#NO MORE LANGUAGE STUDIES…

[yuwuta]

please feed us some yuuji blurbs there’s a lack of him rn :(

ofc… sweetest boy all time… here’s something was was meant to be a longer project but got lost in the editing whirlwind… love him so bad... 

NEVER LOST IN TRANSLATION, BECAUSE YOU KNOW WHAT I WANT 

notes: reader is implied to be american/english-speaking, yuuta and megumi are bilingual, yuuji, bless his soul, is not. i didn’t use italics for conversations between yuuji and megumi because it would all be in japanese, but when they get mixed later in the scene, japanese is differentiated with italics. hope that’s not too confusing lololll

Honestly, Yuuji tried his best in school. Some things came easier than other, but with a bit of hard work, and help from his friends, he always managed to pull pretty good grades. But right now, his biggest regret is not taking english more seriously in high school, because it’s been about three weeks since he met you, and he’s only been able to say maybe five full sentences to you without the help of Yuuta or Megumi translating. 

He was excited when Yuuta said his friend from abroad would be coming to visit and study, but god, he didn’t expect you to be so pretty. To have such pretty eyes, and pretty lips, and pretty hair, to have the prettiest voice in the world despite him only understanding every eighteenth word you say. You’re beautiful to him, and Yuuji thinks that even if he could speak your language fluently, the words would still get caught in his throat. He’s so lovesick, it’s embarrassing—his friends have been harping on him blushing and stuttering over you for the past month, and he can’t even blame them.

“What does she say to you when you guys talk,” Yuuji whines, hovering around Megumi, and not-so-discreetly looking back at you where you’re still sat in the living room laughing with Yuuta, “Does she ever say anything about me? I mean—probably not right? Which is fine! Actually, dont tell me—no, do. Or maybe—”

“She asks about you,” Megumi says, matter-of-fact in delivery, as he places a bag of popcorn in the microwave, but that doesn’t curb Yuuji’s enthusiasm. He’s practically bouncing, if he weren’t already—begging Megumi to spill the details, “What did she ask? Tell me! Tell me!” 

“She once asked if you dye your hair.”

“That’s it?!” Yuuji screams, heartbroken, and visibly deflating.

Megumi shrugs, “Yuuta probably knows more. She’s his exchange buddy friend thing, so ask him.”

“I can’t ask him, he’s right next to her!” Yuuji pouts, “Wait, what does ‘exchange buddy friend thing’ mean? You don’t think they’re more than friends, right…? I can’t blame her, senpai is really pretty, too, and he can actually talk to her… so unfair.” 

“You know, she’s not fluent, but she can understand some Japanese,” Megumi reminds him, “So, she can definitely hear you, and probably understand you.”

Yuuji’s shoulders slump, and once again, he turns around to look back at you. This time, you two make eye-contact, and that instant, Yuuji’s cheeks go pink, a nervous hand raised to wave at you, and instant internal regret at his actions; but, then you smile, and wave back, and Yuuji stays like that, dumbfounded and lovestruck and on autopilot as he waves with hearts in his eyes until Yuuta looks up from his phone and catches him.

Embarrassing. He knows he’s not the brightest, but he’s at a record high of self-embarrassment since he’s met you.

Yuuta finds himself chuckling when Yuuji spins around and goes back to prodding Megumi with questions. When you turn to face him again, it’s with a shy smile.

“I told you you’d like him,” Yuuta grins—the kind that seems sweet and innocent, but has just a kiss of that all-knowing tease to it; the kind that reminds you that he’s truly related to Satoru.

“Oh, be quiet,” you grumble, tucking your legs in and resting your chin on your knee. You spare another glance in Yuuji’s direction, for once, grateful for the language barrier between the two of you, when you turn back to Yuuta to proclaim: “I can like someone and not do anything about it. You’re real good at that, aren’t you?”

Yuuta’s slightly cocky grin falls into a scowl, and now you get to smile when he argues back, “We said not to bring up he who shall not be named in the presence of my friends!”

“Then don’t bring up my he who shall not be named in the presence of him!”

“Aren’t Americans all about forging new frontiers and chasing after your dreams?” he taunts, “Well, your dream is right in front of you.”

“My dream right now is to kill you.”

“Lucky for me, you’re going to have to hold off on that because your lover boy is approaching.”

You don’t have time to argue back with Yuuta when Megumi and Yuuji approach the living area with snacks in tow. Yuuta scoots to the tail end of the couch under the guise of giving Yuuji space to place the popcorn and nuggets in the center of the coffee table, but he has just enough time to flash you a wink before Yuuji settles in between. Megumi opts for the loveseat closets to Yuuta’s end of the couch, and you do your best not to reach over Yuuji and strangle Yuuta.

