Learn Any Language in Months

Tim Ferris of the 4 Hour Work Week is at it again. Continuing where he left off, on how to learn any language in 1 hour; this time Tim shows us how to learn any language in months.
He states:

Principles of cognitive neuroscience and time management can be applied to attain conversational fluency (here defined as 95%+ comprehension and 100% expressive abilities) in 1-3 months. Some background on my language obsession, from an earlier post on learning outside of classes:

Head here for Tim's full post on how to learn any language in 3 months.

Gung Hay Fat Choy

Or Gong Xi Fa Cai if you speak Mandarin. ("Gung Hay Fat Choy" is Cantonese).

It's the Year of the Ox and here's hoping this year is a little more uplifting.

My husband is half-Chinese so I spent the weekend enjoying delicious Malaysian Chinese food. (Malaysian Chinese food is an epicurean mix of Malaysian, Thai and Chinese cooking spiced by India).

I thought I'd share a video of lion dance with everyone:



And here's an article about a mother/daughter Chinese New Year bonding experience. Note the daughter attends a Mandarin immersion kindergarten.

Blogging from Brazil

Oi (hi), ôla (hello), bom dia (good morning), tudo bem (what’s up?), ei (hey). Welcome to your crash course in Brazilian Portuguese! My name is Lindsey Witthaus, known to my Brazilian friends as Lí – Lindsey is simply far too difficult to pronounce. Why is my name so strange? After a year of living in Brazil I am still trying to figure that out. The word linda (beautiful) is common…take away the -a and that’s my name with –sey tacked on to the end. I will try to answer this question and many other language obscurities during my time on this blog.

I am not a self-proclaimed language guru. In fact, three years ago when I began learning Portuguese I had convinced myself that I was simply no good at learning languages. I could not master the nasal não and I stumbled through read out-loud dialogues while I secretly fumed over the ease at which Spanish majors picked up the language. (I had studied Spanish five years earlier, but forgotten it all.) Now, after a year in country, my colleagues complement my ease at picking up the finer language details and my subtle accent. I’ll fill you in on the lows and highs of my language learning experience.

My specialty in University was environmental science and I dabbled in writing, taking as many courses as I could but not going so far as to specialize in the field. Now, as life would have it, I am an English teacher in Brazil, fluent in Portuguese, taking up Spanish again, and turning to freelance writing to help pay for expensive airplane tickets. Writing is also a passion of mine, and I’ve decided it’s time to pursue my skills more seriously.

For those of you who like hard details, I’ll give you a quick low-down on Lindsey. I am originally from Lawrence, Kansas but I went to school at the University of Pittsburgh in Pennsylvania. I graduated in 2007 with a BA in Environmental Studies, Sociology and a Certificate in Public and Professional Writing – which I hoped to use working for Environmental Non-Profits. To the grace of God or fate or what-have-you I won a Fulbright Scholarship to pursue research in Brazil. I spent 2008 in Brazil, both working on my Fulbright in an extremely rural Minas Gerais municipality (language details from that to come soon) and falling in love with a Brazilian musician in Itatiba, São Paulo. I now live in Itatiba, where I teach English, translate, write, fulfill my groupie fantasy and in 2009 I will be studying to get a professional degree in Environmental Management.

I hope to shed some light on the fascinating language of Brazilian Portuguese – please throw any questions at me, if I can’t answer you, I have friends, family and strangers on the street who can. I’ll also be writing a bit about Brazilian culture and my life living abroad. I hope you enjoy! Até mais (see you later).

English to Japanese - How to Learn Japanese

Are you an English speaker whose been itching to learn Japanese? Or have you tried in the past to no avail.

I've come across one of the best sites for learning Japanese, iKnow!

According to the website

iKnow! is a new way to learn a language based on scientific research into memory and psychology: it trains your brain in the natural ways that accelerate learning.

The lessons on iKnow! are easy, never boring, and can be customized for any language level.

