Aspirations occurs in English in initial onsets like in ‘pat’ [pʰæt], ‘tack’ [’tʰæk] or ‘cat’ [’kʰæt]. It is not phonemic, since it doesn’t distinguish meanings, but it’s distinctive in Mandarin e.g. 皮 [pʰi] (skin) vs. 比 [pi] (proportion).
This is the vowel used in English “sad”. It exists as an allophone of other vowels in Turkish, Russian, Dutch, Slovak, Swedish and French (as a nasal vowel).
Phonemically, it exists in English, all Arabic languages/dialects, all Berber languages, Somali, Afrikaans, Norwegian, Finnish, Estonian, Latvian, Lithuanian, Danish, Kurdish, Azeri, Persian, Qazaq, Uzbek, Turkmen, Uyghur, Bashkir, Orya, Sinhalese, and in some dialects of Portuguese, Andalusian Spanish, Greek, Romanian.
In my “Anthropological Approaches to Linguistics” class, we were given some statements to “agree” or “disagree” with.
“Chinese is more difficult to learn than other languages”
“Texting is ruining english”
“There are some languages without a grammar”
“German is an ugly sounding language but good for describing technology”
“If everyone in the world spoke English, things would be simpler and easier”
“People who don’t know how to read and write don’t really know their language”
These are the ones I strongly disagreed with. I was shocked at how many people either agreed or weren’t sure about these statements, considering that everyone in that class will have already taken at least two semesters worth of anthropology or linguistics courses…
Why’d you disagree with the English being simpler statement? You might think it’s boring, but it wouldn’t be more difficult.
I disagree because it’s quite a colonialist way of thinking. I don’t think that life would be simpler or better if most of the world lost their languages and was forced to speak English.
Portrait of Mrs. Mary Pemberton, half-length (c.1780). George Romney (English, 1734-1802). Oil on canvas.
The sitter was born in 1756 and was the daughter of Thomas Wale and Louisa Rodolphina von Rahten. In 1780 she married Thomas Pemberton at Shelford and lived at Shelworth.
Edith Matthews, née Meredith. James Bolivar Manson (English, 1879-1945). Oil on canvas. Towner.
Manson married Lilian Beatrice Laugher, a violinist, and they moved to the Latin Quarter in Paris, renting a room for £1 a month and economising in a shared studio with Charles Polowetski, Bernard Gussow and Jacob Epstein, who became a lifelong friend and with whom he studied at the Académie Julian, still dominated by the Impressionists’ enemy, Adolphe Bouguereau; occasionally Jean-Paul Laurens tutored.
“What is jam? What makes something authentically jam? Can bacon really be made into jam?
It was all very Existentialist.
The answer to those questions is a bit complicated and non-definitive. The U.S. FDA has defined jam and jelly in very specific and mathematical terms (such-and-such percentage of juice to fruit to water to sugar = jam/jelly); it also uses jam and preserve interchangeably, for the most part. While interesting, the FDA’s definitions did not matter much to me because the FDA wasn’t really using the terms in the way that we usually use the terms. Also, the FDA wasn’t comprehensive in its definitions. It didn’t tackle other fruit spreads like marmalades or curds, for instance.
The more I looked into, the more I thought, dude, this information would make a good infographic.”
A video by Arika Okrent pointing out that one generation’s despised jargon is another generation’s unremarkable vocabulary. Old-timey peevers look ridiculous! (Psst, so do modern-day ones.)
On this website you can read Grimms’ fairy tales in 18 different languages! (English, German, Italian, Spanish, French, Portuguese, Russian, Polish, Dutch, Danish, Romanian, Finnish, Vietnamese, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Turkish and Hungarian)
Good afternoon, folks! Today’s statistical map looks at something that is a passionate cause of mine, and something to which I dedicate a fair bit of analysis every year. It is language diversity at the Eurovision, or rather, the lack thereof. Every year, I analyse the number of songs in languages other than English, and every year the statistics grow more disheartening for those of us who love linguistic diversity.
Last year, we had 6 songs entirely or almost entirely in a language other than English (15% of all songs). This year, we’re down to just 3 out of 43 songs completely in another language. That’s just under 7%and is quite frankly, lame. If we put together all the songs with at least a substantial part of the lyrics in another language than English - thus, disregarding Bulgaria’s promise of “10% Bulgarian” - it’s just 7/43 songs (16%), down from the previous all-time low of 17.5% in 2015, and much reduced compared to 21% in 2014 and 44% in 2013. It is becoming evident that delegations think English is necessary for a good placing at Eurovision - if you do the maths, as I did, it most certainly is not.
I’ve been watching the contest every year since the late 80s, and part of what I loved of pre-1999 Eurovision was the delectable buffet of linguistic delights it offered each year. When else in the year would one hear Turkish, Estonian, Romanian, and even minority languages like Breton and Neapolitan in quick succession? Out of my all-time favourites, only one of twenty is in English, and my all-time favourite is not even in a language I speak (and I speak several), because I didn’t need to understand the lyrics to feel the emotion of the performance. The creators of Eurovision designed the contest as an exhibition of Europe’s cultural diversity - united not by a single language, but by music. I feel sad to see even previously steadfast countries like Serbia jettison their beautiful languages and the contest I love with all my heart becoming more and more an Anglovision each year.
![Aspirated plosivesAspirations occurs in English in initial onsets like in ‘pat’ [pʰæt], ‘tack’ [’tʰæ](https://64.media.tumblr.com/336a13765fb031784e1593639b0bb427/49a2b1dfe50b20fa-60/s1280x1920/bacfce7c8a594925b494a66a1177334d9a84edb7.png "Aspirated plosivesAspirations occurs in English in initial onsets like in ‘pat’ [pʰæt], ‘tack’ [’tʰæ")
![Pronounciation of the digraph <OU> [ow] - Spanish (very rarely), Northern European Portuguese](https://64.media.tumblr.com/d59b3ffbdcb3f395a34a64913e12b2f4/becbddcc5ea3ae1b-27/s1280x1920/bed4ae9f83c4d9a6ad7fb54c1d106bb620a3efdd.png "Pronounciation of the digraph <OU> [ow] - Spanish (very rarely), Northern European Portuguese")
