speakers). Studying any European language, we will come across a lot of words that are familiar to us. And when studying Arabic, we will no longer come across a single familiar word.

Another problem with the Arabic language is that it has many dialects. Classical Arabic, the language of the Koran, was originally a dialect of Mecca (the territory of Saudi Arabia), and its adapted form, which is called “Modern Standard Arabic,” is now used in literature, newspapers, television and radio, in the mosque, as well as in the communication of educated people. Arabs from different countries. But the differences between local dialects are sometimes so huge that a representative of Morocco, for example, may not be understood by an Iraqi, and vice versa, although formally both speak Arabic.

7. There is an opinion that Chinese not that complicated at all. In fact, only its grammar is simple and even primitive - there are no endings, no suffixes, no prefixes.
What makes Chinese really difficult is the mass of synonyms and the terrible interchangeability of words, as well as the hieroglyphs themselves. Many hieroglyphs are often synonyms, and the synonyms themselves require learning more and more new hieroglyphs, and often completely different words are read identically.

At the same time, there are no special problems when reading hieroglyphs; they arise in oral speech, when the brain has to deal with a mass of associations and words that sound the same. Therefore, the Chinese themselves speak in short phrases, sometimes repeating everything they said. And for a native speaker of the Slavic group, even just saying one Chinese sentence with correct, understandable pronunciation is already a great achievement, for which you need to work and work.
As for the simplicity of Chinese grammar, it is more than offset not only by complex writing, but also by extremely complex pronunciation with 4 tones, extensive homonymy, homophony, and homography. Thus, Chinese is in last place on our list, and you can read more about it.

So, we looked at 7 popular languages ​​today and ranked them by degree of complexity. But which language will be easier or more difficult for you is a separate question that depends on many factors. If, for example, you already taught English at school, like most Russians, then you will find it easier to speak related languages ​​- German, Spanish, French.

If you have strong motivation, for example, the intention to move to another country (read about emigration), then of course the language you are learning will be easier for you - your emotional mood, interest in the life of the country, the press, television, the desire to watch films and TV shows in the language will affect you.

Linguists from the University of Oslo have named the most difficult language to master in the world, which has the most complex phonetics. According to scientists, this is the dialect of the Pirahã people living in the Amazon jungle of Brazil. The researchers explained that the reason for the complexity of the Pirahãs is due to the many whistling sounds.

Sign language. How to find out the secret thoughts of your interlocutor?

As Izvestia writes, representatives of this tribe whistle words and entire sentences to each other. In this case, sounds travel over a long distance. With the help of the language, the Pirahans navigate in space, making their way through the jungle or crossing a river. It is also used for hunting.

It is interesting that the verbs here are used only in the future and past tense. Also, the language does not have singular or plural nouns. Speech, based on one consonant and one vowel, can sound in different keys.

Let us note, according to neurophysiologists, that even the wearer’s brain has difficulty perceiving them. For example, Chinese and Arabic.

In response to the favorite question of everyone who has encountered learning a foreign language - what is the most difficult language on Earth? - linguists chuckle: it is impossible to give a definite answer. In their opinion, the difficulties depend primarily on the student himself, namely on what dialect is native to him. The rather difficult Russian language will not be so difficult for a Czech or Ukrainian, but a Turk or Japanese may not be able to handle it.

From the point of view of “relatedness”, the Basque language (Euskara) is called one of the most difficult to learn - it is not related to any of the currently known groups of languages, living or dead. Everyone is equal in the face of the difficulties of mastering Euskara. The Guinness Book of Records names the most difficult languages ​​as Chippewa (the dialect of the Ojibwe Indian people in Canada and the USA), Haida (the language of the Haida Indian people living in the northwest of North America), Tabasaran (spoken by one of the indigenous peoples of Dagestan), Eskimo and Chinese .

The most difficult languages ​​in terms of writing are Chinese, Japanese and Korean. They are difficult even for the native speakers themselves. For example, in Japan, school education lasts as long as 12 years, and half of this time is devoted to just two subjects - the native language and mathematics. Even from preschool age, Japanese children are given educational activities to train their memory. To pass the final exams, they need to learn about 1850 hieroglyphs, and to understand a note printed in a newspaper - about 3 thousand.

The easiest languages ​​(again, for native English speakers) include Danish, Dutch, French, Haitian, Creole, Italian, Norwegian, Portuguese, Romanian, Spanish, Swahili and Swedish. The second most difficult languages ​​were Bulgarian, Dari, Farsi (Persian), German, Modern Greek, Hindi-Urdu, Indonesian and Malay.

Amharic, Bengali, and Burmese are considered even more challenging by American teachers and students, as are Czech, Finnish, Modern Hebrew, Hungarian, Lao, Nepali, Polish, Russian, Serbo-Croatian, Sinhala, Thai, Tamil, Turkish, and Vietnamese. The most difficult languages ​​for English-speaking students were Arabic, Chinese, Japanese and Korean.

