Which European language should I learn?

No...
>haha learn islam hahahha xDDDDD lol it wil b mower usefil heeha
OR
>why just u-rope? why not ASIA haha, bcus u r australian hah!
OR
>y learn anotha langwidg, u alredy no english
...Edition.

The reasons for learning X language can range from the place visually being nice, the politics, the lack of muslim immigrants, the economy, the stereotypes of the people, the actual people, how hard the language is to learn, how applicable the language is around the world, can you move there for long periods of time (as an educated Australian), could you get some sort of decent job (from Australian standards), would you want to move there (from Australian standards), how nice is travelling around the applicable countries, what's the internet like, the cost of living, is the white migrant life good in the respective countries, etc, etc, etc, etc

I'm thinking that as generic as it is, German seems to be the best choice so far.
>applicable to quite a few countries, not just Germany
>applicable countries look nice or are economically gr8
>not the best travel language persay, but can certainly help
>"it's a business language" meme, so it supposedly should improve my job opportunities
>"european women are qts" meme

The Scandi languages and the Romance languages are certainly viable. But Scandi languages are only really applicable to their exclusive country. And France, Italy and Spain (the Romance language countries) seem to be good for travel and not a lot else.

Most of the other languages seem to unfortunately be somewhat irrelevant (sorry balts) in the grand scheme of things.

I could be completely mistaken and glossing over some really relevant languages, hence why this is a thread and hence why I'd appreciate some discussion

Other urls found in this thread:

list25.com/the-25-most-influential-languages-in-the-world/5/
ic.daad.de/sydney/
youtube.com/watch?v=wOX7EsDvJ8U
twitter.com/SFWRedditGifs

Germans are taught to speak English from a young age. No point learning German when it'll be dead in 100 years.

Just because most Germans are taught English from a young age doesn't mean they're just going to stop speaking German for English though, right? I'm sure most Germans will continue to speak German with their German friends as long as they live.

But I guess never being at a native level they would always just switch to English for you regardless. So I guess there's some merit to what you're saying.

Got any other suggestions then?

What a shite comment.

I say put German down as the language you want to learn. It's the only you've more time talking about in your post, so I know that's the one you really want.

German is a good language, it's consonant heavy which is a fun change from romance languages that have vowels everywhere, and if you like Germanic culture and history you'll love Germany

Also, most Germans who actually live in Germany don't speak English fluently (they just think they do)

European language 2016 power rankings according to ME™-institution:
1. French
2. Spanish
3. German
4. Russian
5. Finnish

finnish, the new world language

Yeah, I guess I have talked about it a lot more than the others - only because I think it has more relevance overall (in Europe at least). But point taken, I'll probably settle for German then
A consonant heavy language sounds like fun. I don't know much about the culture and history but that usually comes hand in hand with learning the language in most cases.

And yeah, I've heard a lot of people say Scandinavians speak quite fluent English but haven't heard as much about Germans.

I'm just keen on Switzerland tbqh, looks like an amazing place to travel and/or live for awhile.
>French
Hmmmm, #1?
>Spanish
I guess it's spoken quite a lot outside of Europe
>German
I guess it's spoken quite a lot inside of Europe
>Russian
Very applicable to former USSR countries along with the whole of Russia. But a lot of those places aren't the nicest of places, and don't cater to English people too much if worse comes to worst.
>Finnish
Hmmmmmmmmmmmm does it really make the cut though?
What are your opinions on things as a German? Does it serve much relevance as a native English speaker to pick up German?

Do you know any French or German? Start there.

list25.com/the-25-most-influential-languages-in-the-world/5/

I did a little French in high school, but it's probably the equivalent of what I could learn sitting down for a couple hours, concentrating with any other language. Not to mention I've forgotten most of it.

Don't know any German really, but I think I'm sort of set on it at this point. Just google imaging Switzerland makes me wish I was born there tbqh, look at this place (pic related)

Most of my international friends and people I've met on my job are choosing German as a third language after English or German as a second for English natives.
German is the most spoken language in Europe, as a tourist in Denmark, Poland, the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxemburg, Liechtenstein and even in Alsace-Lorraine and South Tyrol you can survive speaking German.
And I also see a lot of international students here that learned German to get their Masters here, which is pretty helpful if you might want to work for a international office of a German company.
And after all German is not as difficult as everyone says, the Grammar is a lot but structured and just requires some work, but not a lot of "language skills"

This 2bh
>tfw trying to learn french but the r's are fucking hard

hggggggggaaaaiiiirrrrrr

French is a lot higher up than I thought. Obviously France and Canada and I knew it was spoken across Africa, but not to that extent. Fair point.

