Easy Languages: Stories of Language Learning

Join Rita in this special episode and listen to our remarkable guest, Tim Keeley - a hyperpolyglot & author - as he tells us about his fantastic life journey in 30 languages and gives us valuable insights into the historical and cultural ties that bind 4 of the major East Asian Languages: Chinese, Vietnamese, Korean and Japanese. Tim explains - examples in support - the fascinating similarities these languages share and how it is an advantage to learn them together.

Show Notes

Polyglot Gathering

Polyglots mentioned in this episode:

Map of Japan

Ryukyuan languages, Japan

Chinese Dynasties Timeline

Scripts & Language Structure:

In this episode we introduce artificial languages: a group of languages spoken, among other places, on Avatar's Pandora, or Tolkien's Middle-Earth. But the first stop of our trip is actually in Eastern Europe, where Esperanto was created in 1887.

In the second part of the episode, we answer questions from two of our listeners, Anna and Joanna.

Tune in and join the language talk!

Show Notes

Esperanto

Other Constructed Languages (Wikipedia)

13 Sentences to Deconstruct a Language

What makes some languages harder to learn than others? In this episode, we attempt to entangle the objective factors - as to why a language is complex - from the subjective ones. We also dedicate a section to talking about our experiences with those languages which we traditionally think are the most difficult to master.

Show Notes

Foreign Service Institute Language Rankings (Foreign Language Training)

Can We Measure Language Difficulty by the Numbers? (Ofer Tirosh, TowardsScience)

Rank of Language Difficulty (Michael Campbell, Glossika Blog)

What is the Hardest Language to Learn? (Steve Kaufmann, The Linguist Blog)

Past tense ending in Turkish: ‑mış (TurkishTexbook)

13 Russian Verbs of Motion to Move Your Learning Forward (Kelly Virginia Phelan, FluentU)

Chinese Classifiers: What Are They And How To Use Them ( Angie, ChineseEdge)

Japanese Formal & Informal Speech (Lydia Thron, Wyzant)

Conjugation of The Verb To Eat in Japanese (JapaneseVerbConjugator)

Join Rita and Raffaele in this new episode as they discuss the importance of using comprehensible input throughout your language learning journey, and how a certain degree of difficulty is needed and welcome while consuming language-related content.

In the second part of the episode, they share a few resources like apps, books, and courses that make use of this principle and have helped them in the past and can help you too!

But what does Rita really think about all this? Can you believe that even in-comprehensible input can help?

Show Notes

Dog/Language Learning meme (Fluent Forever)

Resources mentioned:

YouTube videos:

Yakutia, also known as the Sakha Republic, the land where the Taiga meets the Tundra, is one of the coldest inhabited areas in the world and home to one of the most unique and thrilling languages and cultures in the Russian Federation. At Easy Languages, we are happy to count Easy Sakha as one of those languages.

In this episode, you'll listen to Tatiana O. & Olga Y. share all the essential facts about their fascinating language, the Sakha language, and give us their tips for learning languages in the second section.

And if you want to learn some basics in Sakha, become a member & join us for a fun after-show!

Show Notes

What is Sakha/Yakut?

In this episode, we have a guest: Fredrik grew up in a small town close to Gothenburg, Sweden, but has lived in Australia, Turkey, Hungary, and Spain, where he lives now. When he's not studying languages, he teaches Swedish as the Swedish Linguist. In the first section of this episode, Fredrik tells us a bit more about his story.

In the second section, we discuss the intelligibility between Scandinavian languages, and one of the features that make Swedish unique: språkmelodi, or the distinctive intonation of this beautiful language. But we also investigate the unusual meaning hidden behind a Swedish day of the week...

Finally, in the last section of the episode, Fredrik opens up about how he really learns languages, and what lesson Hungarian taught him... Tune in and enjoy Fredrik's language journey around the world!

Show Notes

In this episode, we discuss why you should consider joining an online language-learning community if it still needs to be made the case. And there is no lack of reasons to do so!

You can also listen to us share our experiences with language Apps, Forums and how you could use those cooperative settings to level up your language game!

Besides, we talked about how a language challenge could benefit your learning and how to choose the community that suits you best.

There's so much power when language enthusiasts come together!

Listen up and join the fun!

Show Notes

Rita’s suggestions:

- Samuel Vieira and Marjolein Benschop's Language Community

- Speaking Challenge (Jonathan Huggings)

Raf's suggestions:

- https://www.hellotalk.com
- https://www.easy-languages.org/our-languages

Happy New Year, language lovers! Have you ever set a new year's resolution to learn a new language? If so, you're not alone! Learning a new language is a common goal for many people at the start of the new year, but unfortunately, a majority of these resolutions fail. Why is this? Rita and Raffaele discuss the common pitfalls of language learning resolutions and how to avoid them by setting SMART goals instead.

