As fun as it can be to learn a language, just learning it with no context makes it harder to keep my interest. Add some context, however, and bam!
Human: reading new toy's instructions in a different language, visiting a foreign country and ordering food, following along in a conversation on #Duolingo, etc.
Computer: fiddling with someone's open source project that is in a language you don't know, doing a code jam for a particular framework/language, etc.
What's the most obscure hyper-local word or phrase you know?
For example, where & when I grew up, woodlice were knows as "cheeselogs". As far as I know, that's specific to one town in the UK. I don't know how long it was in general use, or even if it continues to this day.
"We have challenges" is one of the most used phrases for "We screwed up and have a problem. Sometimes "challenges" is a legitimate term but it's still far overused. Overuse dilutes meaning.
Full disclosure: I know Alex Cochran. But that’s not why I was so knocked out by this book. ‘The Pollutant Speaks’ is a beautifully written exploration of themes I’m already obsessive about: social justice, the philosophy of language, aliens, big spaceships…
It's always nice to cheer for people I know there. If you'd like to connect, here's my invitation link. Just let me know here that you're a Masto friend and I will follow you back.
Me: "It's after 3, let's get back to sleep."
My brain: "Yeah sleep's cool, but can you name all of the #Indoeuropean#language families and a few examples of each? You might need to explain that to someone sometime."
Me: "Sure! Well, there's Germanic (English, German, Dutch), Slavic (...."
--- 15 minutes later ---
Me: "Oh, and of course let's not forget the Celtic lang-- [looks at clock] -- I hate you, brain."
One of my favorite new apps I now use all the time is Wunderbar: https://wunderbarapp.com. It puts a single word in a language you're trying to learn, along with its definition, in the macOS menu bar. This changes on a timer you can set. I have mine change every 5 minutes. Worth the $4.
Translation:
Hey, duck babes. Did you come to look for something to eat? Yes. You came to look for something to eat. But I can't give you anything to eat because of bird flu.
It turns out that in Norwegian "Gå løp" literally means "Go run". Not sure if those words in Norwegian are used together in such way very often, but at least I found some examples.
I'm amused that this sounds almost exactly like "Gallop" in English (BTW, there's a word "Галоп" in Russian that sounds almost identical to "Gallop".)
(from Neo-Latin de fenestrā) 1. The act of throwing someone or something out of a window. 2. A swift dismissal or expulsion (as from a political party or office).
The term was coined around the time of an incident in Prague Castle in the year 1618.
"Recognition of the significance of speech acts has illuminated the ability of language to do other things than describe reality. In the process the boundaries among the philosophy of language, the philosophy of action, aesthetics, the philosophy of mind, political philosophy, and ethics have become less sharp. "
A newspaper feature using Pokemon to teach Japanese dialects gained traction on Twitter due to an unexpected double meaning. Twitter users were surprised to learn that “chinchin" means something...different there.
@romancelandia
Brit friends, help? Would someone from a good family--not aristocracy, but perhaps landed gentry--refer to themselves as "a posh" when talking to someone else. As in, "I may be a posh from (place), but..."