Time magazine has published an interview with the author of new book Babel No More, Michael Erard. This book is an intriguing read for language students, and fans of linguistics, as it delves into how to approach learning a new language, and how some people are able to learn a language quickly, whilst others are not. The main focus of the book is people who are able to speak more than one language (polyglots) and people who are able to communicate in many languages (hyperglots.) The interview is available here.
You can also read the first couple of chapters free on Amazon!
It’s that time of year again, where we’re all trying to think of fabulous Christmas gifts for family and friends. Don’t worry, I won’t be making these a regular thing all the way through December! I’ve just discovered these magnets which would make a great gift for any language student, and thought I’d share!
These little Magnetic Poetry Kits now come in Spanish, French, Italian, German, Norwegian and Swedish, and are a fun way to practice your writing skills in another language. There’s also a Hebrew alphabet kit, a sign language kit, and a Chinese for Kids kit, but these are a little harder to find.
Ensuring you get the correct spelling, in any written language, is paramount. You can get away with slight mispronunciations is most cases, verbally, but on paper you can and will appear not to have an appropriate attention to detail. The consequences can range from implying something you didn’t intend, to not getting a job because you have misspelled a single word on your CV.
Oh, the irony.
Using spell check sometimes just won’t cut it. Some words which sound the same when vocalised are often used incorrectly in the written form. These can be spelled correctly but often misused. There/their/they’re, two/to/too, and your/you’re are all commonly used incorrectly.
You wouldn’t think to submit an essay or letter without proof reading first in your own language. The best spell check you can use when recording text in another language is someone who is a native speaker of the language which you are writing.
July 8, 2011 at 2:00 am
· Filed under Observations, Writing · Posted by Wendy
Everybody has different aims to consider when learning languages. One of them is whether to focus on written or conversational language. Of course, you don’t have to focus entirely on one (and I wouldn’t recommend you to), but it will affect things like the type of texts or materials you study from.
At the moment, I’m studying a reading textbook, which has short essays followed by comprehension questions. My teacher is careful to point out which things are only suitable for written texts (and so I should avoid saying things that way). There are also discussion questions so I can get my fill of speaking practice. This method suits me right now as I am using language mainly for work, where I am communicating a lot by email.
My friend is using a textbook that is made up of conversations about various topics. It includes follow up questions and audio as well. This method is great for beginners and people who need language for everyday situations.
Which method do you prefer? Do you think a distinction needs to be made?
May 25, 2011 at 10:00 am
· Filed under Writing · Posted by Wendy
Having been an on and off blogger and generally outspoken person for many years, I can’t imagine the concept of having no right to free speech at all. Even though I’ve lived in countries where you have to keep a lid on your opinions to some extent (Turkey, China), I’ve never felt in danger of being reprimanded, hurt, or imprisoned.
So when I heard about the amazing Afghan Women’s Writing Project, I had to stop and think for a while. The project helps Afghan women write and publish pieces in English about their real lives and experiences. These women often have to publish work anonymously, and sometimes put their personal safety at risk by secretly accessing computers to submit their work for editing and publishing. They are helped directly and remotely by volunteer editors and mentors.
Some of the pieces of writing are general, and some are extremely personal. Writers have often hidden their participation from all of their friends and family.
To read more, have a look a the Highlights section of the AWWP site.
March 10, 2011 at 10:00 am
· Filed under Writing · Posted by Wendy
Ah, you have to love a bit of language-related humour. [sic] humor is a tumblog that allows the author to vent frustration arising from the clearly terrible fiction she has to read at work.
Sure, writers may technically be using language correctly, but that doesn’t mean that they can’t put together some cringe-worthy word combinations. In many cases, though, they aren’t even close to getting the language right.
Here are a few of my favourites:
Awesome use of a colon:
“Hunter was wearing a track suit that featured: pants that could turn into shorts by unzipping the lining of the leg. A half an hour into the trip, he had done just that. He was wearing a cream colored golf shirt, and he wore Deck shoes without any socks.”
Sounds more like a snack:
“James hair was braided corn roll style.”
She understands entertainers:
“One of the sailors made a comment in German she didn’t understand and while his body was shielding her from the rest of the group, he squeezed one of her breast affectingly. A jester she did understand.”
Nobody talks back to him:
“Move out my way, bitch, you are the one who gave birth to this retorted boy.”
Aims for NSFW, but just ends up…puzzling:
“We started to put the pieces of our lovemaking puzzle together. Slowly and carefully placing the final part of our puzzle in place, my body arched as it accepted his part of the puzzle.”
