The lessons are starting to become uninspired/uninspiring. My guess is that Duolingo had to rapidly hire some Ukrainian speakers and no one had the time to write thoughtful, well-vetted lessons. So we get sentence after sentence with only small variations… Read More ›
Linguistics
Learning to read aloud fluidly in a new alphabet
As you know, I’ve been learning Ukrainian through Duolingo for about six weeks now. I have good news and bad news. The good news is that I am progressing. The bad news is that Duolingo doesn’t give me enough context!… Read More ›
What are we? “Jewish Americans” or “American Jews”?
The excellent PBS documentary from 2008, The Jewish Americans, is an in-depth account of three hundred years of American Jews. I have no idea why it took me 14 years to watch it! The mix of presenters includes public figures,… Read More ›
Learning Ukrainian: progress report #4
As you see from the title, this is the fourth of my weekly reports on my progress in learning Ukrainian through Duolingo. After today, I will switch to writing intermittent reports: i.e., whenever I have enough new to write about,… Read More ›
Learning Ukrainian: progress report #3
We have, as they say, good news and bad news. The good news is that my Ukrainian lessons are progressing well in their third week. The bad news—speaking as a teacher—is that pedagogically speaking the lessons are not designed nearly… Read More ›
Learning Ukrainian: progress report #2
It’s now one week since my first progress report. Apparently I’ve learned 95 new words in the past seven days. Duolingo previously said that I had learned 105 words in the first three days. Eek, am I slowing down? Aside… Read More ›
In praise of Omniglot
What, you may ask, is Omniglot? Well, the name gives it away (or hints at it, at least). Latin omni- ‘all, every’ followed by Greek glot- ‘tongue, language’ tells you that it has something to do with every language. And… Read More ›
Learning Ukrainian: progress report #1
Today is Exelauno Day, so named because “Exelauno” means “march forth” in ancient Greek. My Greek 2 teacher used to celebrate it because he had gone to Roxbury Latin School, where it is (or at least was) an official holiday…. Read More ›
German is hereby completed!
Well, OK, not exactly. I don’t even know what it would mean for German to be completed. It’s just that I have completed everything that Duolingo can offer me in German. And that is far from “everything.” Basically, I have… Read More ›
What lies on the other side of the River Styx?
Who knows? You’ll have to read the engaging novel Across the River Styx to find out. You might have a rough voyage, but the reading won’t be rough. Looking at the cover image below, you’ll see what this novel is:… Read More ›
You’re wondering what a “book word” might be. Right?
Here are some examples of book words: awry, bedraggled, biopic, cache, calliope, Greenwich, Hermione, misled. So, what do these words (and a few dozen more) all have in common? The answer is that they all are (or might be) words… Read More ›
If ontogeny really recapitulated phylogeny…
If you need the full explanation, visit explainXKCD.
Stress is good. That’s why Shakespeare could never have been French. (Say what? Read on for an explanation.)
No, not that kind of stress! We’re talking about stressing syllables, not your mind. English poetry and prose alike depend heavily on stress—especially poetry. In prose, if you get the stress wrong, your words may be incomprehensible. Or you may… Read More ›
Texas German vs. Pennsylvania Dutch
Is there really such a language as Texas German? The answer is yes. So why is it—according to my informal (and totally unscientific) poll—that everyone has heard of Pennsylvania German (usually, however, called by the misnomer Pennsylvania Dutch, where “Dutch”… Read More ›
Can German speakers understand Yiddish—and vice versa?
Is Yiddish really a language? Or is it a dialect of German? And does anyone speak it anymore? The quick answers are yes, no, and yes, respectively. It used to be a dialect of German—12 centuries ago—but both languages have… Read More ›
Rudolph in Old English
In recognition of Christmas 2021, here is Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer in the original Old English, a.k.a. Anglo Saxon, from exactly one thousand years ago, courtesy of All Things Linguistic: Hwæt, Hrodulf readnosa hrandeor – Næfde þæt nieten unsciende næsðyrlas! Glitenode and… Read More ›
Netflix cares about the length of a sentence in a given language. You should too.
Here’s the problem. Netflix shows shows in many different languages. Some languages, like English, allow compact phrases like that “shows shows” (which looks confusing); others use circumlocutions that take up more room on the screen. Why does matter? Because it… Read More ›
Everyone mispronounces omicron! (Well, almost everyone.) And it means more than just a COVID-19 variant…
Right now—with good reason—everyone is focused on Omicron as the name of the new COVID variant. But most people are unsure how to pronounce the word, or they (confidently) mispronounce it. And they also don’t know what it means. I’m… Read More ›
The hidden meaning of crypto
What does the word “crypto” mean to you? For many decades it has been a term of art in applied mathematics—shorthand for both “cryptography” and “cryptology,” being thereby particularly useful for those of us who don’t want to argue about… Read More ›
The answer is “Ladino, not Yiddish.” What is the question?
Well, the question is “Which Indo-European language, spoken by many Jews mostly around the Mediterranean, is derived from Old Spanish but is not Castilian nor Catalan nor any other language that most Americans have heard of?” The answer, as you… Read More ›
Learning Strategies 