This has to be the most impressive online self study application for Japanese I've come across in a while. Featuring excellent dictation exercises, great layout and organization and the social networking aspect of it makes it a winner.

More from the website:

iKnow’s patented learning algorithms generate a personalized learning schedule based on your learning history. What this means is that items you’re having trouble with will come up for review far more frequently than items you know well. It’s like having your own private teacher who knows what you need to focus on.

You set your goal, and iKnow!’s learning engine creates an optimized schedule for reaching that goal. Every time you launch, it will recommend how many lessons you should study that day to reach your target.

iKnow! also features multimedia content (images and audio) in the training cycle to enrich the experience and strengthen memory connections.

For anyone interested in learning Japanese with the help of other like-minded people, Leximo Highly recommends, iKnow! This is a winner!

It's a New Day

Barack Obama is officially the 44th President of the United States of America. It truly is a new day.

Why is Leximo blogging about Obama you ask?

Because Obama embodies what Leximo is attempting to do. Unite the worlds different cultures. Obama has roots all over the world, starting from Kenya, Kansas, Hawaii, Indonesia, etc.

His worldly experiences helped him get this far, and will help him as the 44th President of the United States.

Enjoy this video from Will.i.am and sing along, the lyrics are below.

P.S. Leximo will be back up in a bit. Doing maintenance.

I went asleep last night
Tired from the fight
I've been fighting for tomorrow
All my life
Yea I woke up this morning
Feeling brand new
'Cause the dreams that I've been dreaming
Has finally came true

It's a new day
It's a new day
It's a new day
It's a new day
It's a new day

It's been a long time coming
Up the mountain kept runnin'
Souls of freedom kept hummin'
Channeling Harriet Tubman

Kennedy, Lincoln, and King
We gotta maninvest in that dream
It feels like we're swimming upstream
It feels like we're stuck inbetween
A rock and a hard place,
We've been through the heartaches
And lived through the darkest days

If you and I made it this far,
Well then hey, we can make it all the way
And they said no we can't
And we said yes we can
Remember it's you and me together

I woke up this morning
Feeling alright
I've been fightin' for tomorrow
All my life
Yea, I woke up this morning
Feeling brand new
Cause the dreams that I've been dreaming
Has finally came true

It's a new day
(it's a new day)
It's a new day
(it's a new day)
It's a new day
It's a new day!

It's been a long time waitin'
Waiting for this moment
It's been a long time praying
Praying for this moment

We hope for this moment
And now that we own it
For life I ma hold it
And I won’t let it go

It's for fathers, our brothers,
Our friends who fought for freedom
Our sisters, our mothers,
Who died for us to be in this moment

Stop and cherish this moment
Stop and cherish this time

It's time for unity
For us and we
That's you and me together

I woke up this morning
Feeling brand new
'Cause the dreams that I've been dreaming
Have finally came true
Yea, I woke up this morning
Feeling alright

'Cause we weren't fighting for nothing
And the soldiers weren't fighting
For nothing
No, Martin wasn't dreaming for nothing
And Lincoln didn't change it for nothing
And children weren't crying for nothing

It's a new day
It's a new day
A new day
It's a new day
It's a new day!

Leximo is Up, More to Come...

I've put up the new Leximo (Leximo 0.2 for all the techies reading this).

Its been up for a couple of days, slowly re-iterating and fixing bugs.

Go ahead and check it out, let me know what you think of the video feature I've added.

Leximo in the GW Hatchet

An interview we did with our school newspaper, The GW Hatchet has been published. I thought it would be great to share it with our readers.

Find the article here, Students Launch Online Global Dictionary.

Texting: Gud r bd?

I was born in 1989 in the generation where the Internet has grown up with me. This new avenue of total connectivity is something that is a part of my life and I can't seem to think of a life without it. I'm connected to others every single minute of my life, either with my mobile phone or home PC. This change is something that can't be ignored. It's a part of our lives just as the car has become inseparable from modern life.

