i'm not normally one to make jokes about dialect or accent. but the way that British people pronounce "lieutenant" feels like an in-joke i'm not privy to
Aww, you're feeling lieut out?

PR's Tumblrdome
Cosimo Galluzzi

Janaina Medeiros

oozey mess
will byers stan first human second

roma★
he wasn't even looking at me and he found me
d e v o n

tannertan36
I'd rather be in outer space 🛸

titsay
AnasAbdin
Cosmic Funnies
Mike Driver
Sweet Seals For You, Always

★

izzy's playlists!
Lint Roller? I Barely Know Her
i don't do bad sauce passes
NASA

seen from Brunei
seen from China
seen from United Kingdom
seen from Germany
seen from Brunei
seen from Türkiye

seen from France
seen from Spain
seen from Canada
seen from United States

seen from Ukraine

seen from United States
seen from Poland
seen from Indonesia

seen from Japan

seen from Brazil
seen from United Kingdom
seen from United Arab Emirates

seen from United Kingdom
seen from Türkiye
@laurenloveslearninglanguages
i'm not normally one to make jokes about dialect or accent. but the way that British people pronounce "lieutenant" feels like an in-joke i'm not privy to
Aww, you're feeling lieut out?
(me, my parents, my sister, and the baby are sitting at the kitchen table eating lunch)
baby, pointing at the light fixture over the table and signing "on": o.*
my sister: we actually can't turn that light on right now, because the lightbulb inside is burnt out! it needs a new one.
baby: ighbu.
sister: yes, lightbulb! granddaddy said after we eat he's going to climb up there on a ladder and change it, and then the light will come on!
baby: gadada! adda, uuu! ighbu o!
sister: exactly!
baby, signing "on" and pointing at the light and then my dad, with increasing urgency: GADADA ADDA UUUU. O.
my sister: we're going to finish eating first though, ok?
baby: nonono. O. gadada adda uuu.
[a split second goes by]
baby, pointing to himself: ba. adda uuu. ighbu.
me: you're going to climb the ladder and change the lightbulb yourself?
baby: dzyeah. *pointing to the buckle where he is buckled into the high chair* ububu.
me: unbuckle you? so you can change the lightbulb?
baby, highly businesslike: dzyeah.
*pronounced like "on" without the n
this comment passes peer review
it's meee I'm your guardian angel hiiiiii 😇 okay🙏 so. in about six months, you're gonna die of starvation. 🥺 and if I don't protect you, I will get: #fired! 🫢 and that is No Good 🙅♀️ hahaaa So. 🙏 I looked into causes of starvation, and it turns out: Your death is totally preventable! 😯 Uh oh! 😆 There's more than enough food to sustain you without interfering with anyone else's survival, but you're not allowed to have it! 🤨 Whaaat? 🤷♀️ Apparently, your death is premeditated by thousands of things called "shareholders." So. 🙏 I've been killing people,
soy yooo tu ángel de la guarda holiiiiii 😇 okay🙏 bueno. en como seis meses, vas a morir de hambre. 🥺 y si no te protejo, me van a: #¡despedir! 🫢 y eso No esta Chido 🙅♀️jajaaa Entonces. 🙏investigue acerca del tema y resulta que: ¡puedo prevenir tu muerte al 100%! 😯 ¡Uh oh! 😆 Hay más que suficiente comida para que sobrevivas sin que interfieras con la supervivencia de los demás, ¡pero no puedes teneral! 🤨 ¿Queeeé? 🤷♀️ Al parecer, tu muerte fue premeditada por miles de cosas llamadas "accionistas." Y bueno. 🙏 empeze a matar personas,
c'est moooi ton ange gardien coucooou 😇 bon 🙏 alors. dans genre six mois, tu vas mourir de faim. 🥺 et si je te protège pas, je vais me faire: #virer ! 🫢 et ça c'est pas Pas Super 🙅♀️ hahaaa Donc. 🙏 j'ai fait mes recherches sur les causes de famine et devine quoi: Ta mort est 100% évitable ! 😯 Oh-oh ! 😆 Il y a largement assez de ressources pour te nourrir sans interférer avec la survie d'autrui, mais tu n'y as pas accès ! 🤨 Quoooi ? 🤷♀️ Apparemment ta mort a été préméditée par des milliers de trucs appelées des "actionnaires". Du coup.🙏 j'ai tué pas mal de monde,
hiiiiii 😇 我是亲的守护小天使!okay🙏 嗯。您在差不多半年会饿死哈🥺 若我不能救您我会被#炒鱿鱼!🫢 那可不行哦🙅♀️ 哈哈。所以昵🙏我查了一下人类饿死的原因,然后发现:诶呀呀😯亲的死是可以避免哒!😆 这世上有足够食物给亲吃,一点儿也不需要影响别人的生存率哒!但不给亲!🤨 怎么会这样昵? 🤷♀️ 原来,亲的死是被一帮叫“股东”的东西计算好滴! 所以昵🙏 我杀了一些人,
y'all are doing some rosetta stone shit to me
Today is a big day on the Spanish internet. Valentine's day in Spanish is "día de San Valentín", which sounds almost the same as "Sam va lentín", which is how, in some parts of Spain , you would say "Sam goes slowly".
