the little linguist

Language Study Blog // Russian; Spanish; Turkish; Arabic // She/Her

[linguisticmaps]

Relativization strategies

How do languages form relative clauses like “the man that ate bread went home”.

Relative pronoun/particle/complementizer - “the man [that/who ate bread] went home”. Typical of Indo-European, Uralic and Semitic languages. 

Correlative relative (non-reduction) - “the man [who ate bread], [that man] went home or “the man [he ate bread] went home” - this strategy involves an anaphor, repeating the antecedent with a noun/pronoun. Pronoun retention is also lumped in here. This strategy occurs in Indo-Aryan languages (Hindi, Bengali, Punjabi, Gujarati, Marathi, etc.), in Mande languages (e.g Bambara in Mali), Yoruba, Lakhota, Warao, Xerente, Walpiri, etc. 

Nominalized/participial relative - “the [bread eating] man went home” or “the [bread eaten] man went home” - I lumped this two together because the behaviour is very similar - used in Turkic, Mongolic, Koreanic, Dravidian, and Bantu languages. 

Genitive relative - “[ate bread]’s man went home" - used in Sino-Tibetan, Khmer, Tagalog, Minangkabau, and Aymara. 

Relative affix - “the man [ate-REL bread] went home” - used in Seri, Northwest and Northeast Caucasian languages and Maale (Omotic). 

Adjunction - “the man [ate bread] went home”, with no overt marker just justapositions modifying the main clause. Used in Japanese, Thai, Shan, Lao, Malagasy. 

Internally headed relative - "[the man ate the bread] went home", the nucleous is in the relative clause itself. Used in Navajo, Apache, Haida. 

If you know about the languages left in blank, please let me know!

[russianswords]

What to watch in russian language?

It’s a very good question! Thank you, Tiff! So, russian television mostly is an adaptation of some European and American tv shows, serials and films. But! There are some really good stuff, that I would like to mention. *it’s important that I chose shows, serials and films that *I* like, because you can easily find all this popular&well-known stuff on internet, but I want to show something that is worth watching in only my opinion:) >>TV SHOWS<< • Иван Ургант And yes, everyone chooses it. But there are reasons why! 1 - it’s funny, 2 - you can watch it on YouTube for free (it updates everyday, so all series are fresh), 3 - it’s a very good version of Jimmy Fallon. WATCH IT! • StandUp на ТНТ So, it’s standup on TNT. Everything is clear, I think. It’s funny and it’s a good practice of intermediate+ level (I watch English standups all the time :D) And pay attention to the site of the channel “ТНТ”, there are the most interesting things for teens (in my opinion) You also can watch Танцы на ТНТ, Импровизация, Comedy Club, Где логика? etc. You can find anything you want. • Уральские пельмени Old comedians with kind jokes about russian reality. It’s not THAT funny, but one of that things that you can watch to improve Russian language and understanding of our culture:) >>SERIALS<< • Измены It’s a serial on TNT again. But it’s a good one, I mean picture and idea, just find it on internet and watch:) • Закон каменных джунглей ZKD It’s TNT production again :) It’s about some “bad” teens, maybe something like British “skins”. • Нюхач It’s something like idea of “Sherlock”, but the main character is a snuff-taker, he breathes in and finds important information. Maybe you will like it!:) >>FILMS<< I can’t help you with films. I, and the most part of russians, don’t watch our films. It’s not interesting, it’s awkward, clumsy. I can’t help you with it. I don’t know any good modern russian film. > If it is too difficult for you, try to watch cartoons > if you have watched all of this, try to find films of not-russian production but with Russian voiceover > remember of YouTube, there are a lot of Russian people:)

[spanishskulduggery]

¿Cómo se usa el verbo "pretender"?

The verb pretender is definitely not “to pretend” [which is fingir “to feign” or engañar “to deceive”]. Someone who is a “pretender” as in “someone who deceives” is normally called a farsante [lit. “someone carrying out a farce”] or mentiroso/a “liar”

It’s mostly used as “to hope” or “to have expectations”.

The root word is “before” + “to stretch/lay out/tendency”… It comes out as something like “a hopeful” as in someone who hasn’t done something yet, but they hope to do it. It comes across as “to do something in the hopes of something else happening”

In some contexts it does get translated as “to attempt” as well: pretendió persuadirme “he/she was trying/attempting to persuade me”, or ¿qué pretendes decir? “what is it you’re trying to say?” or “what do you mean by that?”

