How easy is it to learn Spanish?
Spanish is a member of the Indo-European language family’s Ibero-Romance group, which emerged from various dialects of Vulgar Latin in Iberia following the collapse of the Western Roman Empire in the 5th century. The earliest Latin manuscripts bearing elements of Spanish date from the 9th century in mid-northern Iberia, and the first organised written usage of the language occurred in the 13th century at Toledo, a key city in the Kingdom of Castile. Beginning in 1492, modern Spanish was introduced to the Spanish Empire’s viceroyalties, most notably America, as well as colonies in Africa and the Philippines. With approximately 500 million native speakers specifically in Spain and America, it is also a Romance language.
So, how easy is it to learn Spanish?
Spanish is rising to become one of the most learned languages with numerous advantages to learning it. It is also one of the simplest languages to learn. According to the FSI [Foreign Service Institute of Languages], Spanish belongs to Category 1, which includes all languages that are closely related to English.
A language that would require only 575-600 hours, or 23-24 weeks of guided study, and a nearly equal number of hours and days of self-study done concurrently!
This would make Spanish one of the simplest languages for an English speaker to learn. If, on the other hand, a person is not a native English speaker, they must first identify their language in one of the five categories listed in the FSI, and then determine its proximity to Spanish.
A native French speaker, for example, would find it much easier to learn Spanish than a native Arabic speaker. This is due to the fact that, like French, Spanish is a romance language, but it also falls into Category 1.
This would imply that Spanish and French have many uncanny similarities. Arabic, on the other hand, falls into Category 5, which includes languages that are extremely difficult for native English speakers. As a result, native Arabic speakers may find it difficult to learn Spanish as well.
Finally,
Spanish is one of the six official languages of the United Nations, and it is also used as an official language by the European Union, the Organization of American States, the Union of South American Nations, the Community of Latin American and the Caribbean States, the African Union and many other international organizations. As a Romance language, Spanish is a descendant of Latin and has one of the smaller degrees of difference from it (about 20%) alongside Sardinian and Italian. Around 75% of modern Spanish vocabulary is derived from Latin, including Latin borrowings from Ancient Greek. It has absorbed vocabulary from other languages, particularly other Romance languages such as French, Italian, Mozarabic, Portuguese, Galician, Catalan, Occitan, and Sardinian, as well as from Quechua, Nahuatl, and other indigenous languages of America.
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