# The Story of Czech Canonical page: https://dominiklukes.net/writing/the-story-of-czech The piece introduces the history and structure of Czech while advising learners how to approach the language. Journalism · Reporting · CR Business Guide · c. 2000 Published in CR Business Guide, c. 2000. Text from the author's final draft; the printed version may differ slightly. What is Czech? Where did it come from? How to learn it? What are the pitfalls? What are the tools? Ever wonder? Here's the complete story in 2000 words. ## The Story of One Expatriate It's an old story. You hit the ground in Prague, businessman, tourist, expatriate and you want to do the right thing and learn the language so that you can talk with the people who live here. You're going to take a course as soon as you settle down and get cracking. But then come the frustrations. Everybody keeps telling you that Czech is a next to impossible language to learn. All Czechs you need or want to communicate with speak English to you. Your teacher doesn't really know how to teach. You are under pressure to get your job done. And before you know it two years have passed and you don't know any more Czech than it takes to read a menu in one of Prague's Italian restaurants. You want to avoid this? You want to be different? Are you sure? Read on! ### How to Go About It It took Czech hundreds of years to get to this point and it takes any one Czech a good seven years to figure it out. How can a non-Czech gain admittance then? Determination helps. A little bit of talent, a little bit of luck. To survive in Prague, Czech isn't strictly necessary but it is becoming more so if you want to get a job here other than as an English teacher. The bottom-line is: If you don't take a course and study on your own (at least one hour of homework for one hour with a teacher) you will never find out what the fuss is all about. No matter whether you study Czech, Swahili, or Spanish. True, people are different and somebody gets more from one-on-one than group-based tuition. But **nobody** can learn any language without putting a lot of work and time into it. It seems that the key factor separating the winners from losers in language learning is motivation. Getting or keeping a job is one but be prepared for at least a year of hard work and frequent frustration before you become competent enough to conduct business in Czech. It can be done! How does four hours with a teacher a week and another ten on your own sound? Knowing about your learning style helps. Buy a book on language learning along with your Czech textbook and read it carefully. The things I have consistently seen not to work in terms of motivation are swapping Czech for English or finding a Czech partner. The problem is that your counterpart will invariably speak more English than you do Czech and are much more motivated to learn it. The vast majority of these arrangement deteriorate into English conversation. The thing, on the other hand, I have consistently seen work is spending a year outside Prague in a small Czech city. Not only will you be a comparative rarity but fewer people will speak English to you. If you avoid contact with expats you stand a better chance still to achieve your goals. Hard work is still necessary but it's easier to sustain your drive. Unlike in Prague, finding a partner is often a boost. Taking all the above into consideration, all you need to know before you take the plunge, is where to find your instructor. The perfect way to start is to attend one of the dozens intensive language summer schools in Prague, Brno or Pilsen. You are making a huge investment with your life energy by trying to settle in the Czech Republic, so what is US\$400 and a month of your time? To continue your education you can choose one of the many Czech courses offered by over 20 language schools in Prague, many listed in the Czech Republic Business Guide. The downside is that there is no consistent quality guarantee even within one school. Few provide much training to their Czech language teachers so your enjoyment is very much a luck of the draw. Always ask for a demo lesson before committing. Having a teacher you find inspiring is more important on an evening course than with a summer school because it is harder to keep the energy going over several months especially if combined with work duties or job hunting. One word of caution, though, many Czech classes turn into social clubs which is good for meeting people but bad for language learning. Remember that not doing your homework is as bad as not cleaning your teeth. The other option is to find a private teacher. It is more expensive but it suits some people better. Many schools provide this option but it is really only affordable to companies. If you're on your own you can easily find some one through a bulletin board in one of the many expatriate hangouts. You can also try advertising in the Prague Post. Insist on a demo lesson, however, and don't be afraid to say no. There are many good teachers in Prague who do this for a living. Remember that when you cancel classes and don't be surprised if you have to pay for your Czech lessons even after you've decided to take a last minute vacation in Italy. ### What Books to Get Buying a textbook has been the last milestone on the road to learning Czech for many a foreigner. Let it be your springboard. What to choose to jumpstart your learning? Although different people like different things, *Communicative Czech: Elementary* and *Intermediate* is a pretty safe bet and a great starting point at any rate. It comes with decent tapes and provides enough guidance for your teacher but it doesn't have enough English for self-teaching. After a year or so, *Teach Yourself Czech* will be a good refresher and put many things into place for you. It is a little too difficult to start