Hence, since a few years ago, every February 14th, the Spanish internet is full of "wait for me mr. Frodo" style memes. One of our holiest days of the year.
oh and the post would probably make more sense if I actually shared any meme right?
You can't even picture how many variations of the meme people post today. It's all very silly and I love it.
The funniest part is the actors are aware of the meme!
omg this is my favorite discovery of the year I am loving these memes
the name "theresa" is so funny like. theres a what
de naam 'eris' is zo grappig. er is wat?
Navnet "erik" er så spøgst. Han er ik hvad?
الإسم فيفي مهضوم كتير. في في شو؟
Göran är också kul. Gör han vadå?
tuomas tapani karhu on hassu nimi. tuomasta pani siis mikä?
Hey what happened to tht tower yall were building?
Love the word "also". I have more things to say
writingraccoon
Is brea liom an focal "fresin". Tá níos mó le rá agam
Ann orðinu "ok". Jak hefi mera at segja
lufige þæt word "eac." ic hæbbe ma þing secgan
pourquoi du pain est masculin mais la baguette est féminine....... la baguette est transgenre ?
je vais laisser la communauté parler:
la baguette, icône trans?
oui
non
eh bah
10k notes pour un post francophone sur tumblr macron où est mon poste de ministre de la culture
“La sirena y el pescador,” Elisa Chavez.
Hey all! This poem is part of my chapbook Miss Translated, which I produced in a limited run as Town Hall Seattle’s Spring 2017 artist-in-residence. The main conceit behind this work is that to accurately portray my relationship with Spanish, I have to explore the pain and ambiguity of not speaking the language of my grandparents and ancestors. As a result, these poems are bilingual … sort of. Each one is translated into English incorrectly.
The poems I produced have secrets, horrific twists, emotional rants, and confessions hiding in the Spanish. It’s my hope that people can appreciate them regardless of their level of Spanish proficiency.
oh shit. my spanish is pretty shaky, but i’m pretty sure “te perdono” is “i forgive you.” wow understanding just that much is pretty chilling.
and something about…blood? and transformation? oooh yikes. she didn’t want legs in the spanish version did she. and it was a painful process.
so this poem is about…misunderstandings leading to pain for the person misunderstood? whish is really effective with the way it’s written, wow. this is the most meta poem form i’ve ever seen. wow.
#reblog#photoset#poetry#i later ran it thru google translate to confirm my theories#won’t post said translation or say how right i was#cuz i feel like that’s missing the point
<— This right here is AMAZING. Look at the journey this person went on reading my poem! Secret fact, I have been stalking tags and reblogs of this because what I wanted more than anything was to provide an experience for people and LOOK AT YOU ALL GO. Your engagement and enthusiasm is amazing and so humbling for me.
Holy crap, this is incredible. As a natively bilingual Latina woman, allow me to dive into a full analysis.
First, I should tell you my experience of reading this. I didn’t even look at the English at first, because I didn’t know that the mistranslation was the point, and of course I didn’t need it. So I read the whole poem in Spanish and thought it was really sad and moving. Then I looked at the English and my eyebrows went right up to my hairline. Why the hell would you translate it this way, I thought.
Then I read the caption and realized that this is a genius way of demonstrating how translation into English can be an act of colonization and violence.
I would translate the first two lines as “The mermaid rose from the sea / To see the dry world.” They’re very neutral lines. She was curious about the dry world, so she went to check it out. That’s a very different connotation from the mistranslation, which tells you that the mermaid preferred the land to the sea.
The second two lines I would say mean “She found a fisherman on the beach / this beautiful fish without a net.” She’s the one with agency here, not the fisherman, and she thinks of herself as a free fish, unconstrained by a net, not as a fish without a home.
The next three lines by my lights read “She had a gleaming tail; scales / that covered her breasts, arms, and face / and a wake of lacy waves.” Again, it’s from her perspective, not the fisherman’s, and she thinks of herself as having a gleaming rather than oily tail, a lacy wake rather than a frothing one.
