Learning Languages with Social Media

One of the best ways to learn a language is to speak it. So what do you do when there's nobody around to talk to? If, like us, you spend most of your life in front of a computer, you should consider getting on Facebook, Twitter, Google+ or any of the other social media sites and start communicating.

Long before the aforementioned social media websites existed there was instant messaging. Services such as MSN Messenger and AIM enabled us to talk with our friends from anywhere in the world, as long as they had a modem and a good tolerance level for high-pitched squealing noises anything was possible. As its popularity and reach grew, the internet quickly became one of the great places to learn languages.

You can learn a language from the comfort
of your home, no pants required. 

Practising languages is tantamount to your success in learning a new language. You can study as much as you want but as we've found, if you don't use the language it becomes very easy to forget everything you've learnt. Instant messaging can help you practice your writing, but also requires quicker comprehension in order to formulate a response. You don't need to be as quick as if you were actually speaking to someone, but you need to be faster than if you were writing a letter or an email, which makes it a perfect middle ground for those wanting to exercise their language skills.

Now that the popularity of instant messaging is on the decline, its space has been taken up by social media, most of which come equipped with a chat function. If you have friends that speak a language you'd like to learn, communicate with them. Send them some messages in their language and get learning. If you're not sure how to say something then look it up, just not on Google Translate, and keep going.

As well as chatting or tweeting to your friends, look for groups, forums or other places where language learners want to get together to practice and learn languages. There are thousands of communities for language aficionados on-line so you have no excuse not to be doing it!

How Google Became a Verb

Many years ago, at least in terms of the internet, a couple of college students at Stanford (which is one of our top language universities in the U.S.) made something that helped change the way people both browse and speak. Their product, or perhaps service, was Google.

Without Google, finding things on the internet
is like finding a needle in a haystack.

As you surely know, Google is a search engine. Its primary function is to direct web users to the appropriate web page based on their search criteria. From its birth as a company all those years ago in 1998, Google has gone from strength to strength. From its humble origins as a white page with a text box, which hasn't changed much over the years, the corporation now includes cloud computing, email and even our much-loathed Google Translate.

The name for Google came from the word googol, which is the number 10¹⁰⁰, written as a one followed by one hundred zeros. Making it a pretty big number obviously is supposed to indicate the prowess of the search engine's capabilities.

The word Google as the name for the company has existed since its inception, but as a verb the first known occurrence came in an email from co-founder Larry Page on 8 July 1998 in which he said "have fun and keep Googling!". Despite the company trying desperately to stop people using the word in this manner, they have only themselves to blame.

It's unlikely "google" was
featured in this dictionary.

The American Dialect Society chose it as their most useful word of 2002, and it was even mentioned in an episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer way back when.

In popular media it's used more and more frequently, and Google have taken steps to avoid its overuse since they fear it may become a generic trademark. They encourage people to use the verb to google (note the lowercase "g") only when referring specifically to Google's own search engine.

In many dictionaries, Google refers to the company or product, and google refers to the verb meaning "to search for on the internet", whether you use Google or not. So you can google on Google, but you can google using other search engines too!

With the world getting better-connected every day, we can only expect more words like this to find their way into the lexicon. We've heard people using Facebook as a verb too.

Have you heard any good internet neologisms? Tell us about them in the comments below!

2012: Year In Review

We've been having some fun looking at Facebook Stories and seeing what the world has been talking about most this past year. Since Facebook is American, they've dedicated several sections to the past year in the U.S., including memes, songs, books, movies, events and almost everything in between. We're having a look at the most talked about things from several countries around the world.

Australia: One Direction

It seems the Aussies can't get enough of the English-Irish pop group. They've also been fond of reality TV, the London 2012 Olympics and the globally-famous mummy porn, 50 Shades of Grey.

Here's 9 shades...
you'll have to get the book for the rest!

Canada: The Hunger Games

The Canadians spent the year talking about The Hunger Games, the box-office smash featured in the Top 10 for most countries. They also enjoyed The Avengers and the TV series The Walking Dead and a few films and books that were also popular in Australia. Mitt Romney also made an appearance on their list.