It is curious that despite the kinship and obvious similarities in spelling, Hebrew and Arabic belonging to the Semitic group turned out to be at different levels of complexity. This pattern is also true for speakers of both languages. As a study by scientists from the University of Haifa has shown, it is more difficult for Arabs to read texts in their native language than for Jews and the British (or Americans). The reason is simple but surprising: the brain processes the graphic characters of these languages ​​differently.

As you know, the functions of the left and right hemispheres are different. The right one, for example, “specializes” in solving spatial problems and patterned information processing, while the left one is responsible for speech recognition and detailed processing of text messages. In this case, the right hemisphere is responsible for intuition and is able to “understand” metaphors, that is, words and phrases with a veiled meaning, while the left hemisphere is responsible for understanding only the literal meaning.

Israeli scientists analyzed brain activity during reading and word recognition in people whose native language was English, Arabic or Hebrew. Volunteers were offered two experiments. In the first, they were shown words or meaningless combinations of letters in their native language on a screen. The subject had to determine whether a given word made sense, and the researchers recorded the speed and accuracy of the answer.

In the second test, volunteers were shown words simultaneously on the left and right sides of the screen—either on one or both. Thus, the brain was faced with the task of processing the shown symbols with the left or right hemisphere separately.

The resulting picture turned out to be interesting. English-speaking volunteers and those whose native language was Hebrew easily “read” words in one hemisphere independently of the other. But the Arabs had it worse: when reading Arabic, the right hemisphere cannot function without using the resources of the left. Reading Arabic characters uniquely activates the cognitive systems of the brain, scientists conclude. If you want to develop your mind, learn Arabic!

By the way, the same pattern was previously discovered for the Chinese language compared to English. In the study, scientists observed the brain activity of Chinese and English speakers, respectively, while they listened to their native speech. In English-speaking subjects, only the left hemisphere was activated, while in Chinese, both were activated.

Learning a foreign language can be a very exciting experience. Knowing at least one more language opens up the possibility of interacting with completely unfamiliar cultures. Some languages ​​are easier to learn than others. Thus, unless you are a masochist, we recommend avoiding these 25 most difficult languages ​​in the world to learn. But if you managed to learn any of these languages, we shake your hand!

25. Tagalog.

Originating from Austronesia, Tagalog is quite popular in the Philippines, spoken by almost a quarter of the population.

24. Navajo.

The Navajo language is an ancient Athabascan language spoken by approximately 120,000 to 170,000 people in the southwestern United States.

23. Norwegian language.

This language, originally from northern Germany, has become the national language of Norway. Norwegian, along with Swedish and Danish, is similar to other Scandinavian languages, and has many similarities with Icelandic and Faroese.

22. Persian language.

Persian belongs to the Iranian group of Indo-European languages, and is primarily spoken in Afghanistan and Iran, as well as in Tajikistan and other Persian-influenced countries. Approximately 110 million people around the world speak it.

21. Indonesian language.

For many centuries, the Indonesian language was the lingua franca of the entire Indonesian archipelago. It is considered one of the most widely spoken languages ​​in the world because Indonesia is the fourth most populous country in the world.

20. Dutch language.

This language was born in western Germany. It is mainly spoken in the Netherlands, Belgium and Suriname. It is currently an official language in Aruba, St. Maarten and Curacao and in parts of Europe and the United States. Dutch is closely related to English and German and does not use the Germanic umlaut as a grammatical marker.

19. Slovenian language.

Slovenian is part of the South Slavic language group and is spoken by more than 2.5 million people worldwide, mainly in Slovenia. This language is one of the 24 official working languages ​​of the European Union.

18. Afrikaans.

A West Germanic language spoken by natives of Namibia and South Africa, as well as Zimbabwe and Botswana. It is considered an offshoot of various Dutch dialects and is thus considered a relative of the Dutch language.

17. Danish language.

Spoken by more than six million people worldwide, Danish is a North Germanic language that currently has the status of a minority language. In Greenland, approximately 15-20% of the total population speaks this language. It is similar to Swedish and Norwegian and is a descendant of Old Icelandic.

16. Basque language.

The Basque language is the heritage language of the Basque Country, which stretched from northeastern Spain to southwestern France. Almost 27% of the total population of the Basque territories speak this language.

15. Welsh language.

The Welsh language is part of the Brythonic group of Celtic languages ​​used in Wales. This language used to have many different names, it was even called “British”.

14. Urdu.

Better known as Modern Standard Urdu, the language is commonly associated with Muslims who live in Hindustan. Urdu is also the official national language and lingua franca of Pakistan. One of the 22 official languages ​​in the Indian constitution, it is similar to Hindi and identical to Hindi in terms of grammatical construction and basic structure.