As a student of Mandarin Chinese, I use the romanisation system pinyin to ’spell out’ the sound of Chinese characters, including their tones. Each tone marking shows what sound you should make for the vowels. For a long time, I have been looking for an input engine that would allow me to type tones directly, instead of having to use letters and numbers, or go through a complicated special symbol input. I wanted to be able to type something like e3 and come up with ě on the screen. Until recently, my only options were to use the input engine NJStar (which works really well, except that the full version is really expensive), copy and paste special characters each time I wanted to use them, or create complicated macros which would only work in certain programs.
A while back, I thought I could use Texter, which is a tiny yet powerful text replacement program from Lifehacker. Unfortunately it doesn’t support Unicode characters, which are the ones I wanted (although give it a go if you type the same things a lot and want shortcuts that work in all your programs). I couldn’t find many other alternatives online, although I found a few other people online who had the same (pinyin writing) issues as me.
Then I found a link to PhraseExpress, another text replacement program, and I thought I’d give it a go. Well, lo and behold, it works perfectly! All you have to do is add your desired characters (e.g. ā) and the key combination you want to associate it with. You can even add whole pages of text instead of just special characters, and export your shortcuts so you can use them on different computers.
I did have to fiddle a bit with the format of the shortcuts (you obviously have to use something which you don’t use anywhere else), but finally decided on using .[letter][tone number] as my template. So now if I type “.i2,” I get “í”. Magic!
If you have been wanting to type special characters in any language simply and quickly, I highly recommend downloading the PhraseExpress software. It’s completely free for personal use.
If anyone has any additional comments or recommendations, that’s what the comments box is for!
With the script technology available these days, it’s uncommon for language learners to focus so much on the writing of languages like Japanese and Chinese. All you need to do is recognise a character, and know what it sounds like, to be able to write it on a computer. Even in my own study, I am trying to focus more on reading, listening, and speaking, as it seems like it will take a long time to rote learn individual characters.
On the flip side, learning how to write characters yourself helps make them more concrete in your mind, and can really help you understand them and their relationships to other words and characters. A useful tool I’ve found to help you write Japanese or Chinese (on the computer, no less!) is Skritter. With Skritter, you can practice writing characters on the screen, and the program can help you with stroke order as well as giving useful information about the characters and radicals. It also provides a tracking service so you can see your progress, and focus more on characters that you are having trouble with.
They provide a two week full service trial for learners of Japanese and Chinese (both traditional and simplified), so if you want to improve your writing skills, check it out!
I recently gave in and bought an iPod Touch, and it was, in all honesty, mostly so I could try out some of the hundreds of useful language-learning applications out there. The incredible potential of having not only mp3s and podcasts, but dictionaries, flashcards, and other learning tools in your pocket is a little bit mind-blowing.
So, you will probably see a few reviews and recommendations for not just individual applications, but general good practices when using your iPhone (or Android).
This first one is a slightly alternative way to use a productivity tool. I first downloaded the demo version of Use Your Handwriting (UYH) from Gee Whiz Stuff because it provided a seemingly novel way of jotting down notes and to do lists in your own handwriting (or fingerwriting).
After playing with it for a little bit, I realised that it would be an ideal way to practice my Chinese characters, as there’s a simple interface and a big writing/drawing area. You can easily move to the next screen (it even does it for you if you want), and shake to erase if you’re unhappy with your writing. If you turn the device vertically, you can write top-to-bottom and left-to-right like they used to do in the old days! The paid version even has rainbow colours (although you can, of course, choose other ones), which are different for almost every stroke, so you can tell if you are doing them correctly. It also lets you write long notes and has a very handy email function, so you can send your jottings to yourself, your teacher, or your friends.
If you’re a learner of a language with a non-roman script, I would highly recommend it for practicing your writing (get a stylus for even better results). It’s also a good place to jot down characters or words that you see during the day but can’t look up immediately. Or just general note-taking in bright colours!
Do you know any other good apps for this purpose, or language learning in general?
As a student of Mandarin Chinese, I use the romanisation system 
With the script technology available these days, it’s uncommon for language learners to focus so much on the writing of languages like Japanese and Chinese. All you need to do is recognise a character, and know what it sounds like, to be able to write it on a computer. Even in my own study, I am trying to focus more on reading, listening, and speaking, as it seems like it will take a long time to rote learn individual characters.
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