Languages Online: The Best of May 2017

It's that time again where we have a look at some of the best language content to hit our screens over the last lunar cycle.

10 - International Greetings: How to Say “Hello” in 29 Languages on FluentIn3Months.

This content comes from one of our favourite language sites. "Hello" and its equivalents in other languages are some of the most common words we use. However, we barely think about them. In this article, you can see their origins and what they mean.

9 - CEFR Levels: What They Are, Why They Matter, and How to Test Yourself on FluentIn3Months.

Have you ever wondered why people say they're A2, B1, etc. when it comes to speaking languages? This is because of the CEFR Levels used to gauge language ability. In this article, you can find out all about them and how to find out what level you are.

8 - The Lost Cockney Voice on BBC.

This interesting radio broadcast talks about the Cockney accent, how it's disappearing, and why. A fascinating listen and something you can put on in the background while you work, too!

7 - Ill-gotten gains – why Americanisms are a boon for the British on The Guardian.

Why do the British hate Americanisms so much? It's kind of weird given how many of them are just English expressions that fell out of use. Additionally, there are plenty of Americanisms we use without even realising. This article has it covered.

6 - From rage-quit to sweatying it: the language of childhood in 2017 on Oxford Dictionaries

Not sure what kids are talking about these days? Me neither! In this interesting article, you'll find out about some of the weird and wonderful words the youngest generation are using.

5 - Why a foul mouth can be a force for good on The Guardian.

Though controversial, swearing can be a powerful thing. After an interesting psychological discovery, this author gives her thoughts on why swearing is so powerful.

(Source: Dan Chung/The Guardian)

4 - Strong language: swearing makes you stronger, psychologists confirm on The Guardian

Ever stood on a piece of Lego with no shoes on? If you didn't swear, I salute you. However, it might've been a good idea to do so since psychologists have discovered that swearing both makes you stronger and increases your tolerance for pain. Read more about it here.

3 - Acento Misterioso on Itchy Feet

Numbers 3 and 2 this month both come from Itchy Feet, a great comic about languages and travelling. If you're learning Spanish, you'll enjoy this one!

2 - Just Do It on Itchy Feet

The second comic in our list from Itchy Feet is fantastic. Remember, confidence can go a long way when speaking a foreign language!

1 - La politique: French political vocabulary in English on Oxford Dictionaries

Since France headed to the polls earlier this month, it's no surprise this article made it to number 1 this month. It's surprising how many French words and ideas made their way into English political terminology. Find out more about it here.

Were there any interesting stories that we missed? Tell us about them in the comments below.

Ashamed of an Accent: Linguistic Insecurity

Languages are as varied and interesting as the people who speak them. Every language has plenty of different accents, and depending on the culture or place where languages are spoken, some are considered more "correct" or "standard".

This must mean that some dialects, accents, and ways of speaking a language are considered to be inferior. The idea that a certain way of speaking is considered inferior can lead to something known as linguistic insecurity.

Linguistic insecurity is when a speaker adjusts the way they use their language due to feeling anxious (either consciously or subconsciously) about the way they use their language. This can manifest in a number of ways, depending on which elements of language are considered to be non-standard.

One way to alleviate this anxiety is to shift registers. Speakers with linguistic insecurity sometimes will speak in a higher register than they would normally, often by using a formal register. This can also lead to hypercorrection. This is when the speaker, in an attempt to correct their language, applies a "rule" where they don't really have to.

As a speaker of Geordie (the dialect of Northern English spoken around Tyneside), I have been guilty of hypercorrection. For example, in my dialect, I would usually pronounce the end of the word "master" like the letter "a" in "hat". However, when adopting a more standard dialect, I have found myself altering the pronunciation in the word "pizza" and correcting the "a" to the sound of "er" and pronouncing it like "pizzer".

So who does linguistic insecurity affect? As you can imagine, it tends to be those who speak a variant of the language which is considered to not be the standard. Studies have shown that those of lower socioeconomic classes also tend to be more susceptible to linguistic insecurity, but not the very lowest classes. The lower middle classes tend to exhibit high levels of linguistic insecurity.

Linguistic insecurity isn't an issue if you're toiling in the fields.

So why the lower middle classes? It is thought that since the lower middle classes are stuck between the lower and upper classes, they are exposed to the speech patterns of the lower classes, but also consider the attitudes and speech patterns of the upper classes to be correct. Studies tend to show that the second tier of socioeconomic classes (especially those who aspire to be a member of the top tier) show greater levels of linguistic insecurity.

Studies also show that linguistic insecurity affects more women than men. Of course, linguistic insecurity is a very personal thing, too. I personally love the varied nature of languages and can sometimes be very stubborn and refuse to bow to linguistic prescriptivism when it comes to how I talk. However, some days, like most people, I just want to fit in and find myself speaking in a way that would probably embarrass my friends back home!

Do you use a non-standard dialect of your language? Have you ever felt anxious about the way you speak? Tell us about your experiences in the comments below!

Language and Culture in Sci Fi: Firefly and Serenity

Over the weekend I went to see Disney's Big Hero 6. One interesting aspect of the film is that the story takes place in San Fransokyo (an obvious portmanteau of "San Francisco" and "Tokyo"), where East meets West both architecturally and culturally.