All that to say, pretender is commonly used the way you’d see pensar “to plan” [as opposed to pensar “to think”] or esperar “to hope for”.

In that way I’d say it’s most common to planear, hacer planes, pensar or someone who “aspires to” something, or it comes across as intentar or tratar de (hacer algo) as “to try”

The other usage which is somewhat dated but does show up in very prominent works of literature is that pretender is also used as “to woo” or “to court” someone. Here it again means “to attempt” or “to put into place”

You’ll probably see something like el pretendiente [which I think is always masculine] which means “suitor”, as in someone who is “hoping” to be in a relationship or in dated terms someone who is “courting” someone in attempt to marry them. In the Odyssey you might read about Odysseus killing all of the pretendientes who were trying to make Penelope marry one of them.

In a non-romance situation, pretendiente means a “candidate” and synonymous to candidato/a or aspirante “hopeful / someone hoping for something”

You do see pretendiente as the more negative “pretender” in the sense of los pretendientes al trono “pretenders to the throne”… not that they’re “pretending” to be the ruler, but they’re trying to stand out as candidates and take it for themselves.

[foxlanguages]

Say this instead of that

Some synonyms for common adjectives in Spanish

bonito - agraciado, bello, lindo, precioso

feo - antiestético, desagradable, horrendo, atroz, feúcho

grande - mayúsculo, voluminoso, amplio, vasto

pequeño - minúsculo, diminuto, chico, reducido

perfecto - ideal, magistral, sublime, insuperable, magnífico

malo - malvado, maligno, malévolo, infame, vil, cruel

bueno - bondadoso, benévolo, benigno, clemente, indulgente

cómodo - descansado, placentero, confortable, grato

común - general, genérico, ordinario, usual, frecuente

extraño - raro, insólito, singular, inverosímil, curioso

alegre - jovial, gozoso, regocijado, jubiloso, radiante, animado, festivo

triste - sombrío, melancólico, deprimido, acongojado, mustio

vacío - desocupado, libre, deshabitado, solitario

lleno - colmado, saturado, pleno, repleto, atiborrado, atestado

frecuente - repetido, continuo, periódico, usual, regular

inteligente - lúcido, listo, ingenioso, hábil

[miss-manley]

Negation Turkish

Negation is formed by the suffix -ma

This suffix always appears before the tense suffix

Yapıyor —> Yapmıyor

He/She does —> She/He does not

[allthingslinguistic]

The Language Sounds That Could Exist, But Don’t

It’s the third of my collab videos with Tom Scott, and it’s about the FORBIDDEN AREAS of the International Phonetic Alphabet! 

[how-to-make-mistakes]

Russian expressions: nose

(Stressed vowels marked in red)

Бормотать себе под нос — to mutter under one’s breath

Водить (кого-либо) за нос — to string someone along

Воротить нос — to turn one’s nose up, to be picky

Держать нос по ветру — to trim the sails to the wind

Задирать нос — to cock one’s nose, to be arrogant

Зарубить на носу — to remember well, to nick down, to make a good note (mostly used in imperative)

Note: etymologically, this one doesn’t have anything to do with the human nose. The most popular version of its actual meaning is “to make a cut on a plant” (so as to mark something one shouldn’t forget). This piece of wood probably had a shape resembling a nose.

Клевать носом — to doze, to nod (when not expected to, because of getting tired or bored)

Кровь из носу — urgently, necessarily (for needs or duties)

Ex.: Пора собраться. Нам кровь из носу нужно закончить работу к среде, а мы ещё не начинали! – Time to pick ourselves up. We need to finish the work by Wednesday, and we haven’t even started yet!

На носу — very close (temporal)

Остаться с носом — to let someone fool you/ to get nothing

Повесить нос (also: повесить голову) — to break down, to get upset; hence «Выше нос!» is used to cheer someone up.

Совать нос (в + Prepositional) — to pry into something, to nose

У (кого-либо) под носом — under someone’s nose, right in front of someone

[allthingslinguistic]

How to teach yourself linguistics online for free

Wish you were enrolled in an intro linguistics class this semester? Starting a linguistics major and looking for extra help? Trying to figure out whether you should study linguistics and what comes after?  Whether you’re just trying to grasp the basics of linguistics or you’re trying to construct a full online linguistics course, here’s a comprehensive list of free linguistics websites, podcasts, videos, blogs, and other resources from around the internet: 

Linguistics Podcasts

Specific episodes:

The International Phonetic Alphabet and vowels

Constituency

Gricean Maxims and presuppositions

Kids These Days aren’t ruining language

Learning languages linguistically

Phonemes and palatalization

Prepositions, determiners, verbs

Morphemes and the wug test

Why do we gesture when we talk?