Next stanza: “The fisherman caught her by the tail / and cut it in half.” From her point of view, the fisherman has committed a sudden and senseless mutilation. Then he goes, “’Now,’ he said to her, ‘you have legs. / Why don’t you walk?’” It’s almost like an accusation. You have legs now, why don’t you just get up and walk?
My read on the next stanza is: “The mermaid began to sing to the sea / for aid, her blood transforming / the sand of the beach into rainbows.” The sea is her home, not the land, and she’s crying out to her home in pain as she bleeds.
Then the poem ends with “She sang to the fisherman, ‘I forgive you, I forgive you, I forgive you.’”
The reason this mistranslation is so brilliant is that it takes a story about a mermaid trying to forgive a man who’s committed senseless violence against her, and turns it into a story about a man who uplifts a woman to a better life out of the kindness of his heart. And the thing is, that’s exactly what happens to so many stories from colonized cultures when they’re adapted by the oppressor. Translation into English, and further the cultural language of the oppressor, can be an act of violence and erasure rather than one of respect.
This is why I have worked so hard to translate poetry from Spanish to English that has previously only been translated by white Americans who learned Spanish in college. I can bring something to the translation that they can’t. It’s usually not this extreme, but this exists to some degree in all translations by people who don’t truly understand the culture that produced the work they’re translating.
Yes some languages like French or Thai or Japanese have nonsensical or weird spelling but you can already read English so you should be used to that by now
Look at Thai. This script is very old. Many of these sounds don’t exist like that anymore. Do not panic. You know how to read knife. You are battle hardened already.
Japanese kanji have many different sound and meaning. Too many. However, you can already deal with things that don’t make sense. You have conquered deer and dear. You have learned to deal with phishing and fishing. You can do this.
French have many silent letters, but so do we. Grab French by the throat. Choke it to death to assert dominance.
Choking the French language to death to assert dominance is the most British thing I’ve heard (affectionate)
What did you just call me
there is something magical about watching people writing English to complain about spelling in other languages, though, isn't there?
And then there's Welsh
Welsh spelling is phonetic and regular.
This explains why some aspects of English can be hard to learn for speakers of other languages.
"English has more phonemes than many languages, with around 44, depending on which variety of English you speak. It has an unusually large set of vowel sounds – there are around 11. According to WALS, most spoken languages only have between five to six vowel sounds. This is part of the reason that English spelling is fiendishly complicated, because it has inherited five letters for vowels from the Roman alphabet and speakers have to make them work for more than twice that number of sounds.
English has some comparatively unusual consonant sounds as well. Two sounds, those represented by the “th” in “bath” and “bathe” respectively, are found in fewer than 10% of the languages surveyed in WALS. In fact, these two sounds are generally among the last sounds acquired by children, with some adult varieties of English not using them at all."
official linguistics post
linguistics professor: so we've covered prefixes and suffixes. does anyone know what an infix is?
student: abso-fucking-lutely
we're gonna settle this once and for all
peruse
to look at/read in an informal/relaxed way
to examine or read in a very careful way
nonplussed
surprised/confused so much they are unsure how to react
unperturbed (unbothered)
egregious
outstandably bad; shocking
remarkably good
chuffed
delighted; pleased; satisfied
annoyed; displeased; disgruntled
one time i walked into God’s room when He wasn’t expecting me and He was kneeling by the foot of His bed praying. tf. who was He praying to ..?
dei cubiculum quondam intravi dum me non exspectaret et ad pedem cubilis orans genuit. qf. cui orabat ..?
this is good because maybe there are medieval priests who wanna read this one