San Francisco skyline at night.

There are a number of nice intercultural details that feature in the film as well, such as the chōchin (提灯) paper lanterns that hang from the San Franciscan streetcars. San Francisco's famous hilly streets are also lined with sakura (桜 or サクラ) cherry blossom trees. In addition to these purely aesthetic features, the characters also seemingly alternate between Japanese and American cuisine.

As I noticed these interweaving cultural details, it reminded me that while it isn't often the crux of plotlines, fascinating (and fictional) cultures and languages are often a recurring theme in science fiction universes. Since I'm a massive fan of science fiction, this got me thinking about the cultures and languages in my favourite genre of both film and television.

Today, as part of what I hope will become a regular series of posts on this blog, I will be covering one of my favourite sci fi television series, Firefly, and the accompanying film, Serenity.

Firefly took a lot of inspiration from real cowboys.

Joss Whedon's wrongly-cancelled space western took place in another fusion universe. Much like Big Hero 6, the backdrop draws upon elements of both Western and Eastern culture. This is explained by an alliance between the United States and China that took place prior to the events of the show.

Thanks to this cultural fusion, Mandarin Chinese is the second language of the galaxy and is seen throughout the show in writing. Whenever characters need to swear they use Mandarin words, which worked as a kind of "minced oath" for the audience who are able to tell they're swearing without the need to be offended by it (unless you're Chinese, of course). That said, a lot of the Mandarin in the show is said to be unintelligible, probably due to the actors being principally Canadian and American.

In the Firefly universe, the two main languages are not perfectly and evenly distributed, with one language being favoured over the other depending on where you are. For example, on the planet of Londinium, one of the most-populated and central planets of the galaxy, English is more common. Mandarin is more widely spoken on the sister planet of Sihnon, which exhibits a more typically-Chinese culture and naming conventions.

As well as the shared dominance of English and Mandarin, there are obvious dialectal differences dependent on where these languages are spoken. In the case of English, the variety spoken on the central planets differs from the way the language is employed on the outer planets. These two varieties are known as "Core Speech" and "Frontier Slang" respectively. "Core Speech" is considered to be more prestigious and employed by the wealthy and educated, while "Frontier Slang" certainly does not carry the same reputation.

How accurate do you think Firefly or Serenity is? Which sci fi series or film should we cover next? Tell us below in the comments.

Speaking Geordie or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love My Accent

Growing up I never realised I had an accent. Of course, everybody has an "accent" but for the sake of simplicity, when I say accent, I mean a non-standard accent. If you have ever ventured to the northeast of England, you will have noticed that very few people speak like they do on the BBC news.

When I was younger, I was surrounded by the natives of Newcastle-Upon-Tyne, who proudly identify themselves as Geordies. As children learn a language by listening to those around them, I inevitably picked up the accent and never distinguished the difference between the varieties of English I heard on television from the delightful accent I was hearing at school from teachers and pupils alike.

I knew there were Geordie words because, when at home, my mam (I don't use mum or mom) wouldn't allow me to use Geordie words. I was told I'd "never get a job speaking like that". Oddly enough, swearing was fine as long as I only swore in the house, and never in anger towards someone. The only time I could use "proper" Geordie was when singing along to the local folk song, the Blaydon Races, which can only be sung in Geordie.

While I love the accent, I know there are people in this world who will automatically think you are stupid if you speak with a broad Geordie accent. Ironcially, I didn't realise how strong my English accent was until living abroad. During my ERASMUS year in France it became abundantly clear that I didn't have the same accent as the other Brits, Americans, Canadians and Australians.

Those from North America and Australia thought I just had a "British" accent. It was mainly the English who were very quick to point out anything I said that they perceived as "wrong". While the mocking was rarely malicious, I still attempted to standardise my accent and even considered investing in accent-softening, believing that if I wanted to be successful I'd have to talk like a Southerner.

It wasn't until I met a guy from Québec, Canada, and a girl from Andalucía, Spain, that I noticed that this problem is global. The French students would make fun of the Québecois for how he'd say things in French and if you have ever heard Andalusian Spanish, you know it is far from the traditional Spanish that is taught in school.

I was fascinated by their accents and their non-standard lexicon, and sought to learn to speak like them in French and Spanish. I stopped seeing my Geordie accent as a disadvantage and instead realised that while you can have standardised pronunciation and grammar, which evidently helps the largest number of people to understand you, you can also have a fantastic linguistic identity beyond that of your mother tongue. I know people won't always understand everything I say and when they don't, I am happy to explain and speak more clearly if they are having trouble. However, if they want to be dicks about it, I am happy to tell them exactly where to go...

Newcastle, the home and birthplace of one of the greatest English accents.

Have you been subjected to accent snobbery? Tell us your stories in the comments below.

Languages In The News: January 2014

As we sluggishly approach the end of January, we hope you have managed to keep your resolutions. Today we'll be having a look at the top language news stories from the first month of the new year.

On the last day of the year NPR was clearly thinking about its resolutions for 2014. They put together an argument for why twerk and selfie are words that need to go.

The Guardian challenged spoken language with its fascinating look at prescriptivism in British dialects. Without asking, we later got the opposing opinion from across the pond from Techcrunch.

