Why learn French over and above some other language? Don't get us wrong, there are many other languages besides English that enjoy great importance in the world today - Spanish, Chinese and Russian to name but three.
But you may be asking yourself, why learn French online in particular and not some other language - there are enough of them out there!
Let me first tell you my opinion as someone who was brought up bilingual in English and Serbian, the latter being a language spoken by less than 10 million people. In a certain sense it doesn't matter WHAT language you speak, ANY foreign language is a massive advantage. It widens your horizons, it makes you able to think the way someone from another culture thinks and it is a massive advantage in learning any subsequent language. Also, you never know what opportunities are out there. I could not possibly have known that there would be a war in the former Yugoslavia and that suddenly (though regrettably of course) my Serbian language skills would be a much-sought after skill.
Why choose French in particular, then, if you are looking at online language courses? Here are five reasons:
1) French has MANY similarities with English. Because I am addressing English speakers in this article I know you will appreciate this advantage of French. Did you know that a THIRD of all English words have a French origin?! What? That is a third of all English words for which you do not need to learn the French equivalent, you already know it! If you have never tried learning French before I assure you, if you sign up for an online French course you will quickly discover that you understand a great many words without having them explained to you, and many more words with a similar meaning, which makes learning French much quicker than many other languages.
2) French is an official language of the European Union. Actually, the European union currently has 23 official languages, those of its member states, but of course they cannot use all 23 for practical purposes, so there is a narrower category of so-called 'procedural languages'. These are the languages that are mostly used for written and spoken communication in the EU, and they are English, German and. you guessed it. French. Sign up for an online French course and you will be learning a language which is at the heart of the European political system.
3) French is an official language of the United Nations! Similarly to the previous point, but worth noting separately, the UN has six official languages, and one of them is French! Learn French and you are learning a language of international political communication!
4) French is your key to other Latin based languages. The French language is descended from the Latin language, together with Spanish, Italian and a number of other similar languages. In a couple of respects it is also one of the harder ones to learn. Complete an online French course and you will find it exceptionally easy to master another Latin language such as Spanish.
5) Learning French will improve your English! Huh? What do I mean by that? Well, learning any language, online or otherwise, improves your overall feeling and appreciation for language. But not only that, the similarities French has with English have an interesting aspect, and that is that for historical reasons generally the French words that have entered the English language tend to be words belonging to a higher register. Here is an example, in French envoyer means 'to send'. What word is it similar to in English? Envoy. What is an envoy? Well, it's just a messenger really! But when we use a word of French origin it tends to have a 'higher' meaning. An envoy is a messenger, but in the context of diplomacy and top-level politics. There are many, many similar examples but the point is this, by learning a French word you are often also learning or refreshing the meaning of a more 'fancy' English word. This means that an online French course can actually have a positive effect on the standard of your English!
Author Resource:
Well, there are many more ways completing an online French course could benefit you, even though that is not to say that ANY language is not worth learning! Check out these resources on this subject - learning the French language - (the site where this article was originally published) and you could be speaking French in no time! Remember - learning a language isn't something you can do overnight, so don't get taken in by any hype about 'learning French in 10 minutes' or whatever. It isn't that easy, but with the help of a good online French course you can make the job a whole lot easier for yourself!
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