France: François Hollande

Given that France could be said to have invented modern politics, it's no surprise that their new president, François Hollande, would feature at the top of the list. Sports were on the tip of everyone's tongues as Chelsea Football Club, FC Bayern Munchen and Swedish footballer, Zlatan Ibrahimovic all featured in the list.

Germany: BVB

BVB, or Borussia Dortmund was on most Germans' lips for 2012, as were FC Bayern Munich, Chelsea Football Club and Cristiano Ronaldo. Reality TV star Daniele Negroni was also being talked up by the Germans.

Europeans sure love their football!

Italy: Terremoto (Earthquake)

The earthquakes in northern Italy in May and June were the main talking points of the year for most Italians. There was widespread destruction across the affected areas, including 26 deaths. Technocrat Mario Monti came in second and the same football teams from the Champions' League final, Chelsea and Bayern Munich pop up too. Footballers Mario Balotelli and Gianluigi Buffon were popular as well.

Spain: Trabajo (Work)

Spain's year was dominated by the economic crisis. Trabajo, meaning "work" was the most talked about topic and huelga, meaning "strike" was second. The rest of the list mentions Rajoy (the current prime minister of Spain) and the crisis económica (economic crisis). The Spanish national football team, La Roja, the Eurocopa (Euro 2012), Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo all also feature.

United Kingdom: London 2012 Olympics

The Brits were banging on about their Olympics all year, and Usain Bolt was an often mentioned athlete. The Diamond Jubilee of Queen Elizabeth II was also talked about, as was 50 Shades of Grey and box-office smash The Avengers.

Part of the Queen's Diamond Jubilee celebrations.

United States: Barack Obama and the Presidential Election

There was plenty to talk about in the United States this year, but the top story was the seemingly never-ending presidential election. Barack Obama was the most talked about politician and public figure, and lucky for him all that buzz helped secure him a win. Like their northern neighbours, Americans became obsessed with The Hunger Games, as they devoured the books and headed to cinemas to see the first film. Instagram became a favourite tech tool that is no longer just used by hipsters, and the meme TBH (to be honest) was often seen at the end of opinionated posts. Americans also became fanatics of the band Fun., whose song We Are Young (feat. Janelle Monáe) was #1 in the charts for six weeks and was heard everywhere from Super Bowl commercials to being covered on the show Glee.

Happy New Year!

The Power Of Social Media On Languages

It wasn't too long ago that there was an article on the BBC (ah, the good ol' Beeb) that we found very interesting. It was about the tu form in French becoming very common in social media. Read the full article here.

For those not in the know, in French using the word tu (second person singular) rather than vous (second person plural) is considered very informal. However, it has become commonplace across social media.

Perhaps tu being shorter than vous contributes to this, especially in the case of social media sites such as Twitter that have character limits.

Of course, social media isn't usually considered the most formal setting. Even if you don't necessarily know a person, on Facebook, Twitter, Google+, etc it would be fine to use a colloquial register.

Colloquial language is fine. Manipulating their logo in any of the above ways is not.

You probably rarely write in full sentences. Would you start a text with "Dear..." and end with "yours sincerely"? We think not!

Text messages have also had a huge effect on the way people use language for some time now. If you've ever had a Pay-As-You-Go SIM card you know the importance of getting everything you need to say into that one text!

Those familiar with the internet before social media will remember that MSN Messenger, AIM and other IMCs (instant messaging clients) had people using BRB, OMG and the now world-famous LOL. Meaning "laugh out loud" and never "lots of love". We've all heard the horror stories of texts that read:

"Sorry to hear your father passed away. LOL"

Sorry for your loss. LOL

The point was made that French, German, Chinese and English users tend to use less formal language on social media sites. On the other hand, Japanese users show all sorts of formalities in their language use. Though if you're familiar with Japanese, you will know that it is rife with honorifics. If you used to watch the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (the brilliant original, not this CGI rubbish the kids have now) or any kung fu films, you will know the word Sensei. Other honorifics include -san -chan, -kun and many, many, many more!