Of course, the beginning of the new year is always full of retrospectives on the previous year. The BBC was no exception, looking at the 20 most overused words of 2013 on New Year's Day.

It certainly seemed that on both sides of the pond, twerk and selfie were the most popular words of the year, as well as the most likely to be condemned to lexical hell.

Our favourite academic blog, Language Log also looked back at 2013 and the word "because" in its new, somewhat disgusting usage.

The Oxford University Press blog mixed music with language and showed us a number of instruments that took their names from their creators. Sadly, there was never a Mr. Piano or Mrs. Guitar, but there were a few interesting ones that we had no idea were named after a person.

Edutopia cleared the muddy waters of academic language with 8 strategies for teaching academic language.

The video game website Eurogamer had a story on a devoted group of translators who translated an entire game for free since there was no English version available.

NPR's codeswitch blog posted a riveting look at dying languages and the eventualities when their last monolingual native speaker dies, while the main site brought together science, music, and language in a story on a pill that could help you attain perfect pitch and language learning skills. Codeswitch was back in the latter half of the month with a look at Puerto Ricans living on the US mainland, revealing that not as many of them speak Spanish at home as one might think.

Slate gave us an interesting anthropological and etymological piece on the origins of Jewish surnames, plus a piece on translation and some of the more difficult terms to translate from The Metamorphosis.

Montreal Gazette had a divisive opinion piece on the ongoing debate of why English speakers should be speaking French in Quebec.

The Telegraph gave us proof that baby talk is still beneficial to speech development in infants.

It seems that for every colour there's an etymology.

By the middle of the month, we came across something quite amazing: a Buzzfeed article that wasn't a list peppered with GIFs! Not that we hate images of cute cats and reaffirming that we were born in the 80s, but it's always nice to see real articles there too, such as the one on the Spanish translation used for the Obamacare website. This wasn't long-lived as later in the month, Buzzfeed was back with a list, this time the 37 worst translated movie titles ever. Though it only includes Spanish language titles, it was nice to mindlessly muse over the translation decisions and why they were made.

Phys.org had scientific news that computational analysis had revealed elements of writing style that differentiates successful fiction.

Sarah Hashim-Wallace of the LA Times provided us with a piece in which she tested how useful the Google Translate app was on a trip to Tokyo. It may have received 4 out of 5 stars from one reviewer but the results in the field paint a very different picture.

Towards the end of the month an opinion piece from The New York Times appeared on translation as a performing art. We were drawn in by Antony Shugaar's piece and hope you will be too. To end the month, Gizmodo had a wonderful piece on the etymology of colours, plus a video with the Oscar-nominated song from Disney's Frozen in 25 languages was doing the rounds and we loved it! Here it is for your viewing pleasure:

Did we miss any of your favourite language articles? Tell us about them in the comments below.

5 Tips for Learning a Dialect by Amy Rinkle

Just as there are dialects and regional variations to spoken English, students of languages quickly become aware of the many dialects that exist within other languages. As an Arabic student myself, I soon learned there are many different shapes and forms of Arabic; spoken dialects that were far more commonly spoken in daily life than the Modern Standard Arabic I was being taught at University. One of the many hurdles I’ve faced when studying Arabic is how to acquire the vocabulary, phraseology and inflection that was specific to the dialects I was interested in speaking, not just the formal language I was being taught. I’m not alone in this problem, and Arabic is not the only language where students face this issue.

So what should you do if you want to learn a specific dialect, but the resources and classes available to you are oriented to a different one? Here are five tips to help:

1. Learn the professional spoken and written language

Yes, that’s right. Even if the classes and resources that are available to you are not available in the dialect you most want, it is not a waste of time to learn the common or professionally spoken and written dialect. This knowledge will aid you when you are learning your dialect, and it will enable you to at least communicate with native speakers, and give you a base knowledge of vocabulary and grammar from which to compare where one dialect differs from another.

There is a debate on whether or not it is better to learn a regional dialect first, and then the formal or professional dialect, and I will not take sides on that debate — I will only say that in my experience, many of the resources and books that are available for teaching students a regional dialect are supplemental, and would be vastly confusing to someone who did not already have familiarity with the language. Therefore, I do not consider a waste of time (just the opposite!) to put in significant effort in learning the most common or professional dialect.

2. Look in obscure places to find new resources

Though they might not be easy to find, and though it may be harder to find classes that are taught in your target dialect, there are resources out there for those who are looking to learning a regional dialect. It’s finding them that can be the problem!

There are several different ways to find books and recordings meant to teach you your chosen dialect. I would suggest first finding a university that is teaching your language and has a strong study abroad program to the region, and email or talk to the language department or area studies center and ask for resources. Since most professors who will be teaching in that language are native speakers, they will often know about obscure curricula in regional dialects, and they will have access to the niche publishers and organizations that produce them. Some resources are not even available to the general public! It certainly can’t hurt to ask, and many professors will be delighted to help advise you on learning a dialect, or even recommend a tutor, if you are living in the country and region that speaks the dialect you are trying to learn.

It may sound bizarre, but missionary organizations or aid groups are other places that might have excellent recommendations on resources for learning a dialect. Since many of their members are interacting with the public and therefore need to speak a dialect in a specific region, they will often have either created their own curriculum for learning that dialect, or they will know where to find classes, tutors, books, or other resources. All it takes is an email to find out.