But I have no plans to go to Africa or South America (for Spanish) or Asia (for Mandarin + other dialects), and if I did it would probably be in touristy places that cater well to English speakers.

Still set on German due to its relevance within Europe.
Interesting, I didn't know there was significant German speaking populations in Denmark, Poland, Netherlands, etc, etc. I don't know if many Universities in Western Australia (if any) have ties with Universities in Germany to study abroad but I wish I had the opportunity.

I might just get to researching and reading, try get stuck in as much as I can and see if I like it. Surely it's in my blood seeing as I carry a German last name
I can't roll my r's either, so hard.

In German it's not so much of a rolled r with the tongue as it is a sound produced from the throat right? I think I can already do that if that's the case

>1. French
Time to leave. French is the most disgusting language on planet earth. BR portugese isn't human speak so it doesn't matter.

learn Spanish or French, they are both pretty shit at English, or Russian if you want slav QTs.

ic.daad.de/sydney/
That's the page of the German office for foreign students, you may find something helpful there is you are interested in language courses or studying abroad.

There is a small German population in the most european countries, but a lot of people in the neighbor countries learn German for the tourists

I actually started learning a bit of Russian. Can read the almost any word but don't know what 99% of them mean. I sort of lost interest due to the lack of relevance that the language has. Of course it is spoken in a bunch of countries, but the majority of those places have it pretty rough. Especially since no one has really forgiven EVIL RUSSIA for being so MEAN during the Cold ''''War''''.

Spanish and French are still really solid choices but I think I've sort of been sold on German at this point. If I ever actually get far enough with German to where I could pick up a third language (doubt it, but we'll see), Spanish or French would probably be the decision.
I'll look at the website now, hopefully it's not restricted to only people in Sydney. That's the problem about living in West Australia, a lot of the opportunities get given to people on the East coast and we get fuck all.

And that makes sense then, a lot of the neighbouring countries of Germany are beautiful as well.

I want to kick your ass.

It's just the office sitting in Sydney.

Learning a third or fourth language is easy, here everyone who graduates has to learn at least the basics of a third language. I'm currently learning number four, although I should rather keep up my Spanish

I myself have always been interested in dutch and german because the Netherlands and Germany and gorgeous landscapes and i also want to attend October fest

Rude m8, learn latvian.

You can train both now. That's already pretty hard and gives you quite some trouble.

How many do you consider yourself fluent in? And which languages? Any others you'd like to learn one day?

fight me boi

*pic*

Yea, guttural Rs are kinda weird

user, can you rate the retelling about these people?

1)Sie heisst Franciska und sie ist 37. Jahre alt Lehrerin aus Wien. Sie spricht Englisch, Spanisch und Deutsch. Deutsch ist ihre Muttersprache.
2) Er ist 35. Jahre alt Informatiker aus irgendwelcher Stadt. Nun(oder jetzt: ich weiss es nicht) lernt er Japanisch und spricht Deutsch.
3)Ich habe ihre Name und Vorname vergessen, aber ich weiss dass sie ist 22. Jahre alt Studentin fuer Medizin aus Frankreich.

What country in Europe do you find yourself having a strange obsession with?
Learn that language, you won't have the drive to learn the ones you won't care about and never become fluent
Learn the language no matter how "useless" it seems. It's not useless. You can still put your skills on a job resume.
Now which looks better on a resume?

>Speaks fluent (whatever language no-body's ever heard of)
Because your strange autistic obsession with that country got you through the rough parts and you became flunet

or

>
Because you tried to learn something just because it was popular or useful and failed

And if you truly love the culture, the language, whatever you love that's related to the language in some way, then you'll find an application for the language it will improve your life.
Learning a language, no mater what language, is not a waste of time.