hit gelamp sume dæge þæt ic ga in godes rom þa he ne min wende and he cneowlode æt his beddes fet him gebiddende. þf. to hwam gebæd..?
motherfucker stop translating my post into the common vernacular and distributing it out to the peasantry
Honestly, as a German I can not quite understand the obsession of the English speaking world with the question whether a word exists or not. If you have to express something for which there is no word, you have to make a new one, preferably by combining well-known words, and in the very same moment it starts to exist. Agree?
Deutsche Freunde, could you please create for me a word for the extreme depression I feel when I bend down to pick up a piece of litter and discover two more pieces of litter?
um = around
die Welt = world
die Umwelt = environment
ver = prefix to indicate something difficult or negative, a change that leads to deterioration or even destruction that is difficult to reverse or to undo, or a strong negative change of the mental state of a person
der Müll = garbage, trash, rubbish, litter
-ung = -ing
die Vermüllung = littering
ver- = see before
zweifeln = to doubt
-ung = see before
die Verzweiflung = despair, exasperation, desperation
die Umweltvermüllungsverzweiflung = …
This is a german compound on the spot master class and I am LIVING
#my german is still too basic for this but I desperately want a compound word for how much these compound words piss me off
das Monster = monster
das Wort = word
der Groll = grudge, anger, malice, rancor
der Monsterwortgroll = …
Monsterwortbildungsimitationsunfähigkeitsverzweiflungsgroll
die Bildung = formation
die Imitation = imitation
un- = un-, in-
fähig = able
-keit = -ility
die Unfähigkeit = inability
der Monsterwortbildungsimitationsunfähigkeitsverzweiflungsgroll = anger about the inability to imitate the formation of monster words
Linguistikfehdenhandschuhwurf
die Linguistik = linguistics
die Fehde = feud
der Handschuh = glove
der Fehdehandschuh = gauntlet
der Wurf = throw
der Linguistikfehdenhandschuhwurf = throwing down the linguistic gauntlet
*slowly backs in fear*
@shiplocks-of-love, @thatswhywelovegermany
Monsterwortbildungsunfähigkeitsangstverzweiflungsrückzugsecke
Monster=monster // wort=word // bildung(s)=formation
unfähigkeit (s)=incabability // angst=anxiety
verzweiflung(s)=desperation // rückzug(s)=retreat // ecke=corner
=the corner in which you retreat when you´re desperate because of your fear when being unable to form monster words
*eye twitch*
But what I want to see now is two germans arguing over the construction of one of these monster words.
@shiplocks-of-love I don’t think that will happen. The words make perfect sense. I think if German is your mother tongue you get a feeling for combining words, like a
Monsterwortbildungsgespür
Monster = monster
Wort = word
Bildung(s) = formation
Gespür = intuition
;-)
Sprachirrgartenbelustigungsbeitrag
die Sprache = language
• irren = to become lost (also: to err, to be mistaken; to wander, to stray)
• der Garten = garden
der Irrgarten = maze, knot garden
• be- = prefix with a variety of functions: ¹as part of a compound word, it denotes a processing or change of state; ²as part of a compound word, it denotes a touch; ³as part of a compound word, it denotes a more intensive preoccupation with or thematization of something; ⁴it forms from a noun an adjective with a pseudo-participle form because the corresponding verb does not exist; ⁵as a prefix, it forms a transitive verb from a previously intransitive verb; ⁶as a prefix of a verb, it shifts the focus and thus changes the sentence structure
• lustig = funny
• -ung = suffix turning an adjective/adverb into a noun
die Belustigung = amusement, entertainment, merriment
der Beitrag = contribution, article in a newspaper or magazine, posting on social media, input to a discussion
Bloody love this language <3<3<3
The thing is, since in German you have to decline/conjugate many words in relation to the noun they are refering to those monster words actually serve a purpose of making the language simpler. A common example is a (as in any) red wine (ein roter Wein) as compaired to the compound a red wine (ein Rotwein). If rot is an adjective it has to be conjugated: der rote Wein - des roten Weins - die roten Weine - and many more. But it if rot is part of the noun you only have to decline Wein: der Rotwein - des Rotweins - die Rotweine. So, die Verzweiflung über die Vermüllung der Umwelt is way longer than Umweltvermüllungsverzweiflung and you would have to know three grammatical genders and the words’ respective declinations. Whereas for Umweltvermüllungsverzweiflung you only need to know that Verzweiflung is grammatically feminine (die) and its deklinations.
