Slavic languages

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GayOver@reddit

I could right away communicate with a Slovak, being a Bosnian myself. They understand us too, right away.

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Mission-Shape-4895@reddit (OP)

Interesting. Is Polish the most difficult for you?

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GlumCompetition3338@reddit

For a Slovenian, probably Czech.

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NumerousManager3600@reddit

Im wondering for a Serbo Croatian or Macedonian Bulgarian speaker. If you had never heard Russian before, how much of it would you understand?

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moisthotdogg@reddit

Personally Russian. I don't know though, I have seen it a lot on social media growing up, much more than Slovak or Czech for example, so that probably plays a factor

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From all the ones I've heard. Hardest to understand is Polish and easiest in Russian. For no other reason, than I simply studied Russian in school. It also helps that it's written in cyrillic. I still struggle to read Serbian/Croatian because they're written in latin, despite them being much closer to Bulgarian and indeed when I hear them I understand a lot.

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deviendrais@reddit

Russian probably feels so easy to you because a massive amount of Russian vocabulary comes from Old Church Slavonic so it shares a lot of Vocab with South Slavic languages. In terms of vocabulary Russian is even closer to Bulgarian and Serbian than to other East Slavic languages like Ukrainian or Belarusian. >I still struggle to read Serbian/Croatian because they’re written in latin Можда ти је лакше читати српски кад се пише на ћирилици?

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Th3Dark0ccult@reddit

Да мога да го прочета. Only this letter (ћ) is mysterious, because we don't have it.

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Aggravating_Fan_7322@reddit

Isn't that h/2π?

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Antique-Army4569@reddit

се изговара како меко ч

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jaleach@reddit

It helps to take a language in school when you're younger because your brain still has flexibility. That goes away the older you get. I took Spanish, and I'm nowhere near fluent, but I can read an article in Spanish and get the general idea of what it's about. I can listen to someone speaking and sometimes pick up words and phrases to sort of understand what they're talking about.

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markohf12@reddit

Any language that has a fixed stress position will be much easier for Macedonians to pick up, there are only 4 Slavic languages that has these rules: Macedonian (3rd syllable from left to right) Czech & Slovak (1st syllable) Slovene (not fixed as a rule, but majority of the population talk with a fixed stress) All other Slavic language are either completely free of fixed stress (Serbian, Bulgarian, Croatian etc...) or free fixed of stress and also heavy on vowels (Ukranian and Russian).

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nefewel@reddit

Polish is fixed stress, with the stress being on the penultimate silabale.

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StrudlEnjoyer@reddit

I'm no linguist but I'm pretty sure Slovene has free stress. The majority doesn't talk with a fixed stress, though the stress can differ between dialects. According to Wikipedia: "Slovene has free stress: stress can occur on any syllable and is not predictable. The same word can be stressed quite differently in different dialects."

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Stealthfighter21@reddit

Serbo-Croatian stress is far from free.

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markohf12@reddit

AFAIK the only stress rule Serbian and Croatian has is that it can't be on the last syllable, but you are completely free to add it anywhere you like, which basically makes it free.

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HumanMan00@reddit

Last sylliable is for the Southern dialect only.

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Statakaka@reddit

Russian is winning over Slovak only due to the exposure

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Local_Collection_612@reddit

Russian is easier than Ukrainian and Polish. I had Ukrainian coworkers talking in Russian to me because I could not understand them in Ukrainian😅

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3Chart@reddit

Western Ukrainians that sound like Poles or the normal Ukrainians?

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Local_Collection_612@reddit

Normal Ukrainians

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Judestadt@reddit

Definitely Slovak and Czech. I was recently in Prague and Czech definitely felt more familiar and understandable than, for example, Russian.

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Cultural_Chip_3274@reddit

Out of curiosity, in which one of these languages asking a glass of water would not be mutually understandable? Could you enlighten me?

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Winter-Speech978@reddit

If the sentence is Can I have a glass of water? Only CAN and WATER are similar, the rest of the words are very different, not just these slavic languages, but all of them in general.

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deviendrais@reddit

https://preview.redd.it/r58yrus9t3hg1.jpeg?width=463&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=d452faac4cdd637b293a116077535993634f8032 I’d have to go with Slovak. I feel like I can recognise more Russian words but the grammar and syntax feel slightly off to me

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sjedinjenoStanje@reddit

I said Polish but I'm unrepresentative - I lived in Poland and speak the language fluently. I have no idea which would be easiest had I not learned Polish. Possibly Slovak, but tbh knowing Polish helps the most with that language, not knowing Croatian.

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BoranijaZaRucak@reddit

For me, Slovak and Czech languages sound familiar and easy to learn. Even if I don't understand them, in some cases, I can understand the context of the text.

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OkoMushroom@reddit

Maybe Slovak but literally none of them through speaking. Maybe if you gave me something thats written down and I take my time trying to comprehend it.

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Unable-Stay-6478@reddit

Easiest Slovak - hardest Czech

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RustCohle_23@reddit

Russian because of all the fu\*\*ing blyats in DotA and CS.

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Different_Sea5642@reddit

I'd say Slovak and I guess Russian after that. Polish is the wierdest.

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Sad_Philosopher_3163@reddit

The easiest should be Slovak, at least from what I have heard. It was surprisingly similar. The hardest is definitely Polish for me. A lot of the time it sounds like straight up gibberish. Written Polish is more understandable, but it’s still the hardest to understand overall.

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33 Comments

GayOver@reddit

Mission-Shape-4895@reddit (OP)

GayOver@reddit

GlumCompetition3338@reddit

NumerousManager3600@reddit

moisthotdogg@reddit

Th3Dark0ccult@reddit

deviendrais@reddit

Th3Dark0ccult@reddit

Aggravating_Fan_7322@reddit

Antique-Army4569@reddit

jaleach@reddit

markohf12@reddit

nefewel@reddit

StrudlEnjoyer@reddit

Stealthfighter21@reddit

markohf12@reddit

HumanMan00@reddit

Statakaka@reddit

Local_Collection_612@reddit

3Chart@reddit

Local_Collection_612@reddit

Judestadt@reddit

Cultural_Chip_3274@reddit

Winter-Speech978@reddit

deviendrais@reddit

sjedinjenoStanje@reddit

BoranijaZaRucak@reddit

OkoMushroom@reddit

Unable-Stay-6478@reddit

RustCohle_23@reddit

Different_Sea5642@reddit

Sad_Philosopher_3163@reddit