9 Easiest Foreign Languages to Take in College

Published on March 20, 2017 at 1:10 pm by Dragana Randjelovic in Lists

Although we have listed here the 9 easiest foreign languages to take in college, do not relax and expect a miracle in learning a new language. It is actually very hard to define the terms of difficulty and easiness when it comes to language learning, and explain what an easy language to learn is in the first place. Every language has some special qualities which can be defined as difficult or easy to learn for non-native speakers.

Mandarin (a dialect of Chinese), for example, has been marked as a very easy language to learn because of its simple grammar. Words in this language do not change their form when grammar rules are applied, but new words are used instead. So, basically, people learning this language does not need to bother them by acquiring complicated grammar rules. Instead, they are forced to learn a very long list of new words. On the other hand, according to some language teachers, Spanish has the easiest pronunciation among the popular languages in the world, but the grammar is much more difficult than that of the English language. The difficulty level of every language is usually evaluated in terms of reading, writing, speaking and listening and these four language skills are necessary to master in the process of language acquisition. If we want to evaluate the level of easiness of every language, we should observe each of these skills separately. However, that is simply not enough. There is still a subjective feeling of how difficult or easy each language is for each of us.

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Learning a new language depends on the native language of the learner, too. It is easy to acquire a language which is similar to our native language or has cultural similarity with our culture. Native English speakers could see that many languages are related to English, so these are easy for them to learn due to a large number of similar words and grammar rules. That is why we consulted sites and blogs which advised the easiest foreign language to learn for English speakers.

The speed of adopting a new language depends on the language you have learned before. If you followed our list of the 6 Easiest Dead Languages to Learn and have learned some of the languages from there, like Latin, for example, it should be easier for you to learn any of the languages from the Romanian group, like French or Italian. So, if Latin was easy to learn to you, then French would be, too. However, we have tried to find languages with simple grammar, like those without verb conjugation to make the best list of the easiest foreign languages to take in college.

However, the time you will need to learn a new language and get “A” on the final exam mostly depends on your motivation, the other subjects you have chosen for studying and surely the learning methods. It would be much easier if you can find someone who speaks that language already, or it is his or her native language. The internet could help you to find native speakers of any language in the world, so use it to learn the language as easy as possible. If you have a lot of friends in the same language course as you, form a group where you will speak and read only in foreign language, heckling each other in grammar, reading, and pronunciation. Finally, if you are really interested in adopting a foreign language, you may consider of traveling to the country where that language is the native one. That could be a start of the great adventure and maybe the future professional career. The period of time needed for acquiring a new language well enough to be able to use it easily also depends on the learner’s motivation to learn a particular language. There are many people who learn a new language only because it is their hobby or they have a constant need to improve themselves and change their subjects of interest, while other people find learning a new language to be a proof of their intelligence and wide knowledge. In addition, some people think learning is a good way to prevent dementia or Alzheimer disease and some just want to show off in front of their friends. Their motivation to learn a new language is lower than that of someone who has to learn a new language because of a new job opportunity or moving to another country. As a result, we collected the necessary information about the period of time needed to learn a new language from language schools because people who pay to learn a new language do their best to learn it as quickly as possible.

The starting point for making the list of the easiest foreign languages to take in college was the data we collected from language schools about the period of time needed for learning a new language and the number of students who applied for a particular language, but the data are not precise and do not show the precise number of weeks or lessons needed for learning a certain language. Instead, we used their lists of the easiest languages which are based on the level of difficulty of their vocabulary, punctuation or grammar and then did some comparison among these lists. We also consulted blogs and forums for some advice and recommendations. So, take some time and start learning a new language, it could be a great adventure. Keep in mind that learning a new language is even easier all over again after you have previously learned some other new language.

9. Dutch

We are starting our list of easiest foreign languages to take in college with the language number 9 – if we look at the numbers, there are over 22 million of native speakers of Dutch and 5 million more of those who speak Dutch as a second language. But, besides these numbers, it is very interesting to say that this language is practically considered to be a parent of Afrikaans language and a sister of the English language. This means that it will be easy to learn for everyone who speaks English (both native and non-native speakers), and according to the lists of the easiest languages to learn, it is also named an easy one for non-native English learners, too. Dutch appeared around 450AD, but its standardization began in the Middle Ages.

