Top 5 best-sounding world and semi-world languages

[Mr. Dictator]

Japanese isn't a world language, sorry. Though I certaily don't disagree that it's pretty. Few languages can match its flow, very few, and when put to music it would shame any language except maybe French one on one.

I'd say Japanese is more of a world language than some of the others you threw into the poll, especially swahili. Its at least a semi-world language, whatever that is.

 

[aronnax]

I voted only for Downtownese.

This is poll is Western Eurocentric and alienates many other beautiful 'world' language.

The languages of India? What about Farsi? Japanese? Korean? It's ridiculous that you have included Italy, whose linguistic spread is incredibly limited to Italy, South Switzerland and a couple of villages in Croatia when you are happy to opt out Hindi-Urdu.

 

[Arwon]

At a guess, I'd say he's using "world language" in a sense roughly meaning "regional lingua franca and also Italian and Dutch".

 

[Gurubashi]

I'd say Japanese is more of a world language than some of the others you threw into the poll, especially swahili. Its at least a semi-world language, whatever that is.

Japanese is a language isolate. It's geographic spread is limited to the Japanese archipelago. According to Wikipedia, and the definition I follow, a "world language" is a language spoken internationally and used by many as a second language. Japanese sadly does not meet that criteria, altough I won't argue that it's a nice language.

 

[7ronin]

Do we define "world language" or "semi-world language" by influence? By total number of native speakers? Or perhaps by total number of all speakers? If we make the definition more restrictive then quite a few of the languages on the OP's list don't measure up.

 

[Hygro]

English. There's a reason all the Europeans sing their love songs in English. Ain't no better way to say babay.

 

[aronnax]

Japanese is a language isolate. It's geographic spread is limited to the Japanese archipelago. According to Wikipedia, and the definition I follow, a "world language" is a language spoken internationally and used by many as a second language. Japanese sadly does not meet that criteria, altough I won't argue that it's a nice language.

Japan exports tens of millions of Japanese shows and dramas, books and music across the world, their language influence is spread far and wide, especially to the countries in the Pacific Rim. As a second or third language, Japanese fairs incredibly well. With many Chinese, Australian, Singaporeans, Malaysians and Koreans picking up the language. I myself have 10 classmates who can speak or are learning Japanese. And my grade has 88 people.

Meanwhile, by your standard of numbers, there are more native Japanese speakers than there are native and non native German speakers.

 

[Gurubashi]

Japan exports tens of millions of Japanese shows and dramas, books and music across the world, their language influence is spread far and wide, especially to the countries in the Pacific Rim. As a second or third language, Japanese fairs incredibly well. With many Chinese, Australian, Singaporeans, Malaysians and Koreans picking up the language. I myself have 10 classmates who can speak or are learning Japanese. And my grade has 88 people.

Meanwhile, by your standard of numbers, there are more native Japanese speakers than there are native and non native German speakers.

Yet that doesn't change the fact that it only holds official status in one nation. I don't and won't consider it a world language, and am sorry if our opinions differ on this.

 

[aronnax]

Yet that doesn't change the fact that it only holds official status in one nation. I don't and won't consider it a world language, and am sorry if our opinions differ on this.

That's a ludicrous reason to consider what a world language is if we base it on "number of countries with official language X"

What a ridiculous poll and an even more ridiculous set of criteria.

 

[G-Max]

First, I'd like to know why Klingon isn't a choice. Spoken Klingon sounds powerful, commanding, and important. When you speak Klingon, people know that you mean business.

Secondly, there are two correct answers to this question: German and Russian. Why? Because of these two bands:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VJ3bWq-uLOo

The evidence speaks for itself. That song would not have been anywhere near as awesome in any other language - not even Klingon. Thank you all for letting me win this thread; you're all invited to my victory party.

(My third choice was Dutch because it's really just German without the awesome military history.)

 

[Winner]

That's a ludicrous reason to consider what a world language is if we base it on "number of countries with official language X"

What a ridiculous poll and an even more ridiculous set of criteria.

Can you calm down? There is no reason to start throwing around words like "ridiculous" just because your particular favourite isn't in the list.

I'd say that except for Italian, the list is pretty good.

 

[Leoreth]

His Dutch was good, but why that accent? I'm a Hollandophile, but I don't like the Hollandic accent which is purported to be Standard Dutch for foreigners learning our language.

I don't know anything about Dutch accents, but he usually performs in front of German audiences and the accent he uses is in general perceived to be a little silly sounding. It's for comedic purposes, mainly.

 

[Winner]

(BTW, the Japanese part almost killed me )

 

[Verbose]

Yet that doesn't change the fact that it only holds official status in one nation. I don't and won't consider it a world language, and am sorry if our opinions differ on this.

Well, if anything it coincides quite well with how the Japanese view themselves - to the side, for themselves, and SPECIAL...

Never mind 10 million native speakers outside Japan and 2-3 million non-Japanese globally in the process of studying it every year. Regardless, the Japanese are always astounded (flattered, yet a tad unpleasently surprised) that people from the outside might actually be listening in, and understanding what they are bickering about.

Anyhow, apparently Mandarin Chinese doesn't fit the critera too well either. Not much of an expat community until recently. Effing huge amount of native speakers in China of course, and is the standard for foreigners learning "Chinese" (perhaps 30 million as we speak). But Cantonese might actually be a better Chinese candidate for linguistic global impact? It's been getting around.