In the second half of the episode, Rita and Raffaele will share their own experiences with language learning resolutions, including the challenges they've faced and the strategies they've used to overcome them. Plus, there's a resolution they want to share with you...

Join us and get ready to kick off your language-learning journey with confidence!

Show Notes

Meet Marian Brosschot from Easy Welsh as she discusses, with Rita, how Culture and language are inseparable.

Marian was raised bilingual Welsh-Dutch at home in Wales. She traveled quite a bit and has been teaching Welsh and English abroad for some time. In 2020, Marian B. went to Argentina for a year to work as a Welsh teacher in Patagonia and is currently studying Linguistics at the University of Bangor in North Wales. In this episode, she shares valuable tips for those who want to join the ever-growing number of students learning Welsh and other critical cultural facts about Wales, mysterious names in Welsh, and the biggest Cultural event in Europe.

"Hoffech chi gael coffi" before starting?

Show Notes

Super Easy Welsh 1: How to order drinks in Welsh

Marian’s Brosschot Youtube Channel(Galés con Marian)

Names of places in Wales mentionned in this episode:

Event in Wales:

Numbers of learners of Welsh in the UK

Quote from Jacques Leylavergne and Andrea Parra

In this episode Raffaele “goes solo” and tells you everything about Self-Talk, the incredibly underrated technique that can boost your speaking skills all the way to basic fluency. But how does it work exactly? What are its pros and cons? Join Raffaele and you’ll find out!

Raffaele also shares the news about the most recent addition to our Podcast network, and replies to a question from Easy French’s Hélène about frustration in language learning.

Show Notes

If you've been struggling with maintaining consistency in your language learning journey, Kerstin Cable has some words of wisdom to share.

Kerstin Cable is a language and communications coach, writer, and podcaster living in England. She is a native German speaker who has studied 10 languages, including her language crush, Welsh. Kerstin is the author of 15+ books and courses for language learners, co-organizer of the Women in Language conference, and creator of the Fluent Show podcast, along with being a popular speaker at language events. Kerstin Cable has been featured on BBC World Service, Süddeutsche Zeitung, and The Cut.

In today's episode:

And for those who joined our community on Patreon, you'll hear our multilingual after-show featuring Kerstin.

Show Notes

** [The Farewell Episode](https://www.fluent.show/240 **

** [How to Maintain a Language While Starting a New One (blog)](https://www.fluentlanguage.co.uk/blog/maintain-languages**

** [The Language Habit System:](www.fluentlanguage.co.uk/lhs**

In the first part of this episode, we tell the story of Vilfredo Pareto, the Italian economist who discovered a distribution law that changed economics, and how we can all apply this principle to language learning, especially acquiring vocabulary.

In the second part, we go into more detail and spill the beans on how we go about learning new words in the first stages of studying a language, and why it’s a bad idea to learn from lists of words.

Show Notes

Go on Dying! Do you wonder why Icelanders keep cursing each other regularly or where their names originated? Would you be able to name the God of Poetry in Icelandic mythology or even pronounce Thor or Odin's name correctly? Join Rita and her guest from Speak Viking, Óskar Bragi Stefansson, through Eddas, Sagas, on a journey to learning about an alluring language: Icelandic. Learn about the unofficial motto of Iceland and listen to Óskar explain how to implement the KISS principle effectively in learning Icelandic. And for those who joined our beautiful community, you'll get to know how to greet people in Icelandic during this jolly season along a few fun facts about Icelandic and much more. Bless, bless!

Show Notes

*Speak Viking Media: *

** Old Norse:**

*Bragi: *

*Eddas & Sagas: *

*Gunnar: *

*Þetta Reddast! It will all work out ok! Iceland’s Unofficial Motto: *

*How to ACTUALLY pronounce names from Norse Mythology (Icelandic): *

Pronunciation of Iceland’s Famous Volcanic Glacier:

Salam!

This episode discusses how Arabic varieties around the "Arab world" differ from each other and where a beginner should start their journey with a fascinating yet not fully appreciated language. Therefore, we interrogate which variety one should learn and how long it takes to learn Arabic. And last but not least, we risk asking the taunting question: isn't "darija" -the ugly duckling of the Arabic dialects- underrated? We share our views on these highly controversial topics and a few fun facts surrounding this West Semitic language.

And for those who took the leap and joined our community, you'll be able to learn some basic phrases in Arabic, along with Raffaele, in the aftershow! Yallah!

