What is difficult about French?

Answer 1

First, as for many other languages such as Italian, Spanish and Portuguese, French originates from Latin. Therefore, English speakers and people who don't speak a language derived from Latin may find it difficult to learn French. But don't worry, even Latin people might struggle with French at first!

The first major difficulty encountered by people wanting to learn French is the pronunciation of written words. As opposed to some other languages, two or more words might be written in a totally different way and still be pronounced the same. Here are a few French words whose pronunciation is the same (the English translation is written in parentheses): eau (water), aux (at, plural form), haut (high), OS (bones, the singular form of this word being pronounced in a different way), ... As you see, it can quickly get difficult to pronounce written words. Another tricky french particularity is the letter r. It is neither pronounced like the English ''rww'', nor like the tongue-rolled ''rrrr'' of Spanish. Instead, the French ''r sound'' is created by rolling the back of your mouth (the soft palate).

The second major difficulty you might encounter : the punctuation. Here are a few characters you might struggle a bit with : à, â, é, è, ê, û, ü, ï, î, ç, ... Each of these characters has its own particularity (and pronunciation!) and it's important to distinguish them. In French, accents are not an option. Omitting an accent on a letter is considered an important mistake, even though it might not directly affect the pronunciation of the word or phrase.

A third thing that may leave you scratching your head is trying to figure out how to write a sentence. French is known for having a set of complex grammar rules that are full of exceptions too. For example, we want to translate the following sentence from English to French: ''He will travel to Canada.'' The translation is: ''Il voyagera au Canada.'' But let's say we want to make this sentence an interrogative one: ''Will he travel to Canada?'' (notice the construction of English's basic interrogative sentence: subject and verb are simply inverted). Now, in French, it would be: ''Voyagera-t-il au Canada?'' (notice the inversion of subjet and verb, the adding of a letter tin between, and the dashes). In addition, verb conjugation is not fairly easy in French (but don't worry, it's not as tricky as Spanish!).

Apart from these, French is not so difficult to learn. In fact, if you're motivated and ready to put in the necessary efforts, you're guaranteed to eventually succeed in learning this language. Just practice a lot, have some French friends chat with you, buy a dictionary, listen to french music. Make this language your own! And don't forget that writing is as important as speaking!

Allez, un petit effort et tout devrait bien se dérouler. Je vous souhaite bonne chance!

Answer 2

Some aspects of French that learners may find difficult include the pronunciation of certain sounds, the complex grammar rules, and the use of gender and agreement in nouns and adjectives. Additionally, the abundance of verb conjugations and irregular verbs can be challenging to grasp.