In Europe, if you speak 3 languages you're trilingual. If you speak 2 languages you're bilingual. If you speak 1 language you're English, French or Spanish.
Tag Archives: languages
Recommended book: Empires of the Word
I picked up this book on Amazon and also read it during January. I have to admit that, given that it touches on two of my favourite subjects: history and languages, I absolutely loved it. The insight it gave on the history of the speakers of languages such as Chinese, Dutch or Akkadian was totally riveting, and it was written in such an amenable way I couldn't put it down. The text examples of each language in the beginning of the appropriate chapter was a great technique for introducing them and the author shows he definitely knows what he's writing about.
The only thing that put me off a little bit was its slight English-language bias, which is anyway not unexpected given that the writer is a native English speaker, and the book is written in English. Regardless, one of the best books I've read in a long, long time.
American Spanish speakers
I was very pleasantly surprised when I found many Spanish-speaking WASP-looking Americans while visiting Cancún. Even though Spanish in the United States is still a minority language, it seems that at least for some people outside of the original native speakers it has become important to learn it.
Before the Spanish-language skills of Americans used to be a joke amongst Mexicans, now I'm not so sure.
Language proficency
As frequent readers of this blog and people who have met me personally know, one of my main interests is the use of language and I speak both Finnish and Spanish with my wife (with a liberal sprinkling of English depending on the subject).
With her we've found out that who speaks better the language of the other depends on the day. Sometimes I speak Finnish better than she does Spanish, sometimes it's the reverse. Is it just because of general tiredness or some other reason?
Brody
As you may have noticed in other instances, the contact between different cultural groups will produce unexpected and sometimes some rather comical results. This is the case in Acapulco, which has been a port facing the Pacific for over 300 years and a mass tourism destination for at least 50.
Acapulqueños are renowned throughout Mexico for their usage of a word to refer to friends, acquantainces or whomever they are talking with at the moment: "Brody", deriving from the English "brother". A word that is used all the time, it is the trademark of their speech together with their lack of pronunciation of the letter s.
Sauna
One of the best things about Finland is sauna. The word itself, as many a Finn will point out, is the only one in their language that has been adopted internationally (beats "bastu" in my book). There is a certain etiquette to be followed while in sauna, and it is indeed an integral part of the culture, to the point where the most serious discussions and the closest relationships (no sean malpensados, canijos) will take place there.
The language also has certain words that have their origins in sauna. For example, löyly means steam, but the kind of steam that comes from throwing water at the sauna stove. Furthermore, in line with unfortunate recent events, verilöyly, composed of the words "sauna steam" and "blood", gives a very grisly picture to the listener and accordingly means massacre. Saunakalja is used for beer drunk in sauna and they even have a saying that "Jos ei sauna, viina ja terva auta, niin tauti on kuolemaksi", or "If sauna, alcohol and tar don't help, then the disease is deadly".
Now you know: in order to understand Finnish culture one has to experience and feel sauna.
Language differences
Shouldn't take you this far. The gist of the story is that the distributor of a Mexican horror film in Spain wants to dub it to "Spanish from Spain", regardless of whether the plot takes place in Mexico. You don't see Brits dubbing American movies or vice versa, do you? Subtitles, maybe, but it shows how unprepared and unwilling Spaniards are to listening other usages of the same language, regardless of whether they have a much larger number of speakers than those in Spain. Don't even get me started on their foreign language proficency (or lack thereof).
Absolutely ridiculous.
Yleinen kielentutkinto
Suoritin yleisen kielentutkinnon suomen keskitason tentin eilen. Koe kesti yhteensä 4 tuntia, ja minun mielestä meni ihan hyvin (katsotaan jos tulokset ovat mukana). Itse asiassa, minun mielestä oli liian helppo, ja olisin voinnut tehnyt sen jo pari vuotta sitten.
Nyt haluasin suorita ylin tason, mutta ongelma on että en ole löytänyt mitään tietoa valmmennuskursseista vaikeimmiin tenttiin. Ei ole muutta kursseja työväenopistossa ja en tiedä keneltä voisin kysyä. Onko kenellä ehdotuksia?
Huono suomenkielenkäyttö
OK, tiedän että joskus en puhu suomea hyvin, mutta kyllä voin hyvin nähdä että tämä nettikauppa on käännetty väärin. Jos todella haluaa nauraa etsii toimitusehdot alhaalta.
Hassuin on, että englannin- sekä espanjankielenkäännökset ovat niin huonot kuin suomenkielisen.
Globalisation is…
People with Vietnamese, Moroccan, Mexican and French names speaking French, switching to English, and back to French.
Who said globalisation was americanisation?