3. Watch and listen to local media

Sometimes, the best way to begin learning words in your chosen dialect is by listening and watching media that features that dialect. Movies that are set in the regional where the dialect is spoken, even when its in your target language, are often not the best bet — accents are often toned down in movies, or actors are hired who are not from that specific region. But the news can sometimes be a good source for hearing the dialect, and I have found that talk shows and interviews in particular are excellent for hearing the dialect spoken. Talk radio that is specific to a major city in the region is also a way to begin listening.

Music can also be a great way to pick up a dialect, and especially vocabulary that is specific to a region. Artists from a region will often sing in that particular dialect. Rap, however, is often very specific to the region and you will hear a lot of new words and vocabulary. Personally, it’s not my favorite style of music, but for learning an accent, I would recommend listening to up and coming rap artists — and this is regardless of the language. Rap as a genre is available in a wide variety of languages, and even if it isn’t, it’s still worth it to seek out the music that is produced and sung by artists who speak your target dialect.

4. Find a native speaker to talk to

The three tips above will help you in beginning to learn a dialect, but you will never be able to master it unless you find native speakers to talk to and ask questions. If you live in a region that speaks the dialect you want to learn, this is fairly easy to do — you will be running into native speakers that you can practice with, and many expat groups and language centers are able to recommend native speakers to partner up with.

If you do not live in the area and you want to learn to connect with a native speaker, I recommend emailing a university, again. Oftentimes a language department will host conversation clubs and will have contacts in the community who will know native speakers that might be able to meet with you. If that is not an option, then I suggest looking online. There are several sites that exist to help facilitate language partnerships and meetings via Skype. Look for someone who is a native speaker of your target dialect, and jump onto Skype.

5. Use technology to help fill the gaps

Beyond the sites mentioned above, the internet is a great resource. Use Twitter to find people from the region where your dialect is spoken — many of them will be writing and interacting in that dialect. Jump onto forums or sites specific to that region and see how the members write back and forth to each other. Use Youtube to look up video clips of interviews, shows, and even regular people talking to each other in your target language and dialect. This information is not designed to help you learn a dialect, but it will still assist you, especially if you combine it with the tips above.

There is also a site called forvo.com that is crowdsourcing spoken language with clips of native speakers pronouncing different words. The clips specify which country the speaker is from. It is not precise, but it can help with hearing the pronunciation of the dialect, and if there is more than one recording, then hearing the differences between speakers from different countries and regions.

Finally, my last suggestion is to be a part of the online language learning community, and to follow blogs such as the Lingua File. I myself work from Lango, an iOS app that will help record and crowdsource languages and their dialects, and I have only learned about sites like forvo.com and other resources by being part of the language learning community. Though reading a blog may not directly contribute to learning a dialect, it might point you to new tools that can.

Amy Rinkle is a 25 year old perpetual Arabic student, French speaker, and freelance writer. She is currently affiliated with Lango, an app to learn any language, anywhere, which is fundraising on Kickstarter until January 13th, 2013.

Follow @LangoApp

How To Be An English Language Tourist? by David Crystal

The Lingua File is delighted to have David Crystal as our guest contributor today as he tackles the question, "how to be an English language tourist?":

Hilary and I asked ourselves this question repeatedly when we were planning the tour that we eventually wrote up as Wordsmiths and Warriors: The English-Language Tourist’s Guide to Britain. Where can you find out about the places that influenced the character and study of the English language in Britain? How do you get there? And what do you find when you get there?

Places are often mentioned in textbooks and historical accounts, but you can get only so much out of such drab statements as 'the Anglo-Saxons arrived at Pegwell Bay in 449 AD', or 'King Alfred defeated the Danes at Edington in 878', or 'Dr Johnson compiled his dictionary in the attic of a house in Gough Square in London'. For textbook writers, that is usually the end of the story. For us, it was the beginning. What was that coastline like? What was the battlefield like? What was the attic like?

Pegwell Bay, Edington, Maldon, Lindisfarne, Lichfield, Stratford ... We went to over 50 places where something important happened. Most of the time, we found that the relevance of the language to the place had been forgotten - if it had ever been realised. But there are a few spots where it is remembered. There is even the occasional monument. Our favourite is the memorial to English dialect-writers in Rochdale, Lancashire. A runner-up is the huge monument to Bible-translator William Tyndale, in North Nibley in Gloucestershire - though 'runner-up' is perhaps not the best way of describing it, as it is is on the top of a hill which takes some climbing.

The dialect writers' memorial in Broadfield Park, Rochdale. The building to the left is the
town hall. © Hilary Crystal.

That's a point. If you want to be an English-language tourist, you have to be fit, or reasonably so, as some of the places where important things happened involve a bit of a walk, and sometimes over quite muddy and hilly countryside. So you should take boots too. But the outcome is always worth it. Even though I thought I knew some of the places very well, from my past reading and writing about the language, I was never prepared for what we found when we made the actual visit. The photographs often tell the story better than the words, and are an essential part of the narrative. It confirmed me in my feeling that the English language is not only diverse and fascinating, but unpredictable and exciting as well. For instance...