Show Notes

La langue arabe: Son histoire étonnante et fonctionnalités (Paul, Langfocus)

Arabic Language (Britannica)

Moroccan DARIJA (An Arabic Dialect??) (Paul, Langfocus)
Arabic Dialects - Which Arabic dialect to learn? (Al Andalusi)

Read & Write ANYTHING in Arabic in only 6 lessons! Alphabet #1 (LearnArabicwithMaha)

Learn Lebanese (with Dalia) (Instagram)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TLnr17rEFrQ(Language Simp)

Arabic Alphabet Explained by an American (Language Simp)

Saying the Arabic Alphabet for 10 Hours Straight (Language Simp)

Transliteration and texting in Arabic - Why So many numbers? (talkinarabic)

What makes you happy? (Easy Egyptian Arabic 23)

We Asked Egyptians What They Were Doing! (Easy Egyptian Arabic 36 with Tim from Easy Dutch)

What Are Your Hobbies? (Easy Tunisian Arabic 13)

In this episode, we meet José, a polyglot from Bolivia who moved to Spain and currently studies linguistics, but only when he's not creating content for Easy Spanish.

We discuss how Spanish varieties around the world differ, and what is voseo. But most importantly, we answer the ultimate question for those who want to learn Spanish: which variety should you study?

Finally, should grammar be the priority when you learn a new language? Does grammar even exist? We share our views on these hotly debated topics and more!

Show Notes

In this episode, we delve into the dark depths of the etymology of words like Halloween and Samhain! But fear not, it’s just an excuse for us to talk about Celtic languages and some words that creeped into the English language!

We also covered a hotly debated topic: can you really learn a language in 3 months? And if not, how long does it really take to do so? We’ll check what scientific studies say, but we will also share our own opinions and experiences.

Show Notes

In this episode we celebrate a new milestone: the Easy Greek YouTube channel has reached 50k subscribers! We invited Dimitris to learn a little bit more about his passions but also his family, heritage and languages.

We also discussed the history of the Greek language and its influences on today's Europe and why his students decided to learn the language of mythology and philosophy.

Finally, Dimitris shares his approach to raising multilingual children and his language-learning tips for grown-ups.

Show Notes

Easy Greek Videos:

Little Kook, Athens (Tripadvisor)

Strange Brew, Athens (Tripadvisor)

Saganaki (Wikipedia)

History of Greek (Wikipedia)

The Ingenious Language, Andrea Marcolongo (Amazon)

Book Review (The Guardian)

Easy Greek Podcast 94: Οι κατηγορίες των Easy Greekers

Big Fat Greek Wedding, "Give my any word" scene with Mr Portokalos

The word for orange (fruit) in many languages, map (Maps on the Web)

In Greek mythology, apricots were believed to be "golden apples" (Jogobella)

Greece-Italy relations (Wikipedia)

"Una faccia, una razza" (Greek Reporter)

One person, one language (Wikipedia)

Can our personalities shift when speaking a different language? Do we suddenly become more punctual when expressing ourselves in German and more joyful when communicating in Brazilian Portuguese? In this episode, we take you on a journey from Berlin to Rio, talk about music for our tip of the week, and present you with three of the most interesting untranslatable words in Portuguese. To your headphones!

Show Notes

Easy German & Easy Brazilian Portuguese Video Collaboration

Germany vs Brazil (Easy German 470) (Easy German)

What Do Brazilians Think About Germans? (Easy Portuguese 67) (Easy Brazilian Portuguese)

Untranslatable Words

Korean "Noonchi" explained (Kozziecom)

Saudade (Eurolondon)

Xodó & Cafuné (Caminhos Languages)

Languages and personality shift

Switching languages can also switch personality (Reuters)

How switching languages can change your personality(New Scientist)

Illustration of the three untranslatable words via Brazilian Music

Dominguinhos - "Eu Só Quero Um Xodó"

Elba Ramalho - Ai Que Saudade D'Ocê (Live)

In this episode, we invite you to meet Cari.
You'll get to hear the following:

Show Notes

Easy German

Cari

Easy English

Learning a new language from scratch? You might already know thousands of words! In this episode, we show you how to improve your language awareness and possibly save months in your language journey by using this infallible trick in our tip of the week section: cognate vocabulary and how to navigate the intricacies of false friends!

Show Notes

Hi, it's Rita and Raffaele! In this first episode of the Easy Languages Podcast, we introduce ourselves (and our accents) and discuss why we love languages. We are both part of the Easy Languages network and just recently met in Barcelona, where we produced videos about funny idioms, among other things. As our week's tip, we explain why you should stop translating individual words in your head.

Show Notes

Who said language learning has to be difficult? Join Rita, Raffaele and the teams from the Easy Languages network as they share their stories of language learning and answer your questions. Members get bonus content, monthly Q&As, discounts and many more perks. Learn more at easy-languages.org/podcast!