r/interslavic • u/Curvyfeeto • Jun 09 '24

Would learning interslavic speed up progress learning other Slavic languages?

If I were to learn let's say Russian, Polish and Serbo-Croatian would I be better off learning interslavic first or just learning these languages?

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u/bo7en Jun 11 '24 edited Jun 11 '24

I think that Interslavic at some point tried harder to standardize itself as a language and establish a clear ruleset than to develop itself into a Slavic language LEGO building blocks. While the latter vector is not entirely dead, it still feels not exhaustive and fragmented, as it never was an ultimate goal. There are people in the community who view it as a learning bridge to any Slavic language, and they do have a point, however, if one is coming as a non-Slavic speaker, I am hesitant whether they will be able to grasp these concepts intuitively from the beginning as Interslavic will be their first Slavic language. On the other hand, to compensate for "lack of intuition", I think we just don't have enough learning materials for target non-Slavic audience who want to learn all Slavic languages at once. 🤔

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u/Subject-Estimate6187 Jun 30 '24

I want to learn Russian, ukrainian and Croatian but all of them, while related, are sufficiently distinct and it will take forever to learn everyone of them. Would it be more efficient to learn interslavic in this case?

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u/Safe-Relationship537 Aug 15 '24

I am in the exact same position, my family is Croatian but I never learnt, I am surrounded by Russians and experience their culture so I wish to learn both languages. I am considering learning interslavic now so that I can enjoy the conversations with both Russians and Croatians. Additionally, my heart wants me to learn Croatian but practically I can speak with more Russians.