The boys decide on watching a movie you’ve never heard of, but Megumi reassures you it’ll be easy to follow and has English subtitles. You don’t mind, settling in to your corner of the couch with a handful of popcorn just as the title-screen for Human Earthworm 3 rolls across the TV.

You can follow along well-enough—even without subtitles, you get the gist of the movie. What you really find entertaining is Yuuji, who occasionally blurts out a comment or exclamation, or audibly coos whenever something sad is happening on screen. He’s almost as animated as the characters; you’re more of the silent-watcher type, but you find yourself endearing by this commentary, even if you can only understand parts of it.

You particularly appreciate the way that after every comment, he either motions to Megumi, or turns to you himself to repeat his thoughts in his best broken English, and even when you don’t understand his words, you understand him. His emotions are all on his sleeve: frustration, happiness, confusion, curiosity—communication between you two should be more difficult, but Yuuji makes it easy.

It gives you the confidence you cough out your own observation, “You, um… you’ve… seen the others? You seem to like this series.”

Across the room, Megumi and Yuuta hold their breaths, opting to not translate for you when you switch from Japanese to English. Yuuji is quiet for a moment, turned to face you with a slightly confused look on his face that makes you nervous, until his eyes brighten up and he smiles and begins nodding fervently—“Yeah—yeah, I do! It’s my… hm how do I say it… Oh! It’s my favorite!”

Between the smile on his face, the blush on his cheeks, and sincerity in his voice, you feel like you’re wrapped up in his world. It’s a little confusing, and scary, but it’s not all that bad. Maybe you can do something about it, eventually.

“I.. I think I like it, too.”

[ohitslen]

Living together.

The snail video if you are interested :)

[destiel-wings]

Dean Winchester & hug dynamic analysis

I was thinking about how whenever Dean hugs someone he's almost always the one hugging the other and how this links to his psychological trauma of always being the caretaker of people, making himself bigger to protect them.

Because that's how Dean sees himself, as a shield for others, and then I thought about how Cas actually is the shield, and he's HIS SHIELD, specifically, the only one who's really there to protect HIM, which is why it hits so much when we see this:

The way Cas wraps his arms around him, trying to protect him with his whole body--that he'd use as a shield and give up in a second if he could spare him from any pain and save him.

(for context: Dean was about to go use the soul bomb on Amara there, it was a suicide mission)

Bobby is another one that hits, he hugs him as the big hugger because he's his father, he loves him and he's actually here to protect him (and Dean LETS him -barely, but he lets him *and Cas* - in a way that he doesn't let Sam)

I watched a compilation of Sam & Dean hugs to check if i was right about it, but it's almost always Dean the big hugger with Sam, except when he's about to die or Sam sees him alive again after losing him.

Even then, Dean mostly tries to hug Sam as the big hugger anyway, with at least one arm, like a way to comfort him, making him feel protected, like his body language is saying "I'm here, I'm okay, I'm still strong, i can still protect you" (because their real father failed and Dean thinks it's his job).

He rarely lets himself be the little one hugged with Sam, unless he's barely conscious. Which is why it kills me so much more now that in this moment (s14, when Dean was going to lock himself in the Ma'lak box cause he was possessed by Michael) and Sam has a desperate breakdown and punches him (to stop him) he forcefully hugs him as the little hugger, the way Dean always kept him, like a way of saying "I still need you to protect me, please don't do this to yourself".

In the scene below he gives Sam his blessing to do a dangerous (possibly suicidal) mission, and one of his arms is down, but the other one tries to stay up--he's forcing himself to do it and he struggles because he still wants to protect him, but (as the seasons progress) he slowly becomes more prone to let go.

So in this view the hug dynamic becomes an indicator of how Dean sees Sam (and himself) and his protector role, how adult and self sufficient he considers Sam, and how much he lets people around him take care of him, lowering his walls and letting himself be hugged.

This is also why i think hugs from characters like Garth or Charlie are so special, because they're just like us: they see Dean and they just know that he needs to be hugged a lot, and that he's not used to it, so they just go for it-- and it's so normal and kind and spontaneous that Dean's just not used to it-- he doesn't know how to respond (especially with Garth, at the beginning, but as the seasons progress, he learns to, and he even initiates the hug eventually).

