Ask YC: What (Natural) Language Should I Learn?

[manvsmachine]

I want to start learning a new language; ideally it should have the same qualities as a good programming language: useful (meaning that I'll actually find other people that speak it), fun to use, and not insanely difficult to learn. For perspective, I am American, so my primary language is English. I can speak conversational (read: mediocre) Spanish, and I started looking at Russian a while ago, but felt like I wouldn't ever really get to use it. Suggestions?

[schtog]

well i mean if you know english and spanish then the really useful ones are tough i think.

i like spanish, it has a nice sound and is very easy to learn if you know english(a lot of words are very similar) and grammar feels consistent and easy. my impression at least. obv it has great use too.

the big economies of the future are speculated to be: china - mandarin india - ok english we all know brazil - portugese, also some african countries have portugese a s alanguage nigeria - english

if you dont want the tough ones(mandarin, russian) and spanish you are already learning then i dont know how big the use is but: french, portugese, german

i would probably learn spanish really well instead of learning yet another one with limited use.

i mean knowing to speak just the basics of a language doesnt really help you with anything except when you travel.

but im hardly an expert on the matter.

[mechanical_fish]

i would probably learn spanish really well instead of learning yet another one with limited use.

+1 to that. The most "useful" thing you could do would be to seek depth, not breadth: Keep working on your mediocre Spanish until it becomes fluent Spanish. There's an absolute ton of Spanish speakers in the USA, to say nothing of the rest of the hemisphere.

(By extension, another useful thing you could do is just continue practicing ever-more-advanced English. :) But that presumably fails the "fun" test big time...)

From there, if you've ruled out Chinese (native speakers everywhere!) and Japanese (inspiring manga and anime everywhere!) as too hard (which is probably wise), I think you're down to:

- French (folks on the web rave about French in Action; lots of speakers around the world; great movies and literature; and the food...)

- a language spoken by some nearby foreign friends who will be pleased to practice with you occasionally (in my case: Chinese, Polish, Hebrew)

- a language spoken in a country you really want to spend time visiting (hint: Italian)

- Latin. Intellectually interesting. Relatively easy to study without a teacher: Your accent will almost certainly suck, but none of the native speakers will ever care, because they're all dead! And you've got thousands of years of classic literature to appreciate:

http://www.amazon.com/Harrius-Potter-Philosophi-Lapis-Philos...

[kennyroo]

I took Mandarin classes while working on a project in Shanghai in 2005, but made stunningly little progress and finally gave up. Then again, that might say more about me than it does about Mandarin. You definitely need a teacher, and consider focusing on the spoken language if most of your communication will be verbal.

Korean is useful because very few Westerners speak it. (There's a reason it's called the Hermit Kingdom). Very cool high-tech country with a too-low profile IMHO.

[schof]

I speak Spanish and English (native English speaker) and was thinking of adding Chinese, until I read this: http://www.pinyin.info/readings/texts/moser.html

Now I'm thinking about French.

[manvsmachine]

I read that too... That's why I included the qualification of "not insanely difficult". I do want to learn Chinese eventually, but self-taught is not the way to go with that language.

[simianstyle]

Chinese

[osipov]

to be more precise, Mandarin