8. Hindi

Although there are significant differences between this language and English and other European languages, it is on the lists of the easiest languages due to its grammar and vocabulary. However, it is important to know that Standard Hindi was established in 1947 when it was officially separated from Urdu and other dialects in India. Today, Hindi that ranks 8th in our list of easiest foreign languages to take in college. It has to compete with 22 different languages in India, the country of its origin, but it seems that it wins the competition. Some researchers have said that over 260 million people speak this language, but concerning the fact that many Indians speak two or more languages, the number is not fully reliable.

7. Mandarin

Let’s be honest and say how many of you have thought that Chinese is the most difficult language in the world? Well, you were wrong, because one of the dialects of this language is on numerous lists of the easiest languages made by learners and language teachers all over the world. The reason is very simple grammar, lack of complicated grammar forms, using a new word instead of different forms of the same word. It can be tricky, though, because you need to learn an extensive vocabulary, but, on the other hand, you will practically make no grammar mistakes or have any doubts about that. And now, let’s see what else we have in our list of easiest foreign languages to take in college.

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6. Romanian

Concerning its Latin origin and similarity with other Latin languages, we had no doubt whether to put this language on the list together with other languages from this group. However, there are many other reasons to put Romanian on this list, as well. It has a learnable grammar, there is a similarity in vocabulary with French and Spanish and its simple pronunciation. Romania is a small country, but the fact that over 10 countries in the world, including Israel, have small communities with Romanian speakers shows that it is a popular and influential language and it is yet going to be in the years to come.

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5. Danish

As one of the Indo-European and North Germanic languages, Danish is similar to those usually found on the list of the easiest languages to learn. Thanks to its special qualities, it is even easier than Swedish, which originates from Old Norse, a common Germanic language, so it deserves to be placed on the list of the easiest foreign languages to take in college. Apart from Denmark, native speakers of Danish can be found in Germany, Sweden, but also in the USA and Canada, which makes the total of 6 million of native speakers.

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4. Portuguese

Although it originates from Romance languages, Portuguese fully evolved from Old Portuguese in the Kingdom of Galicia in the 16^th century. Thanks to the colonization, the language widely spread all over the world, including Asia and Africa, so the current number of its speakers all over the world reaches 260 million. Speakers say that it sounds similar to Spanish, containing many words common in Romance languages, but there are many dialects and variants in the USA, Asia, India and Bermuda. Its simple grammar and pronunciation make this language easy to learn. And now, let’s see the top three entries in our list of easiest foreign languages to take in college.

3. Spanish

This is another language from the list of Romance languages, on our list of easiest foreign languages to take in college, but much more widely spoken. After the colonization during the Middle Ages, Spanish was imposed by the Spanish royalty through a special process called “hispanization”. Mostly because of the influence of the Christian Church on spreading Christianity, Spanish is the first language in Latin America, part of Africa, Asia, and Canada. It has been marked as a language easy to learn by numerous learners who have put it on the first place in language schools surveys.

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2. Italian

As one of the Romance languages, Italian is expected to be found on this list of easiest foreign languages to take in college, but people are usually subjective when it comes to it. They remember their visits to Italy, seeing romantic places, eating tasty food, and listening to some nice music, so if you ask people which languages they like most, they usually put Italian on that list. However, there is a huge community of Italian speakers in Canada and the US, which makes this language one of the biggest parts of cultural heritage in the world.

1. French

If we speak about romance and music, we have to put French on this list, too. Although people usually find its pronunciation difficult, its grammar is simple and similar to that of other Romance languages with a long list of commonly used words in other languages. For many of them, we even do not know that they originate from French, while many of them are commonly used as typically French words. Besides in France, French is an official language in more than 20 countries all over the world, making it one of the easiest foreign languages to take in college.