Syllables

Podcasts in general:

Lingthusiasm

The History of English Podcast

Talk the Talk

Lexicon Valley

The World in Words

A Way With Words

Vocal Fries

Linguistics Videos

Modular topics:

NativLang (cartoons)

The Ling Space

Tom Scott’s Language Files

Arika Okrent (whiteboard videos)

Structured video series like an online course:  

Introduction to Linguistics (TrevTutor)

Another intro linguistics series (DS Bigham)

Phonology (TrevTutor)

Mathematical linguistics (TrevTutor)

Syntax (TrevTutor)

Another syntax series following the chapter structure of a free online syntax textbook (Caroline Heycock)

The Virtual Linguistics Campus at Marburg University

“Miracles of Human Language” (on Coursera from Leiden University)

Blog posts

General

How much do I need to know before taking intro linguistics? (Spoiler: not much) 

28 tips for doing better in your intro linguistics course

How to find a topic for your linguistics essay or research paper

For typesetting linguistics symbols: What is LaTeX and why do linguists love it? (with sample LaTeX doc to download and modify).

Further linguistics resources about specific areas, such as sociolinguistics, psycholinguistics, language acquisition (first/second), historical linguistics, neurolinguistics, prescriptivism. 

Phonetics & Phonology

How to make your own paper model of the larynx

Teaching phonetics using lollipops

How to remember the IPA vowel chart

How to remember the IPA consonant chart

IPA transcription practice

A detailed explanation of sonorants, obstruents, and sonority

A very elaborate Venn diagram of English phonological features

The basics of how Optimality Theory works, with coffee analogy

Allophones of /t/, explained with internet gifs

Several good visualizations and explanations of the vocal tract

How to type IPA on your phone (Android and iOS) 

Various ways to type IPA on a computer

Morphology & Syntax

Morphological typology cartoons

So you asked the internet how to draw syntax trees. Here’s why you’re confused.

Types of trees: a sentence is an S, a sentence is an IP, a sentence is a TP

A step-by-step guide to drawing a syntax tree, with gifs

Distributed Morphology

Garden path sentences: how they work, some examples

Structural ambiguity and understanding people in Ipswich

How to draw trees on a computer (TreeForm and phpSyntaxTree) 

Pronoun typology and “the gay fanfiction problem”

The solution to violent example sentences: Pokemon

Semantics & Pragmatics

The difference between epistemic and deontic, necessity and possibility (with bonus modals as Hogwarts houses)

Why learn semantics? Comebacks to annoying people.

Presuppositions, implicature and entailment, and more presuppositions in Lizzie Bennet Diaries

Gricean maxims in Welcome to Night Vale

Scalar implicature and a duck gif

Giving a shit about Negative Polarity Items, NPIs explained using Mean Girls references, and a follow-up on Free Choice Items

The lambda calculus for absolute dummies

The Lambda Calculator (software for practising in Heim & Kratzer style)

Teaching & Academic/career advice

Linguistics resources for high school teachers

Teaching linguistics to 9-14 year olds

On writing an IB extended essay in linguistics (& follow-up)

IPA Bingo

IPA Jeopardy and IPA Hangman

Practising syntax trees using cards and string/straws

Find a linguistics olympiad near you!

Editing linguistics Wikipedia articles instead of writing a final paper that no one but the prof will read (see also wikiedu.org)

Should you go to grad school in linguistics? Maybe

Figuring out if you actually want to go to linguistics grad school

How to decide which linguistics grad school to go to

How to look for linguistics undergrad programs

How to interact with someone who’s just given a talk

An extensive list of undergrad and/or student-friendly conferences - apply to one near you!

Advice for linguistics profs on increasing enrollment and supporting non-academic careers

Linguistics jobs - a series about careers outside academia

Languages

Linguistic approaches to language learning resource roundup

Will linguistics help with language learning? / Will learning a second language help with linguistics?