13. Hebrew.

Hebrew is a West Semitic language that belongs to the Afroasiatic language family and was first used by the ancient Jews in the 10th century BC. It ceased to be a spoken language after 200, but reappeared in the Middle Ages as the official language of Jewish rabbis and was also used in liturgical literature.

12. Korean language.

Korean is the official language of North and South Korea and is spoken by more than 80 million people worldwide.

11. Sanskrit.

The main liturgical language of Hinduism, Jainism and Buddhism, Sanskrit is an old Indo-Aryan dialect that is descended from Proto-Indo-Iranian and Proto-Indo-European languages. It is also one of the 22 official languages ​​of India and has a rich history of dramatic, poetic, as well as philosophical and technical texts.

10. Croatian language.

The Croatian language is a variety of the Serbo-Croatian language and one of the official languages ​​of the European Union. It is based on the East Herzegovinian dialect, which is the basis for many other languages, including Montenegrin, Serbian and Bosnian.

9. Hungarian language.

Official in Hungary, this language is also the official language of the European Union, spoken not only by communities in Hungary, but also in Slovakia, Ukraine, Serbia and Romania. It belongs to the Uralic language family and has similar dialects.

8. Gaelic language.

Also known as Scots, Gaelic is a Celtic language spoken by the natives of Scotland. It is a member of the Gaelic family of languages ​​that was developed from Middle Irish, just like Manx and modern Irish.

7. Japanese language.

This East Asian language is the national language of Japan and is spoken by more than 125 million people worldwide. A member of the Japanese language family, it is one of the most difficult languages ​​in the world due to its close relationship with Chinese and its complex system of honorifics.

6. Albanian language.

The Indo-European language, spoken by people in Kosovo, Albania, Bulgaria and the Republic of Macedonia, is a centuries-old language first spoken by the old communities of Montenegro, Italy and Greece. It is closely intertwined with other languages, such as the Germanic proto-language, Greek and Balto-Slavic, but its vocabulary is quite different from other languages.

5. Icelandic language.

This North Germanic language is an Indo-European language that was influenced by Danish and Swedish after the colonization of the Americas.

4. Thai language.

Commonly known as Siamese or Central Thai, the language is the official national language of Thailand. It is a member of the Thai-Kadai language family, and almost half of its words are borrowed from Pali, the old Khmer language, or Sanskrit. Thai is a tonal and analytical language and is known for its complex orthography and markers.

3. Vietnamese language.

Vietnamese is the national and official language of Vietnam, as well as the first or second language of many of its ethnic minorities. The Vietnamese vocabulary contains loanwords from Chinese, but the Vietnamese alphabet used today is essentially the Latin alphabet with additional diacritics for tones and certain letters.

2. Arabic language.

Today's Arabic is a descendant of Classical Arabic, which was spoken in the 6th century. This language is spoken in a huge number of territories from the Middle East to the Horn of Africa. Most of its colloquial varieties are unintelligible and are said to constitute a sociolinguistic language.

1. Chinese language.

The Chinese language has many forms that are mutually incomprehensible. The language is spoken by approximately one-fifth of the world's population and is considered one of the most difficult languages ​​to learn. Chinese is spoken in the People's Republic of China, Taiwan and Singapore.

Is this what you were looking for? Perhaps this is something you couldn’t find for so long?

October 25, 2013

World languages

There are about 5 - 6 thousand different languages ​​on our planet; approximately 40 from this list are spoken by two-thirds of the population of the entire globe. The most popular of them are: English, Chinese, Spanish, etc.

Among all this diversity, there are languages ​​that are spoken by billions of people, and there are also those that are known by a small number of people. Each language uses its own letters, rules for writing words and phrases, rules of pronunciation, and much more. This is what distinguishes them all from each other. Some of them are very complex. Let's take a closer look at the language complexity rating.

Language for encryption

So, the well-known Icelandic language opens the top ten. It is characterized by its complex grammar and pronunciation. Some sounds have no analogues in other languages, even in English, so it will be very difficult for a beginner trying to learn it. In addition, Icelandic has many very old declensions and conjugations.

Polish is in ninth position. Despite the fact that not many countries speak it, the language has as many as 7 cases. It should also be noted that it does not lend itself well to any grammatical rules and words - there are a lot of exceptions. All of them have to be memorized, otherwise there is no other way. Pronunciation itself is also of great importance. Only true Poles can speak without an accent, while foreigners cannot fully learn the pronunciation of words. All this makes Polish difficult to learn.

In eighth place is the Basque language. It has 24 cases and is very, very old. Its distinctive feature is that the connection between words lies in the designation of case endings. Some well-known moods are also present here, for example, potential. In general, this indicates complex grammar and word formation.