(On the other hand, we might dispense with the "Mandarin" bit of "Chinese" and save us some trouble. But then on the other hand, the linguistic differences between the various Chinese dialiects are about the order of the differences of the Romance languages in toto, which we keep separate, so linguistics and politics don't seem entirely separable. And to return to where I sarted, there aren't a few Japanse dialects quirky enough to be unintelligible to standard Japanese speaker.)

 

[jtb1127]

Mandarin is on the list

 

[Verbose]

Mandarin is on the list

Well spotted!

 

[Gurubashi]

Anyhow, apparently Mandarin Chinese doesn't fit the critera too well either. Not much of an expat community until recently. Effing huge amount of native speakers in China of course, and is the standard for foreigners learning "Chinese" (perhaps 30 million as we speak). But Cantonese might actually be a better Chinese candidate for linguistic global impact? It's been getting around.

Mandarin Chinese has huge political clout and global influence as one of the official languages of the United Nations though. It is also an official language in Singapore, Hong Kong, and Taiwan. Excluding it from the poll in favor of Cantonese would be injudicious.

 

[Danielion]

Indeed! Japanese can be called a 'world language' due to its cultural soft power, which is immense.

 

[G-Max]

English is OK I guess, the grammar is pretty simple for a european language

You must be joking. English is the make-up-your-own-grammar language. Its excuse for "grammar" is a kludge and a dirty hack, and even those kludges and dirty hacks are ignored for the sake of brevity and style. If it's simple by Indo-Aryan standards, then those other languages must have grammar that would make Nikola Tesla's head spin. Either that or I'm too accustomed to Whedonesque language and Valley Girl accents (one of the effects of growing up in California...)

and the sound of it can be really beautiful depending on the speaker. It's best with a British accent spoken by somebody who can pull it off without sounding pretentious.

I partially agree, but Australian/Kiwi accents are the best. They sound close enough to British without having that stiff-upper-lip, tea-and-crumpets-with-the-queen vibe. Irish accents are also nice. Everything that they say sounds like music.

I'm surprised that German has gotten so many votes. It sounds kind of angry to me.

That's what makes it awesome! It's the "sit down, shut up, and pay attention to me or I will send you to the gas chambers" language.

German elegant? Drahtlosnetzwerkverbindung and Landswirkraftmashine disagree.

The ability to fit a whole phrase into a single awesome-sounding word is the very definition of elegance

1. Latin

As an almost exclusively Roman player, I won't deny that Latin sounds pretty cool. I have no idea what my Praetorians are saying, but I love hearing them say it

German. On one hand, it can be very harsh sounding especially compared to "smooth" Romanic languages like English or French, with all its consonant clusters and the glottal stops between words.

But that harshness is why it's so awesome! Also, English is not a Romance language. It started out as Old High German and didn't start borrowing heavily from French until the Renaissance and Hundred-years' War. I call it the unholy bastard child of the Romanic and Germanic languages...

French - I'm no Francophile, but of the Romance languages it's the only one I really like.

Um, I think that Latin might be one of the Romance languages... do you really like "ouvre" more than "Senatus Populusque Romanus"?

This is poll is Western Eurocentric and alienates many other beautiful 'world' language.

Agreed. Sadly, the Age of Imperialism meant that Western Euro languages were spoken around the world and other, more beautiful languages were extinguished or relegated to their home countries.

What about Farsi? Japanese? Korean?

Farsi is not commonly spoken outside of Iran, Afghanistan, and places in that general region. Japanese is apparently learned by anime nerds in countries around the world, so good point there. People who speak Korean and were not born in Korea are a true rarity.

Yet that doesn't change the fact that it only holds official status in one nation. I don't and won't consider it a world language, and am sorry if our opinions differ on this.

"Official status" is a measurement of the opinions of politicians. Go to comic-con and ask the attendees how many of them know the differences between -kun, -chan, -san, and -sama. You might find that (hold the presses!) the opinions of politicians don't always reflect reality.

 

[Virote_Considon]

4. Russian. I actually prefer some of the other Slavic languages, but they're not on the list. I like Russian because it sounds organised-sloppy, which means that it sounds good to a drunk like myself. Watching people speak Russian fluently, and they often seem to sound like they have an air of dignified arrogance about them. They don't respect you, but why should they? I also like that lots of words have a kind of "sh" sound to them. The only downside is that it often sounds too quiet when people speak it, as if the language forces them to lower their volume when they switch from English to Russian, though that could just be me. Or maybe they're just getting subliminal cues from that "sh" sound I mentioned.

3. German. Good for shouting. Good for getting things done. A nice language for curiously questioning things, studying things, learning about the world. A strong industrious peasant language, as all languages should strive to achieve! I also like the way they make new words by just squishing old words together.

2. Dutch & Afrikaans. I like both these languages. They're like German, but with a certain amount of airiness to them which make them sound like some magical version.

1. English. It is the best language, plain and simple. And everyone sounds good speaking it, even if they're not quite speaking it right. This language is absolutely wizard!

It's true that Afrikaans as his origins in Dutch but now a days it is a complete different language.
It had a lot of influence from English and African languages. It contains words that don't exist in Dutch.
If I would speak to someone who speaks Afrikaans I wouldn't be able to understand half of it.

And more important to this thread. They sound completely different. The same words are said differently, the tone/sounds are different, the "flow" of a sentence is different etc.

Us Brits feel the same about English (American).

it can be very harsh sounding especially compared to "smooth" Romanic languages like English or French

English isn't a Romantic language, it's a Germanic language.

I only dislike the fact many Germans don't speak decent High German and butcher it.

Its inclination towards slang is one of the things I love about it. But then, that's also one of the things I love about English as well.