In Jarrow, up in the north-east of England, where Bede worked and wrote, we were not expecting to encounter a class of mini-monks all dressed in tiny habits. In Alloway, Scotland we were not expecting to see the worship of Scots national poet Robert Burns extend to his being portrayed in a mischievous re-creation of Da Vinci's 'Last Supper'. In Old St Pancras churchyard in London, we were not expecting to find piles of gravestones to be part of the story of pronunciation lexicographer John Walker. In York, we were not expecting to find the aftermath of lead-thieves, when we visited the places where Lindley Murray wrote his grammar.

Murray's summerhosue at The Mount School, York. His writing desk and wheeled invalid
chair are preserverd in the school. When we visited, the lead from the roof had disappeared
for the third time, hence the temporary tarpaulin flapping dismally here. © Hilary Crystal.

With locations as far apart as the south-east of Kent and the Scottish lowlands, and from the west of Wales to the East Anglian coast, Hilary and I drove several thousand miles to compile what proved to be a somewhat unorthodox combination of English language history and travelogue. It was a hugely rewarding experience, though, which added a strong sense of place to our existing knowledge of language topics and personalities, and we strongly recommend doing the same sort of thing in your own locality, wherever you live, as a powerful way of making language study come alive. Field trips are not just for historians, geographers, and archaeologists. The English language lurks around every corner, in every country in the world, awaiting your call.

David Crystal is known throughout the world as a writer, editor, lecturer and broadcaster on language. ‘Wordsmiths and Warriors: The English-Language Tourist’s Guide to Britain’ by David and Hilary Crystal is published on 26 September 2013 by Oxford University Press.

Follow @davcr

Follow @OUPAcademic

Bastille Day: The Languages of France

Today France celebrates Bastille Day, the French National Day, which is known as La Fête Nationale in French. In honour of the occasion, we thought we'd take a look at some of the languages spoken in the country, excluding French since we already covered it a while back in its own language profile. With today being a Sunday, most of the country will be shaking off a gueule de bois from the undoubtedly wine-fuelled celebrations that commenced yesterday evening. You can sit back, relax, and learn a bit more about the minority languages spoken in a country where the past relationship between the state and minority languages could be considered tense at best. Nowadays things are better and many of the languages have some degree of official status or legal recognition.

Bastille Day fireworks in Carcassonne, France.

German Dialects

Alsatian is France's most popular "native" language. We use the term "native" sparingly as Alsace, the region where it is predominantly spoken, has changed hands quite frequently between France and Germany. The language is technically a dialect of German and doesn't possess Latin roots unlike many of France's other minority languages. In total, Alsatian is spoken by nearly 1.5% of the population. Lorraine Franconian is another dialect of German that holds official status in France, and is spoken by around 0.2% of the population. Lorraine Franconian is closely related to Alsatian, too.

Occitan

The group of languages known as Occitan, which includes the dialects Languedocian, Gascon, and Provençal, is the second largest group of languages spoken across France. The language in its >entirety accounts for around 1.3% of the population of France. The Languedocian dialect is spoken in, you've guessed it, Languedoc, the Gascon dialect in Gascony, and Provençal in Provence, so you really shouldn't have any problem remembering who speaks which dialect where. Occitan is also spoken in some areas of northern Spain.

Langues d'oïl

The langues d'oïl are a group of languages, or more correctly a dialect continuum, which is spoken from northern and central France to Belgium and Switzerland. Though only around 570,000 speak the language, due to the geographic dispersion of the language, differences can be vast and complicated and the classification of the languages and dialects is still disputed.

Josselin Castle alongside the River Oust in Brittany.

Breton

One of France's most out of place languages is the Celtic language of Breton. In Brittany, or Bretagne in French, the language is undergoing recovery after its UNESCO classification as an endangered language. Recently, there has been an increase in the number of children attending bilingual classes in the region. The language also has around 270,000 speakers. L'aise Breizh!

Happy Birthday David Crystal!

As today is the birthday of David Crystal, perhaps one of the greatest British linguists of modern times, we felt it was only fitting to pay homage to the man.

Originally born in Lisburn, Northern Ireland, Crystal grew up in the town of Holyhead in northern Wales. He later moved to Liverpool where he studied at St. Mary's College, and then moved on to University College London where he studied English. Crystal was later a lecturer at Bangor University and the University of Reading.

One of Crystal's most important hypotheses is on the evolution of the English language. The theory stipulates that local dialects will become more and more distinct and that the language will require a standardised variant such as an international dialect.

Crystal has also authored many books on linguistics covering topics such as orthography, phonetics, phonology, and language evolution. He also worked on two encyclopaedias for the Cambridge University Press, The Cambridge Encyclopedia of Language and The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the English Language.

As Crystal is an expert on language, linguistics, Shakespearean English, and the evolution of the English language, he worked on productions of Shakespeare at the reconstructed Globe Theatre in Southwark, London.

Currently, Crystal works from his home in Holyhead and is working on a new book, Wordsmiths and Warriors: the English-language Tourist's guide to Britain, with his wife Hilary, which is due for release September of this year. We can't wait!

Happy Birthday David!

Portugal Day: The Languages Of Portugal

This guy has a whole national day in his honour.

Since today is Portugal Day, or Dia de Portugal, de Camões e das Comunidades Portuguesas in Portuguese, the day is technically in honour of Luís Vaz de Camões, who is considered to be the greatest poet of the Portugese language.