I love the hugs where they're 50/50 (one arm up, one arm down both), feels like they're equals, both taking care of each other. I feel like with Sam and Dean, this indicates a healthier dynamic, because Dean lets go a little of the role that was imposed to him and manages to see Sam as the strong individual that he is. But the same applies to 50/50 hugs with other characters, like with Cas, where I feel like it testifies how equals they feel in terms of being fighters, there's a show of respect of each other's strength that transpires by the gesture (which is even more astounding considering that Cas is literally a powerful angel).

And just to end on a destiel note, I'd like to note the possessiveness and protectiveness of Dean (rightfully so) whenever he finds Cas after he thought he had lost him, and how that translates into his body/hug language:

[bengaly]

Experimenting with different visual cues to show that a character is not quite fluent in a language yet. Commentary and extras below the cut. (the other language is kalaallisut, a real language spoken in greenland, albeit machine translated and probs not 100% accurate)

1. Blurred bits

I feel like this one isn't very visually pleasing, but it speaks to me more regarding how learning a language feels. You don't quite make out what the words are, and slowly pick up bits from what is being said. This also adds room for uncertainty on the character's POV, the speech bubble wouldn't be theirs, but what you read off it would be their thoughts regarding whats being said. The blur also helps keeping things incomprehensible even if you speak the other language being spoken.

2. Bits in multiple languages

This one adds room for out of the speech bubble commentary. It doesn't make misunderstandings as easy as with the blurred speech, and with an agglutinative language like kalaallisut it might end up being confusing to organise or break the sentence's syntax. It looks cleaner than the blurred bits though, and it still makes the other language incomprehensible (if you dont speak kalaallisut, that is). Colour coding would help indicate whats being understood by the main character and what isnt, and the texts would slowly be fully red across the chapters.

3. Faded colour to indicate not understanding

This makes the reader able to understand everything, and relies on the reader memorising that faded = not understood by the character. Other than that, colour coding would indicate a change of languages.

I like the reader only understanding what the character can understand and I like the types that leave kalaallisut still visible. Though option 3 might be cleaner and easier to manange.

4. Faded colour + blur

This is something I thought after posting it earlier on patreon. Blurring the parts the main character wouldn't understand can be a way for the brain to quickly skip through the missed text, in hopes that at least the first reading will match what the character is understanding.

Also, for the enjoyment of my 4 greenlandic followers, heres the machine translated kalaallisut version I used for 1 & 2. I had to use a double way translation tool and an annotation tool to be sure the words were somewhat related to what I wanted them to be. I can't really fact check it though, so I hope that whichever way the translator messed up is at least worth a chuckle.

If you'd like to see more of this kinda stuff, please consider supporting me on patreon

[adhd-languages]

So if I’m speaking Spanish, and I need to say an English word — like a name, brand, website, etc — I say it like a Spanish speaker

However, I hear a lot of speakers drop into a very native English accent in the middle of a sentence to say “el Starbucks” and whatnot (I love hearing it. Just a random completely English-sounding word in a Spanish sentence)

So I’m wondering…

From my personal observations I think native bilinguals do this more, but I’m interested in more data. Feel free to reply or reblog for a more detailed answer!

(EDIT: sorry the poll is so confusing. “YES” means yes, you do the thing I described, changing your accent to a different one in the middle of a sentence)

[sometimesreading]

Mentally I am in the shade under a tree reading for fun. Physically, I am cramming as much Italian into my head as possible in the next 2 weeks while ignoring the anatomy I should be studying 😭

[benkyoutobentou]

language learning culture is always watching children’s media in various languages

[qrichas]

btw! from twitter, some context from qforever and qcellbits convo

[thebroccolination]

THE EX-MORNING SERIES CONCEPT

By now I think many people have heard that KristSingto’s upcoming series is an original script that was written for them. What we also have confirmed is that it was written about them.

[source]

KRIST: This series was written by P'Backaof and directed by P'Lit where they created this script from the start deliberately for the two of us and they got information for the characters etc. from KristSingto directly. In the series, the name for P'Sing is Tamtawan, and my name is Phatapi. And Tamtawan Tamtawan and Phatapi are KristSingto themselves.

INTERVIEWER: Does that mean you play yourself?

KRIST: [laughing] Yes, we act as ourselves, so it's not difficult at all.