Russian is a big guy for you. Face it, it's too hard for an anglo speaker. Anyway you still can read the whole Russian literature in not fully correct English translation. ;)

That's actually insane, I wish we got taught some decent languages here. I guess no one really sees the need for it, which is fair enough. But I've always wanted to learn a second language just because it's sort of one of those things I've always wanted to do and there's nothing really stopping me at this point (besides making a decision)
It is a really beautiful part of the world
I feel like I'm betraying my Baltic brethren, but with a sub 2 million total country population, real big HMMMMMMMM
Both French and German you mean? Now that would be a challenge

Since when is Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Cyprus and Turkey apart of Europe?

Seriously, I get triggered when I see these brown countries that are not geographically within Europe get called apart of Europe.

It's ok you can't change what you are.

...

As a native English speaker I find Germanic languages more intuitive and natural to speak then French or Spanish

I really did feel this for learning Russian at some point, no one in Australia speaks Russian so it is definitely a unique skill to have. But the shit state of the majority of Russia and the constant shit you would get just for learning it sort of put me off

>'friend' in my room sees my Russian textbook in cupboard
>"so are you still learning Russian? (sarcastically) hahah"
And then if I ever brought it up like I wanted to travel to some nice places at some point I would sort of get a smirk and a sarcastic "oh yeah?"

I'm pretty sure my Mum thinks I'm a fucking extremist just because I mentioned it to her.

The whole thing, although it shouldn't have, it sort of slowly made me less and less motivated to learning it. And thinking about how it probably wouldn't benefit me living in Australia didn't really help.
I tried, I really did. Even invested my own money into books and shit. But not only is the language difficult, when you're dealing with the weird stigma that comes with it, it's hard to find motivation.

Learn Portuguese so you can scoff at anyone that asks you if you know Spanish, and pretend you can be all hipster about it.

Tell them Portugal discovered Australia, and that everyone should know it for extra hipster points.

I can't say I'm still fluent today, but I once learned and became fluent in Plains Indian Sign Language
It actually benefited me loads, and I'm disappointed in myself that I didn't keep practicing. But now I just don't have the time.
Every year I meet at least one person who's fluent in it.
It also made learning other languages easier for me
So that's my experience with how a "useless" language can actually be really useful.
I met some of my best friends while using it.

German and English are fluent, for Spanish I realized in my vacation that I need a couple days to make nice sentences, but I can understand enough. And for Afrikaans I still need to expand my vocabulary but it's working out quite okay.
I hope I'll find time for Dutch, Danish or Xhosa

>met some of my best friends
speak with foreigners on his language?
Have you feared to make mistakes?
What are you talked about with them?

FYI, this happens to all native English speakers who learn another language. Learning French? You're now a snobby & pretentious art conniseur. Learning Thai? You're now a pedophile drug addict. Learning Japanese? You're now a weeaboo.

I've started learning Norwegian, though that's pretty useless and I don't have any plans to even visit Norway in the near future.

Just do whatever seems fun, since chances are that any not shit Euro country you go to will be full of people who have been learning English since they were children.

Yes, both. Now delete this thread.

French because it's nice and spoken a lot
German for technical and mechanical stuff
Finnish for the memes

>speak with foreigners on his language?
Well, they're not foreigners, just Native Americans. Though I have met other whites that know it.
>Have you feared to make mistakes?
the language usually isn't their first language either and the word order is pretty relaxed and simple, so I'm not too worried about making mistakes.
The hardest part of the language is just understanding all the different meaning of the signs, because some signs can have about 10 different meanings.
>What are you talked about with them?
The language can get a bit tedious when talking about things that Europeans brought to the Americas, such as Alcohol (You have to make the signs for earth, water, and multiple times), airplanes, or cars (especially if you want to talk about parts of the car). So for the most part we would just use the language to joke around and say stuff where nobody would know what we were saying. Or talking from across the room when it would be unacceptable for us to talk out loud.

If they didn't all hell would break lose about them being racist
I hope so, will hopefully make it a bit easier to learn
Portugal to be new world super power by 2020
>tfw not even fluent in a second language
I fucking hate this. Like if someone was to say, "I'm trying to learn Calculus to improve my Math skills and try better myself," no one would even question it; they'd probably get a bunch of encouragement.

Yet you say the same thing about a language, even probably have more reasons to justify why you want to learn it (not that you should have to justify it or it's even any of their business), and you get pinned along with the stereotype(s).

Not to mention, the people that have to strongest opinion against what you are doing have the least clue of what they're talking about in most cases.

