anotherdamnpolyglot

[anotherdamnpolyglot]

If you catch a linguistics student bent over a book of strange symbols, holding their throat in one hand and making a bunch of strange, disconnected sounds, leave them alone!! They’re studying

[anotherdamnpolyglot]

"Le Liban est connu pour son mélange linguistique unique, où l'arabe rencontre le français et l'anglais dans la vie quotidienne. Mais ce multilinguisme est-il un trésor culturel ou une source de confusion identitaire ?"

[anotherdamnpolyglot]

Made that feature you requested boss

[anotherdamnpolyglot]

Don’t tell me what to do!!!

👏you👏won't👏remember👏shit👏if👏you👏try👏to👏learn👏100👏words👏in👏one👏go

[anotherdamnpolyglot]

[anotherdamnpolyglot]

En Anglais, on ne dit pas “quatre vingt dix neuf”, on dit “ninety nine” qu'on pourrait traduire comme “Hurr durr, regardez mois, j'ai un système de numérotation fonctionnel” et je crois que c'est magnifique.

[anotherdamnpolyglot]

in an interesting case of linguistic convergent evolution, the english words scale, scale, and scale are all false cognates of each other

[anotherdamnpolyglot]

“‘The Belarusian language is increasingly perceived as a sign of political disloyalty and is being abandoned in favor of Russian in the public administration, education, culture and the mass media, upon orders from the hierarchy or out of fear of discrimination,’ said Anaïs Marin, the United Nations special rapporteur for human rights in Belarus.”

[anotherdamnpolyglot]

Listening to native speakers of the language you’re trying to learn

[anotherdamnpolyglot]

Although written records are rarely regarded as part of sub-Saharan Africa’s heritage, important bodies of Ajami texts (records of African languages written in Arabic script) have existed in Africa for centuries. Ajami writing traditions around the world follow the geography of Islam and are varied. They have played critical roles in the spread of Islam in Muslim communities beyond Arabia and continue to be used for both religious and non-religious writings. Ajami sources document intellectual traditions, histories, belief systems, and cultures of non-Arab Muslims around the world. Despite similar origins in spreading Islam, each Ajami system followed its own trajectory shaped by local cultural, social and political factors. The neglect of African Ajami traditions is due to a number of factors, including the lack of an Ajami public depository, the limited number of scholars with the necessary skills to study Ajami manuscripts, and the pervasive overemphasis on African oral traditions in academia.

[anotherdamnpolyglot]

Random, but I personally find it irritating that African languages are often treated in writing for international audiences as if they were some sort of irrelevant parenthetical. And when it comes to the biographies of distinguished people, these languages are treated as some minor part of someone's exotic past or whatever while English and French are deemed markers of intellectual accomplishment and seriousness. What a shame. And I suspect that even among folks who don't hold condescending attitudes towards African languages, there is a sense that there's something deeply regional, esoteric, and unknowable about them. But this is of course not true, and you would be surprised by how much you learn if you are even a little bit curious.

[anotherdamnpolyglot]

Wait why is no one in the comments pointing out that vixen is also a word with sexual/sensual connotations in the English language?? And no one would ever name their child Vixen?????

English speaker: Vixen is such a beautiful name!

Me, a German:

[anotherdamnpolyglot]

my friend and I are going to play a bizarre psychological prank on our other friend who is studying german when we see her next. and this prank is simply learning german. we are going to speak it in front of her and have a conversation which will weird her out because when did we ever study german? she knows we haven’t? surely it wasn’t just to have this one conversation in front of her to make her question the average person’s knowledge of german? (it is). this project is largely infeasible and not very funny at all. however we are going to do it

[anotherdamnpolyglot]

Well actually I guess I'll just share this more generally if anyone is interested. Collected by a number of people on Twitter including @touchlnggrass and @frankenvy. Hopefully useful for someone studying, and feel free to lmk if you are interested in African languages, linguistics, etc. because I am as well and I haven't really come across others on this platform lol

[anotherdamnpolyglot]

What's the point of being able to speak in 5 languages if I have nothing meaningful to say in all of them.