Does there exist some sort of universal vocabulary list for language learning? That is, here is a list of (say 100) of the most important/useful words nouns, verbs, adj., adv., etc. that should be learned first. Sure different languages use things differently and some concepts are more useful than others, but it seems like an easy starting point in learning vocab.
If none such list exists, surely we could come up with one, right?
“Important/useful” for what purposes? Learning a language for travel would be very different than learning a language for business, or for a student, or interacting with children, etc.
Well, there’s the Swadesh List, which is used by linguists cataloguing languages to come up with a basic and common vocabulary list. It’s also used to very handily compare related languages. Might be close to what you’re looking for.
I can’t exactly remember but Langenscheidts usually made a list of 1000 to 2000 words in a vocabulary book for foreign languages. I forget exactly what percent of everyday language this list comprises, but it is usually pretty high, something like 90 percent.
I’m not sure if it’s the same for every language. I would imagine that it would mainly be the X most used words, not the same words in every language. I’m sure that there is a lot of overlap in the lists, but each langugae has a unique way of conveying the normal info of daily life.
Cool. Swadesh List looks like it. Interesting, though, that it doesn’t have to be and to go, which I think would be some of the more essential ones.
Well, the Swadesh List is usually used for comparative linguistics, and the words ‘to be’ and ‘to go’ are often a little tricky, from a historical linguistics standpoint, because due to the frequency of their usage, they’re prone to being replaced with suppletive forms — at least, this is what happened in English. Compare:
English: I go, I went, I am gone
German: ich gehe, ich ging, ich bin gegangen
We see suppletion (e.g. replacement of an entire root, rather than the ordinary ‘tack on something to the end of the root’ method we use regularly) between the past simple forms of ‘go’ and ‘gehen’; English went and used the past tense form of ‘wend’ (as in ‘to turn’, related to the word ‘to wind’) instead of a more-or-less regularly formed past tense form of ‘go’. I suppose if we used the Old English form of ‘went’, we’d wind up with something that sounded like ‘gang’ or ‘goed’ (and indeed, that may be the form used in certain dialects).
Wikipedia has a nice article on the subject, if you’re interested.
Number 48 on the Wiki Swadesh List is “louse” shouldn’t it be house?
Ha, I don’t know. But bear in mind that the Swadesh list is not for language learning, but instead, for historical linguistics (since the words in this list are those likely to not be replaced by borrowings from another language, and therefore, are particularly useful for comparative linguistics).
Considering that the words before and after ‘louse’ are ‘dog’ and ‘snake’, respectively, it doesn’t seem like a typo to me. After all, how many of us need to know the words for ‘leaf’ and ‘fingernail’ for basic ‘where is the bathroom’-type stuff?