The problem with “economically useful” as a reason for language learning

Further link roundups

This list not enough? Try these further masterposts: 

A very long list of linguistics movies, documentaries, and TV show episodes

A list of books (fiction and nonfiction) about linguistics

A comprehensive list of language and linguistics podcasts, from Superlinguo 

A very long list of linguistics YouTube channels and other free online videos about linguistics 

20 linguistics blogs I recommend following

How to explain linguistics to your friends and family this holiday season

[thewordhord]

[the-bibrarian]

[lagom-languages-deactivated2022]

B1/B2 is the worst level of language learning to be at bc when ur C1 and people ask you if you speak a language, ur like hell ya bitch i do, and when ur A1/A2 ur like umm not really, but when you’re B1/B2 it’s like??? do i speak that language???

[miss-manley]

Quantifiers and Pronouns Turkish

Birçok - Many

Birkaç - Few

Tüm - All

Bütün - All

Kisi - People

Herkes - Everyone

Kimse - Someone

Hiçbir kimse - No one

Hiçbir şey - Nothing

Bazı - Some

[nazarrr]

Cozy vocab in Turkish

Inspired by x 

öpücük - kiss

film - movie

kucaklaşmak- cuddles

kazak - sweater

yastık - pillow

kahve - coffee

çorap - socks

kitaplar - books

rahatlık - comfort

battaniye - blanket

şekerleme - nap

şömine - fireplace

kedi - cat

ısı - warmth

yıldızlar - stars

çay - tea

sarılmak - hug

mum - candle

yumuşak - soft

narin - delicate

tatlı - sweet

konforlu - comfortable

ılık - warm

öpüşmek - to kiss

sarılmak - to hug

önem vermek - to take care

uzanmak - to lie down

sarılmak - to cuddle

okumak - to read

uyumak - to sleep

dinlenmek - to rest

[freefallandkurt-deactivated2021]

Courses in Russian online

Hi, babes.

A couple of days ago I found the official site of Pushkin Institute and it’s awesome. It is translated into several languages, e.g. English, Chinese, German, Spanish and others.

There are Russian courses for students of any level.

There are also lots of courses in Russian, for example, a course on cooking the Russian way, modern Russian art, Old Church Slavonic course and many other topics. Unfortunately, I don’t think there are subtitles for these courses and the courses themselves are in Russian, so I’d recommend them to people with B1+.

And here you can take a test to assess your level of fluency.

There’s also a site for children here. It has very simple materials so it might be suitable for A1-A2 levels. Here are words by themes and here is a little video on verbs of motion and here - on types of verbs.

[mesogeios]

“Some things could only be written in a foreign language; they are not lost in translation, but conceived by it. Foreign verbs of motion could be the only ways of transporting the ashes of familial memory. After all, a foreign language is like art—an alternative reality, a potential world. Once it is discovered, one can no longer go back to monolinguistic existence.”

— Svetlana Boym, “Estrangement as a Lifestyle: Shklovsky and Brodsky”

[miss-manley]

Hebrew alphabet

[miss-manley]

Unit 2 Vocab

Third - ثالث

To me; for me - لي

Camels ابل

Three - ثلاث

Tools - آلات

No - لا

From - من

In front of - أمام

Perfect - تمام

Ants - نمل

You - انتم

Secondary - ثانوي

Day - يوم

July - يوليو

Grateful - ممنون

May - مايو

And - و

Colour - لون

June - يونيو

Houses - بيوت

Financing - تمويل

Or - أو

Representative - ممثل

First - اول

When - لما

Hills - قلال

Whose - لمن

Like - مثل

Hill - تل

The - آل

Death - موت

[wonderful-language-sounds]

Overview

Alphabet

Hebrew Pronunciation Dictionary

Basic Info

Courses & Grammar

Ancient Hebrew Resources

Bliubliu

Clozemaster

FSI Basic Hebrew Course

Hebrew-Language.com 

Hebrew Vocabulary

HUJI Course

In Hebrew 

Learn Hebrew Easily 

Morfix Dictionary

Teach Me Hebrew

Ukindia

UT Austin: Hebrew Materials

Verbs

Verb Conjugator

Books

Assimil Hebrew

A Textbook of Israeli Hebrew 

Colloquial Hebrew + Audio

Everyday Hebrew

Grammar of Modern Hebrew

Hebrew from Scratch

Linguaphone Hebrew

Modern Hebrew Grammar

Modern Hebrew: Intermediate

Pimsleur Modern Hebrew

Teach Yourself Hebrew

Media & Youtube

HebrewPod101

Learn Hebrew with Maha

Memrise

Mondly Languages

Mango Languages

Radio