Watch Your Language Blog

Happy Macaron Day!

Tomorrow, March 20th, is the Jour du Macaron (literally, Day of the Macaron) in France. Started five years ago by the famous French pastry chef Pierre Hermé, it’s a day when you can sample free macarons at some of the most celebrated macarons makers, including Hermé, Jean-Paul Hévin, and more.... More

Tags: flavors, France, French, French food, Paris, pastry
March 19, 2010

 

The 2010 Census and Languages

We received notification recently that we were about to receive our 2010 Census forms in the mail any day now. I’ve had a secret love of filling out forms ever since I was asked to fill the circles in completely with a No. 2 pencil on an IQ test when I was in the 2nd grade, so this is super exciting for me. If you’re not as nerdy about circles and pencils as I am, this might not be as exciting for you, but there’s a linguistic interest to the census, as every census has a section on languages. According to 2000 Census figures, 46,951,595 Americans stated that they spoke a language other than English. How will the numbers have changed since the last census in 2000? While we’ll have to wait until the end of the year for the results, you can look back into the extensive amount of data the government has gathered on language and demographics from previous censuses on their website. The Census Bureau also provides an extensive list of languages for respondees to choose from. My favorite designation? “NOT IN UNIVERSE.” Perhaps this applies to all the alien languages we’ve been talking so much about lately on this blog? (SUZANNE)

Tags: census
March 15, 2010

 

Inventing a Language

Lately, we’ve been discussing invented languages a good amount on this blog (here, here, and here), mostly dealing with the imaginary alien languages of films like Avatar and District 9. And it seems that we’re not the only ones with this focus. This week, the New York Times posted an interesting article on “making up” languages.... More

Tags: film, invented languages, Na'vi
March 12, 2010

 

Oscar for Foreign Language Film: Anything But Na’vi

The buzz around the Oscars seems mostly focused on the triumph of The Hurt Locker and its director Kathryn Bigelow, but we couldn’t help commenting on the foreign language ties to this year’s Oscars. Argentinian Juan José Campanella, accepting his Best Foreign Language Film Academy Award for El Secreto de Sus Ojos (The Secret in Their Eyes), said he was grateful that the Academy didn’t consider Na’vi a foreign language. (Ben Stiller considers it a foreign language, and tried to speak it when he came out on stage dressed as one of James Cameron’s characters, though to my relatively untrained ears, Stiller’s Na’vi sounded a lot more like Yiddish.) This made us wonder: what DOES qualify as a foreign language film at the Oscars? Apparently a majority of the film’s dialogue must be in a language other than English; if too much English dialogue is included, a film may be disqualified from inclusion in the category. (To this point, it’s interesting to note that in 1983, Le Bal —a film from France with no dialogue whatsoever—was nominated in this category.) In 2006, the Academy began allowing countries to submit films in which the dialogue was in a language other than the native language country. So let’s say you made a film in Great Britain, but the dialogue was entirely in Polish? You’d be eligible for the prize. As long as it was good enough…and, apparently, as long as it’s not in Na’vi. (Speaking of foreign languages and the Oscars, did you know that Best Actress Academy Award Winner Sandra Bullock speaks fluent German? Now you do.)


March 8, 2010

 

Translator vs Interpreter

These two terms are not the same, but they are often mistakenly used as synonyms. The Arabic Interpreters blog has a nice summary of the difference:... More

Tags: interpretation, interpreter, translation, translator
March 5, 2010

 

Strange Maps’ Accidental Geography

While it’s not exactly about languages, I couldn’t help but point you in the direction of Strange Maps collection of maps in unexpected places, Accidental Geography. A cloud shaped like New Jersey is always worth linking to around these parts.

Tags: maps
March 1, 2010

 

Foreign Languages Desirable to Employers in UK

According to a poll of 500 employers in Britain:

… languages came second only to IT in a list of desirable skills for job candidates [in the UK]. One in four (43%) recruiters say speaking a second language gives a candidate the x-factor when applying for a job.
... More

Tags: applying for a job, foreign language, French, German, job, Spanish
February 26, 2010

 

Nice Games, Eh?

The other day I saw one of those Olympic filler pieces that highlight the local culture and/or language of the host city. Not surprisingly, since the games are being held in Canada, the segment focused on the use of “eh?”... More

Tags: Canadian English, English
February 24, 2010

 

Kawaguchi vs. Kavaguti

Watching the Olympic Games is a feast for language lovers - trying to hear glimpses of languages as the athletes wait for their scores, catching the French translations of every single announcement, and, especially, listening to the commentators’ interpretations when pronouncing the names of the athletes. Language Hat points to a New York Times article on Japanese-born Russian figure skater Yuko Kawaguchi/Kavaguti, and reminds us that it’s not as simple as a name change. The resulting discussion in the comments section is an interesting look at Russian orthography and phonology.

Tags: Olympic Games, Russian
February 23, 2010

 

International Mother Language Day

February 21st is the United Nations’ International Mother Language Day. ... More

Tags: mother language, United Nations
February 19, 2010