Hi, I am deciding on a foreign language to pick up for college. I am deciding from these four Italian, French, Spanish and Japanese.
I know that some believe in the language during spellcasting while some dont. Personally, I believe in the power of words thus the language used is vital imo.
Italian is the language closest to Latin the university offers and Latin is one language I have always wanted to learn for spellwork.
However, I am to think of practicality in daily life usage thus, swinging towards French and Spanish as they are more widely used.
Along with my great interest in Japan and Onmyoji, Japanese is another language I have always wanted to learn since I was a kid.
Hence, I am torn between these 4 languages. I am to choose one. If you were me, which one will it be?
Re: Which language to learn? By: thorleifc / Novice
Post # 2 Mar 05, 2017
Sounds to me like you really want to learn latin. Latin is the base for French. Italian and Spanish. Why not learn latin and then pick the next romance language based on what career choices you would like have open up?
I'll go for the latin, then make a spell to make it easy (for me its not impossible) especially Japanese they have 3 writing alphabets and kanji writing is the most difficult to memorize.
Re: Which language to learn? By: Divinius / Novice
Post # 4 Mar 06, 2017
The Latin language has many derivitive languages such as English, French, Italian, and Spanish, however Japanese isn't one of those. I've personally had an interest in learning Japanese, but that's a lot of work to take on solely, and even if I had the opportunity to take a professional course on it, I'd probably pass it up.
However, if you begin learning Latin derived languages, I think you'd be pretty set up in your learning and in your communicating. While they (whoever they are) say that Latin is a dead language, I don't agree with that. Latin lives on every day through our tongues while I speak in the languages derived from it. If you understand one Latin derived language, you have a better chance of understanding other Latin derived languages.
I think you should go with what you feel in your heart, because that's what I do. If you'd like to study Italian, I say seize the opportunity. On another note, you see more people learning Spanish from books than you see people learning Italian from books, so you can always study Spanish on your own time.
Re: Which language to learn? By: Wind_Kitsune / Beginner
Post # 5 Mar 06, 2017
I understand what everyone is saying about Latin and while it might help learn other languages Latin itself is not very useful in day to day. Japanese is a language I would love to know but it is very complex. Spanish would likely be the most useful followed by either French or Japanese with Japanese probably being the most valuable as I doubt many Americans bother to learn Japanese. I would get something like rosetta stone and learn as many languages as I thought i could as knowing multiple languages is useful.