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The user formerly known as Jack the Lumberyardman presents

Quote of the day

Those who can, do. Those who cannot, teach. Those who cannot teach, write handbooks.

Please note: the following essay is not mine. I'm not totally crazy (yet).

What makes English language difficult to learn for non-native speakers .

There are more than 909999 words in english language .

words like : through and though and tough there and their and they're then and than accept and except weather and whether and so on!

Too much slang and abbreviations! From the point of view of learning it I think the pronunciation is probably the most difficult. And the fact that every single rule of grammar and spelling has exceptions and the exceptions are never consistant. English language or dictionary is full of words having more then two meanings e.g. some sentences like

He became a math teacher due to some prime factors.

The constipated mathematician worked it out with a pencil

She thought her nose was running but its not

The optician got caught in the lens grinder and nearly made a spectacle of himself

I am sure there are a few more like

I've always hated that we don't have a plural for you. so we have to say you guys or you all. I have heard the the English language is the one with the most rules and the most exceptions to the rules. hmmm...it is a good language, and it sounds dmooth, but it is hard to learn I see the sea and write a c and ate a pea and had to pee and I was blue and the sky is blue and the whistle blew I saw the sun and called my son I eye a buy bye. If possible kindly tell what shuld I do to make a new language easier to learn and use ? We don't have a plural for you. So we have to say you guys or you all.

Watch the second hand on my watch.

He's blunt but he has a point.

I bought a wooden whistle but it wooden whistle.

I bought a steel whistle but it steel wooden whistle.

I bought a tin whistle, and now I tin whistle.

From the point of view of learning it I think the pronunciation is probably the most difficult. And the fact that every single rule of grammar and spelling has exceptions and the exceptions are never consistant.

So I would say that the main disadvantage of the English language is that it is hard to learn.

I won't tell other poker players what my tell is.

I never got to see the Holy See.

"Being a conscientious mortician, before going home, he laid out his work for tommorrow"

"Can I go looking for the Grail again?", Tom requested.

"I unclogged the drain with a vacuum cleaner" Tom said succinctly.

In the English language, there are 26 different pronunciations of the letter "A". In the Spanish language, there is one. Worse still are idioms that appear to be synonymous but actually mean practically the opposite, A disadvantage of the English language is the word DAUGHTER. If lawyers are disbarred and clergymen defrocked, doesn't it follow that:

electricians can be delighted,

musicians denoted,

cowboys deranged,

models deposed,

dry cleaners depressed,

bed makers debunked,

baseball players debased,

teachers declassified,

bulldozer operators degraded,

organ donors delivered,

software engineers detested,

underwear makers debriefed, and

musical composers decomposed?

On a more positive note, though, perhaps we can hope that politicians will be devoted.

Man throwing rocks at seagulls left no tern unstoned.

American actress was asked to define Horticulture ... she said "You can take a horticulture but you can't make her think"

Here are a few puns - some of them are words with double meanings, and one is not a real word:

1. Two antennas met on a roof, fell in love and got married. The ceremony wasn't much, but the reception was excellent.

2. A jumper cable walks into a bar. The bartender says, "I'll serve you, but don't start anything."

it is incredible how many letters you have to write to obtain a word that has just one syllable (though) or words that are not that difficult to pronounce are so difficult to spell ("psychology"). Spellings in english is hard...because so many words have extra letters that you don't need...like through...psycology.The fact that the spelling is far from phonetic - the same combinations of letters can stand for totally different words, like the "ough" in "tough", "though", "drought", etc.

One might also say it's the complex verb system, though - it seems obvious to native speakers, of course, but for non-native speakers it takes a long time to figure out which tense to use when, and many never quite master it.

Its pronunciation, and all the words that sound the same but arent, like see and sea, wander and wonder. it makes it hard to follow ppl sometimes, especially when accents are involved.

In most words that end in "e", the vowel is long (says it's name) bake, take, fate, smite, home, phone. The idioms are insanely difficult for others to understand. ("Rains cats and dogs," "see the light," etc.)

.The slang often creates a barrier. And here I'm talking about two different kinds: the first, I guess, would be just the idomatic expressions that are used, and of which new ones are made all the time (esp by young people). Those kinds of expressions are hard for even older native English speaking to keep up with!!Then there are things like phrasal verbs (which, I'll call a kind of slang for argument's sake). Phrasal verbs are those verb phrases that we know so well and use so often that most often consist of some basic verb plus a preposition or adverb that then changes the meaning of the verb. Take for example, the verb to MAKE. Then add some prepositions/adverbs to it: to make OUT (= to kiss and smoosh faces with someone passionately) to make UP (=to do at a later time, as with a test; to get back on good terms with someone you might have been fighting with) to make OVER (=to complete redo, as with getting a whole new wardrobe, look, etc.) phrasal verbs and idioms. There are a great many idioms that are regional and most people don't even know their origin. However, I think there is 1 disadvantage of the English language that is not on your list: homonyms.

Having so many words that sound alike but mean different things is probably the hardest:

there-their

hare-hair

bare-bear

bread-bred

barred-bard

As with all languages - once you have conquered the grammer and then the pronounciation you are 99% of the way--Ammbaani 16:10, 26 April 2007 (UTC)