This affects many things: productivity, efficiency, laziness, new paradigms, fears and languages. A new form of written English is arising within our midst: textlish. Or whatever clever portmanteau writers come up with. It is a language that is written by teens and young adults all over the world and it originated by shortening text messages.
A quick example:
"Hw r u 2day?"

Many traditionalists quickly stamps this as "bad" English and describes it as a downfall of modern English.
However, I'd like to differ and see another side of this new change. You might blame me for being a part of this demographic and I'm merely defending it, which is partly true, but I'm only going to give you the other side of the coin.

Many linguistics will tell you that there is no such as a "primitive" language or bad language, as language itself is born out of rules and is an innate ability within all humans. Noam Chomsky laid out this theory and called it Universal Grammar. It doesn't matter how you look at a language and how chaotic it seems, it is still governed by rules.
A good example of ridiculous language typification as that which is often seen where the language or dialect of the oppressor or minority is a bad form of the language. In South Africa, this was the very case during Apartheid.

The language spoken by the leading party at the time was Afrikaans, however in certain areas of the country and different form or Afrikaans was spoken by coloured people called "Kaapse Afrikaans". It borrowed lots of English words and dropped morphemes and all such chaotic nonsense. However after studying the language it was found that it had rules and regulations like all dialects and languages.

So what I'm getting at is that Textlish also has rules and is actually more context based than modern English, similar to Mandarin. An example in Afrikaans texting is the abbreviation "j". This could me "jy" (you) or "jou" (your). It depends where in context this abbreviation is used. It often drops strategic vowels in words that have more than one vowel, so that the word is still discernible.
In example:
"strtgic" - strategic
It also drops vowels and consonants if they are doubled:
"stutr" - stutter
"gud" - good
In the latter example a replacement for the "oo" sound is "u", which is another rule that somehow managed to arise to discern the abbreviated good, "gud" from "god".

So this is just some of the few examples of how rule bound Textlish is.
However, here is the negative side of this new found change in written English. When you have to deal with professional matters or writing an essay where standard English is involved, Textlish must stay away at all costs. This is perhaps the fear that is in the back of all parents. "How will my child cope with this horrid language!?"

Hopefully all teens will realize there are boundaries to be set, just as I'm writing this article in standard English so that older and uninformed people can understand me. These boundaries are prevalent within all forms of life: kids playing video games and watching violence on television should distinguish between fiction and reality. So the concern of parents are valid, however instead of totally going haywire over fears, inform your child of the distinction.

Textlish should remain on mobile phones and instant messaging programs where the use of is it is a necessity for comfort and efficiency. However, I personally think that if you have the time to write in normal words, there is no need to abbreviate.

So, in conclusion, Textlish is not a bad form of English; a bad influence? Perhaps. Let's hope the future shows us that children know where to draw the line.

C u l8r.
Niel

High Schoolers Debate Two-Year Language Requirement

As I was surfing the Web, I was pleased to stumble across a newspaper column featuring American high school students debating whether or not a two-year language requirement for graduation was enough. Most of the responses appear to be well thought-out. Two of the students advocated having more than two years of language experience which surprised me.

I was, of course, saddened to see that to graduate high school in these students' district, one only needs to complete two years of a foreign language. When I attended high school (and this wasn't very long ago), students had the option of taking either two years of one language and then two years of another or three years. Most of the students, like moi, took more than three years in a single language.

Yes, that's right. Five years of German (in eighth grade, which was part of middle school we had the option of taking a foreign language).

Of course, I think foreign language education should start sooner, such as in grade school. Believe it or not, the first elementary school I attended had a nice lady come in every week to give us Spanish lessons. After three years my family moved to the Richmond area and our school district did not offer any language instruction whatsoever in the earlier grades. So whatever Spanish I learned, I lost a long time ago.

Out of curiosity, I checked my old school district's website and was pleasantly pleased to learn the district is trying to implement foreign language classes in elementary school. Too late for me but a good start for a more culturally-attuned generation.

