Slavic languages such as Russian can have vastly different tongue and mouth positions when compared to English pronunciations. When you also factor in the dialect of the person teaching English to a native Russian speaker, it can be even more challenging to learn the meaning and syntax of the language.
Of all the European languages a native English speaker can learn, Russian is among the most difficult. The Germanic and Romance languages have a lot of the same core because they both have roots in Latin. Russian is from a completely different language branch called the Slavonic branch, which includes Czech and Polish.
So let's go! How long does it take to learn Russian? The Foreign Service Institute has determined it takes around 1100 hours for native English speakers to reach fluency in Russian. If you spend 60 minutes per day studying Russian, it will take you 3 years.
If you speak Russian, it will be easier for you to understand other Slavic languages, which include Ukrainian, Belorussian, Polish, Czech, Slovak, Bulgarian, Serbian, Croatian, Bosnian, and Slovene.
Primary education in Russia
Most primary schools also begin to teach children a foreign language, which is usually either English or German.
If you're looking for a challenge, try visiting a smaller city or town. Russia ranked just below China on the EPI at 38th, but with 5.48 percent of its population speaking English — not to mention a foreign alphabet you won't be able to easily read — this definitely counts as a challenging travel destination.
In Russia this isn't just a polite gesture, but a complete must. Only 5% of Russians speak English and Russia's overall English language proficiency is still ranked as 'Low' in the international English Proficiency Index (EF EPI).
Noun case is probably the hardest part of Russian for English speakers to fully master. And this of course makes us ask: What exactly is Russian noun case? Simply put, the ending of a Russian noun tells you what it does/what role it has in a sentence.
From the point of view of spoken language, its closest relatives are Ukrainian, Belarusian, and Rusyn, the other three languages in the East Slavic branch.
Riau Indonesian is different from most other languages in how simple it is. There are no endings of any substance, no tones, no articles, and no word order. There is only a little bit of indicating things in time.
The Foreign Service Institute of the United States has determined that it takes about 1100 hours of study to reach fluency in Russian. If you're willing to study 3 hours every day, it could take you a year to reach that level.
The grammar rules in Russian are very complex and have numerous exceptions. In addition, many learners struggle with the pronunciation – the stress in words is largely unpredictable and not marked in writing, while there are multiple homonyms.
Across multiple sources, Mandarin Chinese is the number one language listed as the most challenging to learn. The Defense Language Institute Foreign Language Center puts Mandarin in Category IV, which is the list of the most difficult languages to learn for English speakers.
Russian and German Language Prevalence
This is likely because German is a difficult language to learn, and many people are not willing to put in the effort. Russian, on the other hand, is a relatively easy language to learn, which has contributed to its popularity.
Russian is allegedly one of the most complex languages to learn; its Cyrillic alphabet is enough to scare you away. In fact, the Foreign Service Institute classifies it as a category-four language.
Russian is the most geographically widespread language in all of Eurasia, and it's the most popular native language in Europe. Russian speakers number roughly 138 million in Russia, followed in popularity by Ukraine (14.3 million), Belarus (6.9 million), Poland (6.9 million) and Kazakhstan (3.8 million).
East Slavic Languages
During the Soviet Union, Ukrainian and Belarusian were both classified as dialects of Russian. However, Ukrainians adamantly contest the classification as a dialect, as shown in this video. Belarusian is most closely related to Ukrainian, but shares 75% of mutual intelligibility with Russian.
Compared to other source languages, English contains few words adopted from Russian. Direct borrowing first began with contact between England and Russia in the 16th century and picked up heavily in the 20th century, with the establishment of the Soviet Union as a major world power.
Today the Russian language has the 8th largest number of speakers in the world. With more than 258 million speakers worldwide, there's no doubt that Russian is a global language. Obviously you'll find plenty of Russian speakers in Russia itself, but there are loads of other Russian speaking countries around the world.
Many studies have suggested that learning a new language improves brain function, providing better memory, more mental flexibility, and creativity. Learning a language from a different language family from your native language – for example, Russian – is a great way to maximize these benefits.
After reading through all the differences, Russian probably comes across as the easier language to learn. And it is! For native English speakers, Russian is categorized as taking 44 weeks to learn (or 1,100 hours), while Japanese takes 88 weeks (2,200 hours).
Among the least proficient in English is El Salvador, a Central American country. This country was a Spanish colony from 1525 until 1821, when the Spanish language was used for government, business, and religious purposes. Today, its official language continues to be Spanish.
Many countries, like Russia, use British English as their standard of evaluation. And the second type is exams used for university admittance as non-native speakers who wish to study at an English-speaking university must pass either IELTS or TOEFL.