with. Generally try to steer clear of *Colloquial Czech* although some people find its soap-opera like dialogues interesting, especially if they have at least a rudimentary command of the language already. There are many other textbooks on the market but few of sufficiently high standard. You will find a full Czech grammar along with information on Czech culture and Czech language on the web compiled by myself on the web on http://www.cuni.cz/\~dlukes. If you are at all serious about your Czech, the only dictionary worth the money is the award-winning English-Czech/Czech-English Dictionary written by Josef Fronek. It is a little bulky but gives you all the information you need because it is the only one on the market made with non-Czechs in mind. Spend a little time to learn to use it, perhaps asking your teacher for help, it will definitely pay off. You may want to buy a little pocket tourist dictionary anyway to carry around for emergencies but these are not enough for serious language learning. ### What Pitfalls to Avoid Here are a few dos and don'ts: > Do take a course. > > Do buy a textbook and a good dictionary. > > Do spend time outside Prague. > > Don't expect the language to rub off on you. > > Don't forget to do your homework. > > Don't worry about ř it is much easier and not nearly as important as reputed. > > Don't worry about vowel-less words such as *scvrnkl* they are just the icing on the cake. > > Do worry about long and short vowels differentiating *páni* (Gentlemen) from *paní* (Mrs.). > > Don't worry about cases as much. > > Do worry about aspect. > > Don't despair. Remember: > There is a written Czech and spoken Czech. > > There are many international words in Czech. What do you think *škola* means? > > Czech has given the world some great words, most importantly *robot*. > > Czechs find your attempts at speaking cute and are not laughing at you but with you. > > It is no more difficult to learn Czech than Spanish. Only Spanish is an easier language to learn badly. ## The Story of One Language Loved and loathed, revered and ridiculed, abundant and severely limited. All that is the Czech language. Loved by all those born into it, loathed by all those who for reasons ranging from love to business interest decided to learn it. Who designed this devilish tool of humiliation? Why was it overlooked in Geneva when the Conventions were being hammered out? Did it just spring up from nowhere to give joy to millions and sorrow to thousands? No Czech has more than a thousand glorious years behind it in which it was both one of the official languages of the Roman Empire of the German Nation and a dying flower spoken by backward peasants. *Tak*, let's settle down around the fire and hear the story. ### Milk and Honey Some fifteen hundred years ago, but really in a time when years didn't matter all that much, two brothers said their byes somewhere near Brno. They were both leaders of Slavic tribes looking for somewhere to settle with their people. One was called Lech and the other Čech. Lech headed North to create Poland and Čech went a bit further West where from a breast-shaped mountain called Říp he saw a land of milk and honey which looked just right. That's how the seed of Czech was planted. ### Road to Civilization Emerging from the mists of myth into historical time we see the predecessor of Czech in dialects similar to Old Church Slavonic spoken in the area around 863 AD. This is the year when two priests, Cyril and Methodius, arrived from Constantinople to bring literacy to the area, then unified under the heading of Great Moravia. They established liturgy in language known today as Old Church Slavonic and translated the New Testament into it using a custom-made script which later developed into Cyrillic. Their efforts are celebrated to this date by a national holiday, even though they were later supplanted by 'missionaries' of Rome which brought Czechs forever into the fold of Catholic nations and Latin alphabets. ### Dad Let's fast-forward a little to 1348 when Charles IV. established a university in Prague and made it an important center of learning. Born of Czech mother and a Luxemburgian father he combined the best of the two worlds and became an Emperor of a good chunk of the then-known world. He made Czech one of the official languages of the empire which earned him the undying gratitude of all Czechs and a sobriquet 'The Father of the Homeland'. ### The Birth of Ř Where did this consonant from hell come from? The story starts somewhere around the turn of the 15^th^ century. The sound itself had been around for a long time, maybe one of the early Czechs stepped on his tongue and it caught on, but the spelling up to that time was something like *rzs* so it didn't look too bad. Polish, which has a sound similar to *ř* uses this system to this day and who have you ever heard complaining that it is a difficult language to pronounce? The idea of putting accents on letters instead of doubling or combining them occurred to the first Czech linguist and religious reformer Jan Hus. He was burned at the stake in 1415 under the pretense of heresy but thousands of hapless learners of Czech really know better. This was followed by a major uprising in the Czech lands, one of the demands of which was equal status for Czech as a language in which mass could be spoken. ### And The Heads Went a Rollin' After things settled a little bit following the Hussite movement, Czech experienced a surge of growth and prosperity. Hundreds of books were written and published in the 1500s including a grammar of Czech. Most importantly a new translation of the Bible appeared, known today as *Kralická bible*. It was this book that provided the basis for revival of the Czech language some three hundred years ago. In the mean time, things got ugly on the political side. After a very very