(You have to make the signs for earth, water, and multiple times)
I meant earth, water and fire multiple times

> earth, water and fire multiple times
what does it mean?

If I was to learn any Scandinavian language Norwegian would definitely be my first choice

And I know most good European countries have been learning English from early on. But half the reason I want to learn a language is so I can speak a second language. Although being able to travel/live there would be important to me, learning the language is more the goal I guess.

There will be a certain sense of fulfillments when I hear someone can speak German or is German and instantly can just switch and have a decent conversation with them in their language.
Do you mean technical and mechanical professions, like engineering or something like that? Or that the language itself is more technical?

Learn Irish. Meme status aside, it's a beautiful language, it is seeing a resurgence in number of speakers (both per capita and total terms) and if you don't, you're nothing short of an Anglo Saxon pox who will be exterminated when the Gael sits himself upon Europe's throne.

Pretty much this, as for the German I know that there are a lot of publications for engineering stuff that are only in available in German, mostly just to piss nativ English speakers off.

Finnish for memes also seem to be a must, going to add this on my todo list.

French and also Spanish don't just sound nice, but they are common in a lot of developing countries.

I'm pretty sure you have a lot of time left to learn some languages if you are still in Uni

Maltese.. learn a mix of Arabic, Sicilian, Italian and English all in one language

If you're set on learning an EUROPEAN language, then I'd say the best choice is Spanish, because of the sheer number of people speaking it, as well as the fact thaat it will ease learning a couple other langueges that you might find useful.
You'd have to consider your future too, in my opinion. Are you planning or working with people from certain countries? Or perhaps in a domain dominated by a certain country? Maybe you've got some family somewhere in europe, or at least some possibility of moving there?
You have to consider all those to choose properly, but since I have none of these information, I'd just say that spanish is the most likely one to come in handy.

Go with Russian.

My future is pretty unplanned at the moment. I want to try teach myself a bit of web development and see where that gets me, but I start a Surveying course at University next year so that is probably the most likely outcome. Not as intense of a degree as Engineering, but a respectable, technical role nonetheless.

I don't have any family in Europe but I really want to try moving somewhere like Switzerland, maybe live in the Netherlands for awhile, see what Norway is like, I don't know. I haven't travelled enough or really lived enough to make a decision on where to settle down but they seem cosy.

Spanish seems like a good choice, but as I mentioned before, the majority of the applicable countries are outside of Europe. I was looking for something with more relevance within Europe.
As mentioned before, tried this and ended up losing motivation due to a mixture of reasons. The language is great to know for travelling a lot of places people wouldn't normally be able to travel however, there's not as many opportunities for an Australian to study, work and live in pleasant conditions when compared to some of the other options

Turkish

Just don't overdo them. Most French people barely pronounce them, it's almost suggested more than anything.

A problem you will typically encounter with German is that Germans won't let you speak German - they will automatically switch to English, because they'll think it's more convenient to everyone.

Scandinavians typically act almost violated if you try speaking their languages at them.

Spanish & Italian speakers will usually be delighted to hear you speak their langiage, even some really basic words. Same for smaller countries. (Greece, Hungary, etc)

French, uh, it depends. You'll encounter both attitudes frequently.

hungarian is the patrician choice

I've heard this, but I've also heard that you can just keep speaking German and it might signal that you are determined to practice. Not to mention, the person you are talking to is likely to be a friend and I'm guessing you could just mention you want to practice your German.

Surely it wouldn't be too rude to ask someone to speak German with you because you need to practice. It would just depend on the situation and person I guess

learn russian 4 qts
youtube.com/watch?v=wOX7EsDvJ8U

This тbh

Agglunative languages are the bomb

as an english-speaker, both french and german are the most cost-effective choices.

Spanish is good if you plan on visiting spain or the american continent
French is a good language to have on your resume, people that can't speak english may speak french instead
German is circumstancial, you still are guarenteed to be treated like shit in germany (assuming you're white-ish)
Russian may be useful for literary purposes, there are a lot of ressources in russian and some are rather hard to get in english
Arab is useful if you plan on living in middle-east/north africa, you'll pick up the regionalisms later
Portuguese may be useful if you plan on conquering east-timor, they are in need of portuguese teachers.
Latin if you want to look like a pretentious faggot
Esperanto if you are a pretentious faggot

This

arabic and dutch are worse lad