We felt it was only fitting to pay homage to the languages spoken in Portugal today. Since we've already covered Portuguese, we thought we should recap and then delve into some of the lesser-known languages that are spoken in Europe's westernmost nation.

Though Portuguese originated in what is now Galicia, Spain, it is certainly more prominent in Portugal where it is spoken almost universally, though not by every single person. Like many other languages, it has several dialects that are prominently used in various regions of Portugal. None is more interesting than the Barranquenho dialect found in the town of Barrancos, which is located on the border between Portugal and the Spanish regions of Andalusia and Extremadura. As a result of its placement, the dialect is heavily influenced by the variety of Spanish that is spoken there.

Another language found in Portugal is Mirandese, a language descended from the Astur-Leonese language group, which is of course found in the Spanish region of Asturias and the province of León. It is certainly more of a language in its own right rather than a dialect, especially given its co-official status for local matters in the areas where it is spoken.

Despite Portugal's proximity to Spain, only 9% of the population speaks Spanish as a foreign language, whereas 24% speak French and a huge 32% speak English.

Do you celebrate Portugal Day? If so, we'd love to know what you do to celebrate the day, so please let us know in the comments below!

Language Families And Dialect Continuums

Some languages are quite similar, while others couldn't be more different. More often than not, similar languages share a common ancestry and the languages that have many differences do not. When languages have a shared ancestry, a common root, or were initially the same language before diverging into different languages, they are said to be part of the same language family.

Like traditional human families, language families can be put into a family tree. Of course, speakers of related languages may not be genetically related. Almost every language belongs to a language family. However, there are certain languages that do not, and these are known as language isolates.

The five largest language families account for around 85% of the world's population and include Indo-European, Sino-Tibetan, Niger-Congo, Afroasiatic, and Austronesian languages.

Language family trees are just as beautiful.

Within each of these families there are branches and subdivisions. Both English and French are Indo-European languages, but English is a Germanic language like German, while French is a Romance language like Italian and Spanish.

For languages that are very similar, it isn't always possible to pigeonhole them in such a clear-cut way as to define them as a member of a particular language family's subdivision as we did with English and French. When this is the case, rather than use a tree model as we do with language families, we can use a dialect continuum, which classifies the languages more as a range than as separate entities.

When considering languages in this way, rather than saying Portuguese, Spanish, French and Italian are all Romance languages, we'd consider them all to be a part of a Romance language continuum, both linguistically and geographically. You can see this for yourself with a car and several days of driving, if you so wish.

Starting in the west with Portugal (home to Portuguese) and heading eastwards across Europe, you can begin to appreciate the language continuum as you pass through Spain, experiencing Galician, Asturian, Spanish and Catalan, to name a few. As you reach France, you can enjoy hearing French and Occitan before hearing Italian in Italy and Romansch in Switzerland.

Languages, as much as we can attempt to classify and organise them, are sometimes so dynamic, unique and uncontrollable, that whether we consider them part of a continuum or members of a family seems fairly arbitrary when we could just be enjoying them!

St. George's Day: The Languages of England

St. George was also the bad-ass who killed dragons.

As today is St. George's Day, we thought we'd honour England's patron saint with a look at the languages of England. It goes without saying that England is home to English, but before the Angles, Saxons and Jutes made their way to the British Isles, other languages were spoken across the land. Let's jump straight in...

Aside from being famed for pirates and their accent, the Cornish in fact have their own language. The Cornish language, also known as Kernowek or Kernewek in Cornish, has somewhere between 500 and 3,500 speakers. The language is related to Welsh and Breton and evolved from the native language of the British Isles, Brythonic.

Though classified as an extinct language, Cornish has seen a good level of revival in the UK, forcing UNESCO to reconsider its classification back in 2010. Cornish belongs to the Celtic language family along with Irish, Scots Gaelic, Scots and the next of our languages, Manx.

The Manx language, found principally and almost exclusively on the Isle of Man, actually lost its last native speaker in 1974, but thanks to the efforts of some great linguaphiles, it has been revived. It's now classified as a revived language, though we prefer the term zombie language. Manx now has between 100 and 1,800 speakers.

The Coonceil ny Gaelgey (Manx Gaelic Council), the regulatory body responsible for the Manx language, was set up no less than eleven years after the extinction of the language. It's clearly doing a good job!

St. George's Day is also the saint day of Catalonia, as well as UNESCO World Book and Copyright day. World Book Day in the UK was celebrated back in March.

As the English get vaguely patriotic today, remember that despite their reputation, they're more than a group of monolingual savages!

Franco and Linguistic Fascism

It's probably safe to say that Francisco Franco wasn't a very nice man. His oppression of linguistic freedom in Spain wasn't the worst thing he did, but we do write a blog about languages so it's obvious what we'll be focusing on today.

Franco was a dictator and, like most dictators,
did some very bad things.

Despite being from Galicia, where both Galician and Spanish are spoken, Franco's hatred of the minority languages in Spain stemmed from a paranoia that the minorities would shatter his idea of a unified Spain and could communicate under his nose.

The Second Spanish Republic had recognised Catalan, Basque and Galician, but Franco abolished the statutes in favour of Spanish (or Castilian), which became the only official language of Spain. Under Franco, schooling and the media were always in Spanish. The minority languages became even more threatened as the number of speakers they had dropped.