Considering language change

Erin McKean's talk at TED made at least one thing clear: language is a reflection of its users and therefore the idea that it can remain static and unchanging in a medium such as a thick dictionary is rather outdated. Being somewhat of a traditionalist, however, I argued that language use ought to be moderated to a certain degree, in a sort of Académie française fashion (whose constituents determine what words are suitably French and what aren't -- email is decidedly not, but instead courriel, electronic mail, is accepted). A friend then pointed out that such decisions need not be top-down, and one brings to mind the whole revolutionary Wikipedia model, which has shown that individual contributions can work in sync to maintain a high quality resource for reliable information.

The crowd, after all, is wisest.

The issue I bring up, then, is that because language is constantly in use, and because we are at liberties to use language in whatever form we want (and to conjure up new words like "undictionaried"), it becomes exceedingly difficult to determine what words are actually proper and acceptable. Some may say there isn't the need to make that judgment, that language succeeds because it is used, and so long as there people who use it, it is the remarkable human capacity for communication at work and we should remain satisfied at that.

I think language ought to be treated with a little more care, precisely because it is a reflection of the needs and demands of those who employ it, because it is a mirror that reflects individual identities, because it is what has the power to divide and the power to unite. Language will never be confined to the ink and paper it sits upon (or the pixels we see), for its awesomeness is only evident when carefully arranged in the unique ways we pick and choose our sentences. Language isn't merely words, either, and so the idea that a dictionary represents a particular language is fundamentally flawed at best.

The Internet poses a fair number of challenges when considering the adaption of language to specific needs, environments and domains. Words can be popularized not because they are practical but simply because there exist countless opportunities to spread the use of a term without any particular reason to begin with. Hence, going back to McKean, if we have a larger pan, what will you fill it with?

Rio Akasaka, a guest contributor, is a linguist at Swarthmore College and an avid blogger. He speaks French, Japanese, and Portuguese.

Why I chose Mandarin

First of I would like to introduce myself, my name is Niel de la Rouviere, and I'm currently studying a BA at Stellenbosch, South Africa with majors in English Literature Studies and Mandarin, coupled with minors General Linguistics and Applied English Language Studies.

I was one of those kids that came straight out of high school with no clear goal as to what study or what career to follow. All I knew was that I'd kill myself if I had to sit with same old job and repetitive work routine every single day. Creativity was what I needed. So there was art... nah, only a hobby. Music: couldn't qualify. So I chose the next best thing that I loved to do: write.

I've been writing ridiculously lame plot deprived sci-fi short stories for a while now, so I thought, you know why not study language, try something creative, like writing novels, if not, there's always journalism.
So when I signed up for my course I knew I wanted to take another third language (my home language is actually, Afrikaans, which I will write about in future posts). I narrowed my options to French and Mandarin, and just like in this case, I was stuck with the question, what language do I want to pursue.

My surname is of French heritage and the romanticism of the French really sat well with me. My father also momentarily did a few French courses. So it sounded good, albeit my dad annoyingly raised his voice every time he spoke in French; strange how accents affect your voice.

Then there was Mandarin. The most spoken language in the world (not to be mistaken with English which is the most widely most spoken language). It seemed like a challenge. A new frontier; and the Asian mysticism intrigued me immensely.

In my case, both languages had value and passion, but Mandarin excelled in both. China is full speed ahead at becoming the world's next superpower, thus it is an amazing asset to have. That's the value.
Now the passion: China is one of those strange sub-plot characters in a sci-fi comedy novel: on the outside, it's just there, participating without us knowing, brooding it's own nest, but when we get to know it better, it becomes the most loved character of them all.

Any, English student will know of Othering, and thus I couldn't sit back and let China be that other country. I wanted to know how they think, how they converse and most off all how that amazing pictographic writing system works.

Cheers,
Niel

Forget the Beta, Leximo is Coming Soon...