The Estonian language is in seventh place. It also has a lot of cases - 12. In addition to all this, words can have several meanings at once. The Estonian language also has a large number of exceptions, which makes it difficult to remember.

Sixth place rightfully belongs to the Navajo language. During World War II, this language was used by radio operators to encrypt messages. A very interesting fact is that there have never been any official textbooks or aids for its study. Its grammar is also complex. For example, if we compare it with many Slavic languages, then in it persons differ not by suffix, but by prefix. There are many similar examples that can be given.

Top five

The top five is opened by Japanese. It is very interesting because children have to master writing and pronunciation separately, since the pronunciation and spelling of words are different. In addition to all this, you need to learn 10 - 15 thousand hieroglyphs, a bunch of borrowed words and all the grammar. There are practically no rules in it.

The fourth position is occupied by Hungarian. It has 35 cases, which already says a lot. The alphabet has many vowels, which makes it difficult to learn.

Another little-known language was in the top three - Tuyuka. It has many classes of nouns, and one word can mean an entire phrase. This is the language of the Amazon. Another peculiarity is that here it is necessary to use special verb endings, which make it clear where the speaker learned about this fact.

Arabic and Chinese

Arabic takes second place.

Here, many letters can be written in different ways, in four different versions. There are more numbers here; another dual number is added. The present tense has 13 forms. Pronunciation is also important here. Therefore, in some countries, speaking the same Arabic may look different.

The first place undoubtedly goes to the Chinese language. There are no other languages ​​like them in terms of complexity. It contains many very ancient and complex hieroglyphs that cannot be read, but you can only remember their meanings. There are also 4 tones here. All this makes the Chinese language unique. Despite its features, there are many people in the world who are trying to comprehend it, but not everyone succeeds.

As for the Russian language, it is not among the ten most difficult languages, but stands slightly behind. But nevertheless, thanks to its complex grammar, Russian is not an easy language.

Based on all of the above, we can conclude that Chinese has been the most difficult language for many years. It is followed by Arabic, which is spoken by many Muslims.

Have you just started learning a foreign language and have already encountered incredible difficulties?

Can't wade through the thorns of German, English or French grammar, phonetics and vocabulary without tears? Keep your nose up! Be glad that you are not faced with the task of conquering one of the most difficult languages ​​in the world.

Russian – fifth place

Foreigners compare the study of the “great and mighty” to a nightmare. Even the Russian alphabet puts people in a state of panic. Many letters in Cyrillic look the same as in Latin, but sound completely different. The purpose of “b” and “b” is a sealed secret. But most often the stumbling block is “Y” and “Y”. Pronouncing these sounds is real torture for the uninitiated.

Words also raise questions. The most difficult ones to learn are homonyms. Although they are written the same, they have different meanings. Synonyms also do not stand aside - the verb “to go” alone has about 50 identical concepts! And the consonance of some words and changes in stress can distort the meaning of the phrase and cause an awkward situation.

Having mastered the kaleidoscope of letters and words, the unfortunate ones find themselves in the wonderful world of 6 cases, 2 conjugations and 3 declensions. Keeping all the rules in your head is already a feat, but mastering the exceptions deserves a medal.

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Hungarian – fourth place

The grammar of the Hungarian language is almost inaccessible to mere mortals. It is fraught with unpleasant surprises:

• 25 cases (in some sources - 18);
• The presence of 6 tense verb forms, including the imperative mood for the first person.
• Unusual morphology. What Russian speakers express with prepositions, Hungarians attach to words with case endings.
• The gender of a noun is determined only by the meaning of the sentence or the word itself.

The Magyar alphabet consists of 40 letters (14 vowels and 26 consonants). A difficult point for Russians is the peculiarity of the pronunciation of symbols. So, “S” is read as “Ш”, “GY” - as “Дь”, “A” - as something between the Russian “О” and “А”.

Linguistics is also insidious. It’s hard not to faint when you see the word “megszentsеgtelenнthetetlensеgeskedеseitekеrt” in the text, which translates roughly as “in connection with your desire to maintain an impeccable reputation.”

Japanese – third place

The samurai language is a severe test for foreigners. Even for the Japanese, learning the rules of their native speech is difficult: children spend 10 out of 12 school years struggling with intricate kanji (hieroglyphs) and two alphabets that have their own alphabet. What can we say about those who grew up far from mysterious calligraphic signs!

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The good news is that Japanese morphology is simple and has a clear structure. Nouns and adjectives do not change, and verb forms are easy to learn. The bad news is the abundance of grammatical synonyms: methods of expressing time, condition and reason that are indistinguishable to the European ear.

A separate topic is the famous Japanese politeness. The polite inhabitants of the land of the rising sun use 50 types of greetings. A separate, carefully selected style of speech is provided for representatives of different ages, social status and financial status. One wrong word and you will find yourself on the list of notorious rude people.