The red area is where Spanish is currently spoken.
Other colours indicate the minority languages of Spain.

The Basque language was threatened and could have been extinct by now had Franco's regime continued in Spain. Towards the end of his tenure as dictator "by the grace of God", the minority languages were almost never spoken in large towns and cities and were severely under threat in smaller settlements such as villages.

Under Franco, Spaniards would be punished if found to be not speaking in Spanish. In Catalonia,some citizens would speak Catalan in their homes although it was punishable under law. However, Catalan was rarely spoken in the streets, at least not whilst under the watchful eyes of Franco's men.

The Falangist movement can be considered
to be different from fascism.

The effects of Franco's regime are still visible in Spain and the minority languages are still in a state of revival. Fortunately, neither Catalan nor Galician are considered to be endangered, while Basque is only considered to be vulnerable according to UNESCO. They would, however, be faring much better had it not been for Franco, his regime and the heavily-centralised and monolingual policies he enacted.

French: Dangerous Liaisons

If you know French, you know that for some crazy reason you rarely pronounce the end of a word. Non? Exactly.

But French can't just keep things simple like that... sometimes you do say the end of a word, when you have an awkward vowel sound at the beginning of the next word. This is called liaison. Even then, not 100% of these cases are obligatory.

"I hate studying French!
How could my life get worse!?"

Take the word for "and", et. For some reason this little blighter doesn't like to liaise. Its school reports often cite "does not play well with others".

Think of asking for the time: Quelle heure est-il?

If we break it down we have the following:

quelle = "which"
heure = "hour", in reference to the time
est = "is" from the verb être, to be. Usually pronounced like "ey"/"eh".
il = "he/it" We always would remember he being God for a bit of fun.

Which hour is it? In a world of terrible translations, that is what the question means. Thank God we're looking at liaisons and not translation.

"Quelle heure est... forget it! I'll just find a clock!"

So what about this magical "t" sound? Well the French don't like their beautiful language to be butchered by horrible sound combinations such as a double vowel without a glide, so they pronounce the final sound of "est" and combine it with the start of "il". Try saying "quelle heure est il?"... pronounced "ey eel". They're right! "Quelle heure est-il?", roughly pronounced "eh-teel", does sound much better. English does the same with the words a and an. Just try saying a elephant. Not only does it sound horrible, but it makes you look like an idiot. Especially if you're reading this in a library and have just blurted out "a elephant".

Do We Need Conjugations?

It may sound fairly ridiculous, but do languages actually need conjugations?

Look at it this way: conjugations change the meaning of verbs. They tell us about who or what is carrying out the action and when it happened. If you're familiar with the six pronouns (three for singular, three for plural, each with first, second and third person forms), then you probably know they are the following in English:

1. I
2. You
3. He/She/It
4. We
5. You (plural, often pluralised in interesting ways to avoid confusion, e.g. yous, y'all, you guys, etc.)
6. They

For each of those you need a different form of a verb, known as a conjugation. In English, however, there are only usually two or three options. Many languages feature unique conjugations for each one!

Take the verb to run:

I run, you run, he/she/it runs, we run, you run, they run.

Regular verbs start with a stem. These are stem cells.

We have the forms run and runs and a lot of verbs follow this pattern in English. Simply add an s to the stem, the stem being run. We know who is doing the running thanks to the pronoun and the conjugation. Could we use one or the other? In Spanish, each of the six conjugations are distinct, so the pronoun becomes irrelevant. You will often find Spanish speakers dropping the pronoun and using the verb independently of its verb. This couldn't be done in English since for most verbs five of the conjugations are identical.

We're not saying Spaniards are lazy... but they don't bother with
personal pronouns and this one doesn't even run around the pitch.

 
Could we remove the conjugations since most of the understood meaning is from the pronouns? Probably.

I be, you be, he/she/it be, we be, you be, they be? Sounds a bit weird, doesn't it? Though it wouldn't if everyone spoke like that. We could do one or another. Create six distinct conjugations for each verb in each tense, or have auxiliary verbs to indicate tense and use pronouns to clarify.

Auxiliary verbs are added to the main verb to change its meaning. Take the future tense in English with the verb to run: "I will run". We know this is an event in the future thanks to use of "will"... the word, not meaning the "faculty to initiate action".

I will exercise... tomorrow.

We reckon that a perfect language (no languages are perfect, by the way, not even constructed languages) would feature one system or the other... conjugations without pronouns, or a pronoun and auxiliary verb system. It would definitely be easier for everyone, especially foreign learners since you'd need around half the vocabulary to indicate tenses and explain situations. Don't you think?
 

Language or Dialect? Part 2

Yesterday, we started making the call on what qualifies as a language and what qualifies as a dialect... read the first part here. Here's our next group of contenders in: Language or Dialect?

Catalan v. Valencian

This is definitely a no-brainer for us. The main issue of language or dialect for these two comes from an inability to decide what to call the language. If you're Catalan you call your language Catalan, if you're Valencian you call your language Valencian.

They have long been considered the same language, but certain locals have difficulty admitting to it. The governing body of Valencian, the Acadèmia Valenciana de la Llengua, considers the two to be names for the same thing. The differences are minuscule, we're talking about pronunciation and lexicon.