First let me start off by welcoming our new LexiBlog contributor, Andrea. We're glad to have her share her language experiences with all of our readers.

If anyone else is interested in sharing their experiences with languages, world cultures, travel and anything related, go ahead and send me an email at ian [ at ] leximo [dot] org.

Ever since our Erin Mckean blog post made front page on Digg we've been flooded with requests for beta invites. And to be frank, I'm tired of all this beta testing and trying to get rid of all the bugs and glitches.

So I've decided that Leximo will be opening this week, no questions asked. I just have to organize everything I've been developing and update the server.

In the mean time, you can get a sneak peak at the "buggy version" using the invite code "theleximorevolution" . So head on over to Leximo and check it out. :-)

Going back to our previous Leximo Preview Post, here are images of what Leximo currently looks like before I update it. For the high quality screenshots head over to Leximo's Flickr account.





So what can you look for in the updated, slightly less buggy Leximo you ask?

One of the things I've added is the ability to upload a picture along with your definition and profile. In addition, I've tinkered around with the YouTube API so that Leximo can have videos appear on next to each definition... How sweet is that!

Another newbie at LexiBlog

Hello, bonjour, und guten tag to all the LexiBlog readers out there!

I am yet another new contributor to the Blog.  I, like Ian and Asad, am a student at the George Washington University.  I am pursuing my BA in English with minors in French and Creative Writing.  In the coming months, I hope to become the voice of the Francophile on LexiBlog.  Besides studying French as a foreign language, I have recently started learning German.  While I do not have as much experience with German as of yet, I also hope to contribute to the general understanding of Germanic linguistics, or at least bestow unto lucky readers some whimsical insight into the study of one's third language.

My relationship with languages is a long and intimate one.  At twelve years old, I picked up Dutch on the streets of Amsterdam on a family vacation.  At sixteen, I did the same with Spanish in Cuernavaca, Mexico.  While I've never studied Spanish formally, I've picked up quite a bit on different excursions to Mexico and Spain.  The best way I can explain it is that I have a knack for languages and linguistics.  So I figure, my brain just categorizes language better for me than for other people.

I've studied French since middle school, and along the way, I've learned to look at the history of language, to see how the languages relate to and diverge from one another, how they share roots, etc.  Understanding the way we've formed a language over time is absolutely crucial to the true grasp of a foreign tongue.  The latest connection I've been able to draw is to Shakespeare, written in early modern English.  Well, after learning French and perfunctory German, Shakespeare is a lot easier to understand because of the proximity of the continental European languages to English in Elizabethan and Jacobean times.  Cool, right?

On that note, look forward to posts from me on this topic.  I predict Shakespeare will be making an appearance at LexiBlog in the near future.

Bisous!  (meaning basically "xoxo" in French)

All Languages Have Value

Well, I'm still debating which language to take. Earlier this week I learned I was laid off, which has led me to consider using my new free time to learn a language.

What bothers me is that when I tell people this, people say "learn Spanish, it'll boost your chances of getting a job." This bothers me because I don't want to learn a language for the sake of boosting my marketability. I believe learning a new language should be something done based on passion. If the language turns out to be a resume booster, then that's an added benefit.

Generally, I think children should be given a choice in what language to learn. When I decided to take German in high school, my parents made it clear to me that they preferred I take Spanish. Was I wrong? Were they wrong? Who knows?

In the end, I studied the language with gusto for five years and have many fond memories of my classmates, teachers, and outings with the German club. Ditto when I took Japanese in college. My parents thought Japanese classes would mean I would be a five-year student (I graduated in four years). But I enjoyed my interactions in Japanese class and it was a great exposure to a vastly different culture.

Now, neither language has helped nor hindered my job prospects. Still, I wouldn't trade my language education for anything.

