I punti cardinali sono il nord, il sud, l'est e l'ovest. Ma più spesso si usano i nomi alternativi:

il nord - settentrione
il sud - meridione
l'est - oriente
l'ovest - occidente

Sembra che questi nomi provengano dal latino. Per me sono molto più difficili da ricordare. Oriente va bene, perché si usa anche in inglese, perciò occidente dev'essere la direzione opposta. Ma meridione non mi dice niente. Su Wikipedia si può leggere che quel nome vuol dire che a mezzogiorno il sole si trova verso sud.

Non ho ancora capito bene quando si usano gli articoli con i nomi delle lingue. Si deve dire "parlo l'italiano" o va bene "parlo italiano"? "conosco l'italiano"? "in italiano si dice.." oppure "nell'italiano si dice.."?

Naturalmente, si dice "la lingua italiana", non soltanto "italiano" come aggettivo, ma quali sono le regole? Infatti, se dicessi "parlo l'italiano" potrebbe anch'esso significare italiano come aggettivo. Non avrebbe senso, ma tecnicamente lo si potrebbe interpretare così, mi pare.

Behold, a valid sentence in Polish:

- Je.

In context:

- Co robi? (What's he doing?)
- Je. (He's eating.)*

In Polish verbs reflect the actor, so "je" is the singular, present form of eat. This makes saying "he's eating" (On je.) unnecessary because the he is already given in the form of the verb.

Behold, the same in French:

- Il mange. (He's eating.)
- Ils mangent. (They're eating.)

Same story? Not quite. You see, in Polish you pronounce every single letter. In French you don't. Il mange and Ils mangent sound exactly alike (singular and plural). Which means it's impossible to infer from that sentence alone what the hell is happening.

Let's step back and think about that for a while. Here you have all these verb forms that change depending on the pronoun. But they're pronounced the same anyway. So what the hell is the point? Ils mangent is no more insightful in speech than Ils mange would have been. It's only in writing that it makes a difference. And in writing there's obviously no need to have the special form because the pronoun is sitting right next to it!

Let's try the first sentence again:

- Mange. (Pronounced the same whether it's je, tu, il/elle, ils/elles.)

Now, despite the fact that you have all these different forms, the only thing you can rule out is that it isn't nous or vous. Very insightful, isn't it?

Incroyable!

* Can also be "she" or "it".

Have you noticed that every language seems to deamonize a particular letter of the alphabet? Users of the language either refuse to pronounce it, or they pronounce it as a different sound, or they banish it altogether.

Polish

Polish has excommunicated the V. This is really strange, because all its linguistic neighbors use the V all the time. All words get rewritten with Ws instead.

Norwegian

Norwegian vowels are heavy, industrial strength. Somehow this has made the O into a Polish U or an English OO. To compensate for this lacking, the Å was invented as a makeshift O.

English

English has caught onto the fact that V and W are really the same sound, and have co-opted the W for a completely different sound. Polish has a ready made letter for this sound: the Ł.

English also disfavors the J, and uses the Y as a J when need be.

Needless to say, the R was mutated into a sound that defies definition. This is lost on many English natives who plainly assume that the crazy English R is the standard for all languages.

French

French refuses to pronounce the H, yet it keeps using it in written form.

French also uses the J as a Polish Ż.

The R, of course, is the most eccentric of them. It was made into a gargling sound that stings the throat.

Dutch

Dutch will pronounce the G only as an H. And the H.. er.. also as an H. It may be that the G and the H are slightly different in speech, but if so it still eludes me how.

Spanish

Spanish doesn't like the J. In its place it improvised the LL (but also the Y is used for this). The J is used as an H, in place of the real H, which refuses to be pronounced. Sounds pretty obsessive, doesn't it?

And the V becomes a B, depending on who you ask.

Italian

Like all its latin friends, Italian pretends the H doesn't exist, but still keeps writing it.

Quick, what's the most important quality a foreign language can have? If you said "easy to use" you'd be right. All other concerns are trumped, because other values of a language can never be appreciated unless you can learn it first. And apparently Norwegian ranks first on ease of learning for speakers of English (fun to know :party: ). The ranking is of course highly unofficial, but what the heck. :cap:

Exhibit A:

Scandinavian verbs have some of the easiest conjugation you can find in Europe. Present tense is made by adding an -r to the verb, regardless of who's doing it. That gives us:

ha - to have

jeg har - I have
du har - you have
han har - he has
vi har - we have

Such simplicity is brilliant (and unheard of). :star:

The full rationale is here. A few selected gems follow.

Norwegians understand 88% of the spoken swedish language
understand 73% of the spoken danish language

Swedes understand 48% of the spoken norwegian language
understand 23% of the spoken danish language

Danes understand 69% of the spoken norwegian language
understand 43% of the spoken swedish language

Norwegians understand 89% of the written swedish language
understand 93% of the written danish language

Swedes understand 86% of the written norwegian language
understand 69% of the written danish language

Danes understand 89% of the written norwegian language
understand 69% of the written swedish language.

Hah, suckers! More succinctly:

"Norwegian is Danish spoken in Swedish"

Norwegian + phonology - vocabulary = swedish

Norwegian - phonology + vocabulary = danish