Today, Aof elaborated on his part on Twitter:

[source: @backaof]

[translation: @_beinglistener]

And Jojo added:

[source: @jojotichakorn]

[translation: @_beinglistener]

So, two gay men are the leading creative minds behind KristSingto’s comeback series. Time to study up on your KristSingto history, kids. \:D/

Long live sanctioned RPF. 🎉

[iwtv2022]

There’s no way to talk about Lestat’s performance without talking about class (as a formerly impoverished aristocrat, he’s performing aristocratic decadence that he didn’t have the means to access as a mortal) and there’s no way to talk about Louis’ performance without talking about race (as a Black man, he’s expected by his family and/or society to perform roughness, respectability, and subservience depending on the circumstances). In my opinion, it’s less gender performance, and more how their performances are gendered by both their audience, and the show’s audience. Reducing the discussion to “male-coded” and “female-coded” feels willfully ignorant to me.

[kindaeccentric]

'Blood and Gold' Anne Rice + 'Lolita' Vladimir Nabokov (fragments)

Marius talking about Armand // Humbert Humbert talking about Dolores parallels

[temeyes]

it's my gf (who is also soap's gf)

[wingsofmud]

Clearsight should've taken her girlfriend, Listener, to the Lost Continent with her.

[bookwyrminspiration]

anyone else experience the language learning purgatory where all the easily available resources are below your level, but you're also not proficient enough for smooth conversation. so every time you hear a fluent speaker you encounter several dozen specific words you don't know, but every time you look up references they teach you nothing. so you're on your own and constantly confused

[guillemelgat]

I just started a new semester, and I'm finally getting the chance to take Malayalam, which I've been trying to do since my undergrad. This is obviously a very exciting development, and it's so delightful to be in a language class again for the first time in ages, but it's also been a very unique experience as far as language classes go. First of all, for me, who is generally used to having very odd personal connections to a language and being the overachieving linguist of the class. And second of all because it's just a very different experience to be in a class largely oriented towards heritage learners and people with some cultural familiarity.

There are five people in the class. Of those five, four have Malayalee family and have had some exposure to Malayalam throughout our lives; the last person is a native speaker of another non-Dravidian South Asian language. Of the four of us who are Malayalee, I'm basically the only one who didn't have a significant amount of Malayalam at home growing up. What this means is that we've spent very little time on the phonetics of the language, because everyone roughly knows how to pronounce it - something which wouldn't be true if there were non-South Asian in the class! (It was a bit comforting to hear all the other Malayalees struggling with aspirated consonants, which have constantly been the bane of my existence, and then to hear the instructor say that few people pronounce them right in spoken Malayalam anyways.) The instructor could ask us to say things on the first day, and the more fluent speakers could say them. There is already Malayalam being mixed in with the instruction. I'm sure by the end of the semester we'll be having extended conversations - especially since the two of us who don't speak have very concrete communicative desires for our outside lives.

It's also a very scary experience for me, personally. Or maybe scary isn't quite the right word, but I've always felt out of my depth in claiming Malayalee heritage - I've always felt that there were so many things which I didn't know which any normal Malayalee would. There is no evidence that this is true, at least insofar as that my cousins with two Malayalee parents have wildly varying experiences and I'm not actually that far outside the norm. In most American spaces, I will never be clocked as white, and most people usually immediately identify me as South Asian. Nonetheless, I know that when I visited Kerala this past December, I was decidedly foreign - to the two guys speaking in rapid-fire Malayalam on the flight from Qatar, to the person at the immigration counter in Trivandrum, even to my own relatives. Part of it is a mental block on my part, of feeling myself foreign and therefore never letting myself belong. Part of it is that I am, ultimately, American. But either way, in this class, I can feel that I'm the American in the room, even when I'm not, even when my pronunciation is just as good as the other Malayalees and there's nothing that's telling me I can't belong. I keep freezing up when asked to say real things, or when people speak to me, because there's some unreachable standard in my brain of Not A Real Malayalee, and everything feels fraught and fragile. So maybe this semester will be about overcoming that.

It's still strange being in a language class where the instructor, on the first day, can look at you all and say, "You know why you're here, you want to be here, we all have a shared experience." But it's also a beautiful thing in its own way, and I'm really looking forward to taking on a language in this way. I love the structure and the logic of language, the puzzle of putting it together, the beauty of making friends in it and watching shows in it and listening to songs in it - but as I get older I find myself really reflecting on what it means to learn and to know a language. And sometimes those barriers to learning and to knowing are only in our minds, not in our worlds. Language is communication and connection, and I hope that Malayalam serves me to these two ends, even as it sometimes feels like a trial by fire at each word.

[ask-nyc-boroughs]

I think it’s funny how most people who like Hetalia end up majoring or minoring in like international relations, or history if they end up going to university.

Meanwhile I minored in urban planning 😭🙏 where are the Hetalians who are into urban planning & geography at ?