I worry about the younger generation. Will they have a passion for "Spanish" or will it be just another requirement for "getting a good" job, a task to be trudged through on the way to financial comfort? Personally, if I were someone that spoke Spanish, I'd prefer to interact with someone passionate about my language and culture.

At the same time I recognize the need for hospital staff, police, emergency personnel, etc to know at least some Spanish. And, I recognize that the need is growing for more Spanish speakers.

In the end, I guess I think there needs to be some degree of choice in language education. And, all languages have value.

Erin McKean: Redefining the Dictionary

Is the beloved paper dictionary doomed to extinction?

In this remarkable TED talk, leading lexicographer Erin McKean looks at the many ways today's print dictionary is poised for transformation... hint hint its Leximo, the bigger pan.

Being one of the youngest editors of an American dictionary, Erin McKean is at the leading edge of a new guard of lexicographers reshaping not just dictionaries, but our language itself.

Here is the whole video, I urge you to take sometime and watch it. To summarize the video:

Dictionary + Bigger Pan = Dictionaries Become Language

Update

This post made it the front page of Digg. What an honor, that explains all the barrage of insightful comments being left on this post.

And as pointed out, Erin Mckean did another speech at Google. Here's that video for those that are interested.

You Want To Learn a language?

So you want to learn a language eh? Well I've come across another excellent resource to add on to my previous posts, Free Language Courses and How To Learn a Language in an Hour.


This resource comes via Confessions of a Language a Addict an excellent language blog about learning languages.

The resource is So You Want To Learn a Language which is a collection of useful links for anyone wanting to learn a language. The creators motivation is to create a place where all of the useful language learning links can be gathered in one place, instead of being spread out over different sites.

So go ahead and check it out and add any resources you would like to share with others here http://soyouwanttolearnalanguage.googlepages.com/

Check Out Melungeon Voices

Growing up in Virginia, I occasionally heard stories about the Melungeons, a hard-scrabble group of settlers in the Appalachian mountains. The ancestors of this group are variously attributed to Portuguese explorers, Turkish sailors, Spanish pirates, etc. Other scholars suggest that the Melungeons resulted from European settlers intermarrying with local Native Americans and African slaves.

The name "Melungeon" has been variously attributed to the Turkish Melun can ("cursed soul"), the archaic English term malengin ("guile" or "deceit"), and the Italian name for eggplant, melongena, a reference to the darker skin of the Melungeons.

So, I was happy to uncover the documentary, Melungeon Voices. The DVD version is currently available and there are also occasional showings in the Appalachian region.

Anyway, check out the trailer for this interesting film:



It's great someone took the time to do a documentary on this mysterious group of people...the older generation is passing on and a lot of history is being lost.

World Cultures Network

Being the social media junkie that I am, I've created a news network on SocialMedian (a social news site) called the World Cultures Network.

This is a network for sharing information and news related to world cultures. So go ahead and join Leximo on SocialMedian and add all your favorite sites relating to world cultures.

Below is a great video tutorial that explains and introduces SocialMedian.

P.S. Hope everyone had a happy new year and I'm glad to introduce Rebecca, our new contributer. She's already had an excellent post on How To Make Turkish Coffee and will be contributing more great posts in the future.

A Nice Cup of Turkish Coffee

It's the ubiquitous beverage beloved the world over: coffee!

But what are the origins of this sometimes bitter, sometimes sweet beverage. According to National Geographic, coffee resulted from an Ethiopian shepherd's accidental discovery. It eventually spread to the Islamic world before being imported to Europe.

The Arabic word for coffee, "qahweh" became the Turkish "kahve," eventually becoming "caffe" in Italian. In English, it became "coffee."

What's my favorite cup of coffee? Although I start my mornings with two cups of black French Roast, I have an affinity for Turkish coffee. This is coffee you can't just pour into your Mr. Coffee. It requires special equipment and preparation. But it's actually quite easy.

Check out this Youtube video on how to brew Turkish coffee:


You can buy the special pot, a "cezve" at many Middle Eastern specialty shops and online.