unsuccessful uprising against the Hapsburgs (whom the Czech nobility, showing remarkable lack of foresight, invited on the Czech throne in the early 1500s) 27 Czech protestant nobles were executed on the Old Town Square starting (alongside with the Thirty-Year War) a mass emigration of Czech intelligentsia and Re-Catholization accompanied by Germanization of the Czech lands. ### Somebody Turn On The Light What followed is known as the period of darkness. Czech language was gradually relegated to the peasants and was thought to be dying out by the late 1700s. Happily, a new wave of Czech nationalism called the National Revival brought the language back from the brink of extinction with a new grammar and dictionary published by 1830 and Czech the language of many original works of literature and translations. ### One Nation Two Languages One thing the revivalists weren't really clear on was what real Czech looked like. Unfortunately, they decided that the really pure Czech was to be found in the then two hundred year old *Kralická bible* and disregarded all later Baroque literature not to mention the peasants' way of talking. Thus we ended up with two distinct languages two hundred years apart being used both at once. One the language of writing and official speeches and the other the talk for all other occasions. They mostly differ by endings so instead of *dobrý* you will most likely hear *dobrej* or people asking for *mlíko* while you see *mléko* on the carton. It isn't too difficult but makes for interesting dilemmas for your language teachers. ### One Country Two Nations After nearly 300 years and much struggle Czechs regained their independence in 1918 and joined together with Slovaks to face both good and bad. Both Czech and Slovak were the official languages which was a new thing for the Slovaks but felt like paradise regained for the Czechs. Some attempts appeared to create one language called Czechoslovak and even a grammar was written but they came definitely unglued with World War II. Although very similar, Czech and Slovak are now two definitely separate languages with dictionaries and translations from one into another. Many grocery products, for example, come with instructions in both languages. However, thanks in part to years of bilingual television and radio, when a Czech and a Slovak meet each can speak their own language and understand the other perfectly. The languages will probably drift further apart over the next few generations and the ever-fragile mutual understanding between Czechs and Slovaks will have another spanner thrown into the works by linguistic evolution. Many other languages influenced the development of Czech, from Latin to German. However, although Czech borrowed words from Russian and many other Slavic languages during attempts to revive it in the 1800s, it remained fairly immune to Russian influence during the forty years of communist rule. In fact, English has probably exerted more influence on Czech in the last decade than Russian had during almost half a century. ### Where is My Home... ...starts the Czech national anthem, and the Czech language has had a long journey to finding a really comfortable dwelling in the past millennium. Germans constituted a large linguistic minority in the Czech lands since the early 1100s until they were all shipped out after 1945. The cohabitation, however, was frequently an unhappy one. For a start the Czech name for German is *Němčina* meaning 'the language of mutes'. The old Czechs having devised an original approach to foreign language learning consisting of the principal dictum that if you cannot understand someone they're as good as mute. The fact that the word 'language' was largely synonymous with 'nation' in the Slavic languages at that time certainly didn't help Germans to integrate snuggly with their Slavic compatriots. Not that they showed much desire to do so and attempts in the 17^th^ and 18^th^ centuries to stamp Czech out completely were never taken lightly. It is perhaps most telling that one of the major literary attractions of Prague and definitely the best-known writer Czech lands have given the world, Franz Kafka, despite being fluent in Czech, wrote all his works in German. Driving out the Germans in 1946 and the split with Slovak brothers in 1993 ensured that, perhaps for the first time, Czech has, by means fair and foul, found a safe home with no other language competing with it, thereby freeing its 10 million or so native speakers to use it to squabble about other things of importance. --- ## About this item - Type: Journalism - Genre: Reporting - Published: c. 2000 - Outlet: CR Business Guide - Language: English Topics: [Czech language and culture](https://dominiklukes.net/topics/czech), [Language and linguistics](https://dominiklukes.net/topics/language-and-linguistics), [Language learning and teaching](https://dominiklukes.net/topics/language-learning). ## Related - [The Road to Czech Paradise](https://dominiklukes.net/writing/the-road-to-czech-paradise) (Journalism · c. 2000) - [Czech Language Inside Out](https://dominiklukes.net/writing/czech-language-inside-out) (Journalism · c. 1999) - [A Brief But Uplifting Introduction to Learning the Czech Language for the Faint of Heart (A Twelve-Step Program)](https://dominiklukes.net/writing/a-brief-but-uplifting-introduction-to-learning-the-czech-language-for-the-faint-) (Journalism · c. 1999) - [Czech: Frequently Asked Questions](https://dominiklukes.net/writing/czech-frequently-asked-questions) (Journalism · c. 1999) - [Overview of Czech Textbooks](https://dominiklukes.net/writing/overview-of-czech-textbooks) (Journalism · c. 1999) - [Top 5 Frustrations with Learning Czech](https://dominiklukes.net/writing/top-5-frustrations-with-learning-czech) (Journalism · c. 1999) Section: [Writing](https://dominiklukes.net/writing)