The ideal solution would be to change the name altogether. Catalencian or Valalan don't really roll of the tongue though...

Ruling: Dialects of Catalan/Valencian, just call it whatever you like!

American English v. British English

Now we're just being silly. Historically a bit of a Ross and Rachel story.

"Hey, it's quite nice here... actually, let's not pay taxes. Screw you monarchy! We'll make our own country!" Britain and the U.S. were "on a break" when Webster got his hands on the English language and wrote his "English for dummies", better known as his spelling reform for American English.

This is Noah Webster. It's his fault that
Brits and Americans are constantly
 fighting over whose spellings are correct.

Color or colour? Favor or favour... perhaps marketing would have taken off much quicker in the UK if they had been able to maximise their savings on ink like the U.S. did. Doughnuts? It'd be half price if you spelt them donuts.

Despite the niggling pains that those who speak as though they have a mouth full of chewing gum (Americans) are speaking the same language as those who speak as though they have a mouth full of fruit (the British), both parties will have to kiss and make up and admit that those wearing baseball caps, shorts and a bum bag (fanny pack) are speaking the same language as those in football (soccer) shirts with a pint of beer in hand (uhm... do Americans have a word for beer?).

Ruling: Dialects of English, unfortunately...

English v. Scots

Calm down! We're talking about the English language and the Scots language! Not football or a referendum!

Scots does not refer to Scots Gaelic, which is a Celtic language, but the Germanic language, which is related to English. It has no official status in any country but does have status as a traditional language under the Scottish Parliament and a regional or minority language under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages.

The debate comes down to whether it's just another type of English, just like Old English, Middle English, etc. or a separate language. They're barely mutually intelligible, though the same is sometimes said of the Scottish Dialect. One problem though... we've considered American English to be the same language as British English. If Scots is a dialect of English, then Americans would have to be able to understand speakers of Scots. But can they? We think not.

Ruling: Different Languages

Americans don't really understand bagpipes
either... though does anyone, really?

In the end though, language and dialects are really identified by the speakers. Linguists and governments can say what they want, but they can't change the minds of the people who speak their language... or is it dialect?

Part 1 | Part 2

Language or Dialect? Part 1

Someone once said "A language is a dialect with an army and navy". In terms of "grey areas", the various language v. dialect debates aren't up there with other dilemmas such as euthanasia, abortion or gay marriage... but they can be quite problematic.

Since we have a sick fondness for arguments, here are today's contenders in: Language or Dialect?

Afrikaans v. Dutch

They're used on opposite ends of the world. You can't get much further south than South Africa and if you do you'll probably lose your testicles to frostbite. The Netherlands on the other hand is in northern Europe. Geographically the places couldn't be much farther apart. Linguistically... not so much.

The Netherlands is also known for its tulips...
South Africa, not so much.

Afrikaans came from Dutch and took around 90-95% of its lexicon from it. A good argument for being a dialect is mutual intelligibility, which asks if two parties speaking their own languages can still understand one another.

Between Afrikaans and Dutch the answer is yes. It's apparently easier when it's written down. Afrikaans has been influenced by other sources (as if it could remain unscathed in the linguistic minefield of South Africa!) and also has a simplified spelling (American English, anyone?).

To avoid upsetting anyone, we could say they are languages in their own right. Even with their many similarities they lack a shared history, shared culture and other things we like to consider integral to a language.

Plus, if you have to keep asking "wat?" then it defeats the idea of them being the same language.

Ruling: Separate languages

Arabic and its many, many variations

If you read our post on Arabic, available here, you'll see that Arabic isn't technically a language. It's a group of similar languages considered dialects. Confused? Us too!

There are so many differences and so little mutual intelligibility between them we'd have to agree. Of course they're all held together by the Qur'an and Classical Arabic, so maybe they are just dialects. It's too much of a minefield to even attempt to get to the bottom of in just one post. What does the Ethnologue (our Bible, Torah, or even Qur'an) say?

Ruling according to Ethnologue: Macrolanguage, a language of languages.

Dutch v. Flemish

Dutch again? The Dutch can't decide whether it should be one language with many dialects or many languages. Given that even Belgium considers Dutch to be one of its official languages, with no mention of Flemish, we'll go with that. Thank God! This is getting ridiculous!

Ruling: Dialects of Dutch

We also consider Belgium to be awesome because
it provides us with delicious chocolates.

Galician v. Portuguese

Oh dear, oh dear! Where to begin with this one?

One may remember that there was once Galician-Portuguese, but then politics changed things. Spain got Galicia, and later Franco got Spain and minority languages throughout Spain were suppressed. Despite Franco being from Galicia...

Spain's influence over Galicia managed to change the way Galician is written. The phonology and vocabulary are different between the two. Mutual intelligibility between the two is good, at least in northern Portugal, though it's not so good once you get to central or southern Portugal. Galicians may not get to speak their language further afield just yet.

Linguistically, the two can often be considered variants of the same language, but given the huge political background it may be safer to call them languages. But when have we played it safe?

Ruling: Dialects of Portuguese, sorry Galicia!

Tomorrow we're discussing three more pairings in Part 2 of Language or Dialect?, so be sure to check it out!

Part 1 | Part 2