Ok, now I want to see Germans playing Scrabble
Linguistics!
But wait, there’s more!
When you boink two (or more, see above) words together, they can either adhere as-is (see: Sprach-Irrgarten), or they get one (or sometimes two) letters in between, the so-called Fugenelement (Fuge = gap or seam between two things like for example tiles; Element = element) ¹
As a matter of fact, Fugenelement contains a Fugenelement! The “n” in the middle!
It can also be an “s” (Belustigung-s-Beitrag), or an “es” (Tag-es-Zeit), or an “n” (Fehde-n-Handschuh), or an “en” (Held-en-Reise), or even an “er” (Kind-er-Garten yes really), or heck, even an “ens” Schmerz-ens-Geld, which we all deserve at this point)
(your choice if you wanna think of these elements as lube or condoms. For the boinking.)
BUT WAIT! Sometimes the boinking goes so hard that the first word gets SHORTENED! For example “Schulmeister” = Schul(e)-Meister
This has been a Fugenelementsschulmeisterklugscheißerei.
—-
¹ The above Wikipedia article is a German language article; when you click to see it in more languages, this is what you get:
Yep - this article does not exist in English or in French. But! Our Icelandic cousins can read all about it!
As a matter of fact, it is! The Fugen-S is often a genitive of the original first word, sometimes it’s the plural (Gänsebraten = Gans (goose) -> Gänse (geese) + Braten (roast)), and sometimes they’re something else entirely!
Oh hey, and I forgot the funnest thing! There are fuckall rules for how the words boink! It’s all based on vibes! And sometimes people don’t agree how the words should boink, and then you get two different versions of a composite noun!
“Medieval peasants couldn’t handle my Spotify playlist” but could YOU handle a medieval bard relaying the epic of Beowulf over the course of an hour? Humble yourself.
(via @sinni-ok-sessi )
Ummmm NOT losing these tags, this is so fucking funny @astronicht
Go little scop go!
Amtgard mages
reblog if you think sign language should be taught as a language in schools.
I'm gonna reblog with some videos of people speaking various American Indian/indigenous American languages, because I think most people don't even know what they sound like. Not to be judgement of that—just, you know, I think people who want to be informed should know what they sound like!
Former president of the Navajo Nation, Joe Shirley, giving an address in Navajo.
Nora Marks Dauenhauer telling a story, "Raven and Deer", in Tlingit.
Albert White Hat, a well known Lakota teacher, translator, and activist, speaking Lakota.
This YouTube user, Grahm Wiley-Camacho, has uploaded a bunch of videos in Colville Okanagan Salish, but I'm not sure who all the speakers are.
Multiple people speaking Cherokee and talking about revitalization of the language.
This guy speaking Yucatec Maya (guest starring: adorable small child).
There's a ton of material in Greenlandic on YouTube, but it's hard for me to find, because the titles and other metadata are also in Greenlandic! Of course, this represents a huge win for the language, since this is a biproduct of being in vibrant use by a community of speakers. Greenlandic has been an official language of the territory of Greenland since 1979, and the sole official language since 2009.
Here are some proceedings of the Greenlandic parliament, the Inatsisartut, which are conducted in Greenlandic.
Here is a radio show in Greenlandic, from Kalaallit Nunaata Radioa.
And here is a video of Aki-Matilda Høegh-Dam, Greenlandic MP in the Danish parliament (Folketing), causing some upset by speaking in Greenlandic instead of Danish.
Conversation between Loran Thompson and Francis Boots in Mohawk.
Interview with Yup'ik elder Raphael Jimmy about qaneryaraq "words of wisdom/right living".
official linguistics post
taqʷšəblu (Vi Hilbert) speaking Lushootseed! She was the last fluent heritage speaker of the language, and did a lot of conservation work and education for it.
(Lushootseed is spoken up and down the Southeast side of the Salish Sea, mostly between modern-day Bellingham and Olympia, including Seattle)