e-polish.eu if you are willing to pay. Duolingo if you are not.
I highly recommend buying the Routlidge essential grammars (Polish) if you are serious about learning the language because you will need a reference for the grammar. There 7 cases, and these cases are NOT regular. Unlike Latin or German, the declensions within each case are variable not just by grammatical gender but also the phonological construction and animacy of the word. For 3 of the cases, that translates to 2-3 variations per gender. Polish is fairly regular about its verbs, but the use of a verbal aspect means that each verb has two versions which may or may not resemble each other.
It takes about 1000 hours of study to advance to the C-level of the language. Memrise is a better app for mastering vocabulary than Duolingo, so that is the one I recommend.
There is good news, however: There are 40 million Poles and every single one of them will be delighted that you are making the effort and will enjoy talking with you. They will all provide assistance and happily correct mistakes while simultaneously acknowledging the difficulty of their language and bitching about it good naturedly. If you show that you care about the Polish language and culture, the number of friends you can get is huge. Also, there number of women who want to fuck you if you learn their language and have even a half-decent personality will skyrocket. If you need topics of conversation that facilitate this, here are a few effective ones:
Russia is stupid
Germany is stupid
The Polish government is stupid
the European Union is stupid (and simultaneously great)
Warsaw is stupid (unless you are in Warsaw; if so, Krawkow is stupid)
Other Poles are stupid (but better than Russians and Germans)
The healthcare is horrid and your taxes are wasted.
Polish culture is amazing, but also stupid.
Ukraine is annoying, but nowwhere near as stupid as Russia
Czechia is okay, but their language sounds retarded.
If non of those work and you aren't being fucked or making friends at the end of the conversation, apply two doses of vodka or local beer (I suggest Raciborskie) and try again. Repeat until successful.
If you want to start a fight between your new polish friends, try asking which type of pickle is best. Alternatively, ask them which political is better or whether homosexuality is "normal".
Thanks for all the info. I laughed at #5 because I have a Polish friend from Warsaw who doesn't like Krakow. Another that I would add to the list based on my few anecdotal experiences: potatoes are God's greatest gift to mankind. I'll check the pricing on the e-polish site, and either start that first or do some Duo and then switch later.
Yeah we're quite serious about learning Polish, if not for the purpose of moving then to just know it. I learned Classical/Koine Greek during undergrad and experienced plenty of weird morphology rules during it, so I'm not as intimidated learning Polish as like, a Spanish/English speaker would. Between tense, mood, voice, person, and number, each Greek verb has between 600-800 different forms, and some participles over 2500. It's impossible to memorize them all, just have to memorize the six principal parts and know how to construct/deconstruct them at will. For example the simple word φέρω (I carry) has six drastically different principal parts: ἔφερον, οἴσω, ἤνεγκα, ἐνήνοχα, ἐνήνεκμαι, ἠνέχθην. Several of those words have zero letters in common with each other but are the same word.
You will be very well equipped to learn Polish, then, since classical greek has a much more complex system of conjugation than Polish. Polish has mood (2) and aspect (2) as well as 4 tenses (past perfect, simple past, present and future) which makes it simultaneously much simpler than english and more frustrating. They used to have a pluperfect, but it is only used by academics and egg-heads now. The future tense is generally split between the use of the future tense of "to be" and an infinitive or a simple past tense to communicate perfective and imperfective future tense. Otherwise, verbs are very regular with only a few exceptions for spice.
The nouns, on the other hand....oh god, the nouns.
Eitherway, it's a very rewarding language and can be great fun to speak and mess around with. The poles do not appreciate puns very much and will look at you funny if you mess around with their language for fun, which is a shame since it's a lovely language for fucking around with. But occasionally you will meet a pole who thinks the same and the following conversation will be golden.
Look up the poem "Lokomotywa" by Julian Tuwim on youtube for an example of the amazing things you can do with Polish.
e-polish.eu if you are willing to pay. Duolingo if you are not.
I highly recommend buying the Routlidge essential grammars (Polish) if you are serious about learning the language because you will need a reference for the grammar. There 7 cases, and these cases are NOT regular. Unlike Latin or German, the declensions within each case are variable not just by grammatical gender but also the phonological construction and animacy of the word. For 3 of the cases, that translates to 2-3 variations per gender. Polish is fairly regular about its verbs, but the use of a verbal aspect means that each verb has two versions which may or may not resemble each other.
It takes about 1000 hours of study to advance to the C-level of the language. Memrise is a better app for mastering vocabulary than Duolingo, so that is the one I recommend.
There is good news, however: There are 40 million Poles and every single one of them will be delighted that you are making the effort and will enjoy talking with you. They will all provide assistance and happily correct mistakes while simultaneously acknowledging the difficulty of their language and bitching about it good naturedly. If you show that you care about the Polish language and culture, the number of friends you can get is huge. Also, there number of women who want to fuck you if you learn their language and have even a half-decent personality will skyrocket. If you need topics of conversation that facilitate this, here are a few effective ones:
If non of those work and you aren't being fucked or making friends at the end of the conversation, apply two doses of vodka or local beer (I suggest Raciborskie) and try again. Repeat until successful.
If you want to start a fight between your new polish friends, try asking which type of pickle is best. Alternatively, ask them which political is better or whether homosexuality is "normal".
Sources: I live here, and I married a Pole.
Thanks for all the info. I laughed at #5 because I have a Polish friend from Warsaw who doesn't like Krakow. Another that I would add to the list based on my few anecdotal experiences: potatoes are God's greatest gift to mankind. I'll check the pricing on the e-polish site, and either start that first or do some Duo and then switch later.
Yeah we're quite serious about learning Polish, if not for the purpose of moving then to just know it. I learned Classical/Koine Greek during undergrad and experienced plenty of weird morphology rules during it, so I'm not as intimidated learning Polish as like, a Spanish/English speaker would. Between tense, mood, voice, person, and number, each Greek verb has between 600-800 different forms, and some participles over 2500. It's impossible to memorize them all, just have to memorize the six principal parts and know how to construct/deconstruct them at will. For example the simple word φέρω (I carry) has six drastically different principal parts: ἔφερον, οἴσω, ἤνεγκα, ἐνήνοχα, ἐνήνεκμαι, ἠνέχθην. Several of those words have zero letters in common with each other but are the same word.
You will be very well equipped to learn Polish, then, since classical greek has a much more complex system of conjugation than Polish. Polish has mood (2) and aspect (2) as well as 4 tenses (past perfect, simple past, present and future) which makes it simultaneously much simpler than english and more frustrating. They used to have a pluperfect, but it is only used by academics and egg-heads now. The future tense is generally split between the use of the future tense of "to be" and an infinitive or a simple past tense to communicate perfective and imperfective future tense. Otherwise, verbs are very regular with only a few exceptions for spice.
The nouns, on the other hand....oh god, the nouns.
Eitherway, it's a very rewarding language and can be great fun to speak and mess around with. The poles do not appreciate puns very much and will look at you funny if you mess around with their language for fun, which is a shame since it's a lovely language for fucking around with. But occasionally you will meet a pole who thinks the same and the following conversation will be golden.
Look up the poem "Lokomotywa" by Julian Tuwim on youtube for an example of the amazing things you can do with Polish.