According to the IEEE (The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers) which has published The Top Programming Languages of 2017 which is an interesting read and highlights some trends.
I'm imagining some of the new languages that have rock-star adoption status and usage solve some very difficult problems quite elegantly, like "R" - you'd think these brain surgeons could engineer a better name than "R" but hey, who am I to judge? [coughs]
They have also divided the languages into various categories: Web, Mobile and Embedded. This gives much depth to the comparison and help you to focus on what you've got your eye on actually developing and understanding why some languages are so popular - either because they have overlapping roles in each category or precisely because they do not.
I like the idea of the best tool for the job and rather learning syntax and stick to using the best tools available. Having said that I'm a C# developer and although I do know my way around a number of languages what was interesting to me was Python. And I think I should take some time out and get busy with some Python tutorials - I see so many bleeding edge projects these days being written in Python and what seems to be very happy devs and a thriving community.
I see there is also MIT online introductory programming course for free over here.
Let me know what you guys think and thanks for reading!