Tag: language

○ 625 words to know in your target language ○

ennastudies:

asian-lang-stubyblr:

There is a really interesting blog called “Fluent Forever” that aids foreign language learners in tricks, tips and techniques to guide them to achieving fluency “quickly” and efficiently. One of the tricks is to learn these 625 vocab words in your target language, that way you have a basis to start delving into grammar with ease as you can understand a lot of vocab right off the bat. Plus this list of words are common across the world and will aid you in whatever language you are learning. Here is the list in thematic order :

• Animal: dog, cat, fish, bird, cow, pig, mouse, horse, wing, animal

• Transportation: train, plane, car, truck, bicycle, bus, boat, ship, tire, gasoline, engine, (train) ticket, transportation

• Location: city, house, apartment, street/road, airport, train station, bridge, hotel, restaurant, farm, court, school, office, room, town, university, club, bar, park, camp, store/shop, theater, library, hospital, church, market, country (USA, France, etc.), building, ground, space (outer space), bank, location

• Clothing: hat, dress, suit, skirt, shirt, T-shirt, pants, shoes, pocket, coat, stain, clothing

• Color: red, green, blue (light/dark), yellow, brown, pink, orange, black, white, gray, color

• People: son, daughter, mother, father, parent (= mother/father), baby, man, woman, brother, sister, family, grandfather, grandmother, husband, wife, king, queen, president, neighbor, boy, girl, child (= boy/girl), adult (= man/woman), human (≠ animal), friend (Add a friend’s name), victim, player, fan, crowd, person

• Job: Teacher, student, lawyer, doctor, patient, waiter, secretary, priest, police, army, soldier, artist, author, manager, reporter, actor, job

• Society: religion, heaven, hell, death, medicine, money, dollar, bill, marriage, wedding, team, race (ethnicity), sex (the act), sex (gender), murder, prison, technology, energy, war, peace, attack, election, magazine, newspaper, poison, gun, sport, race (sport), exercise, ball, game, price, contract, drug, sign, science, God

• Art: band, song, instrument (musical), music, movie, art

• Beverages: coffee, tea, wine, beer, juice, water, milk, beverage

• Food: egg, cheese, bread, soup, cake, chicken, pork, beef, apple, banana, orange, lemon, corn, rice, oil, seed, knife, spoon, fork, plate, cup, breakfast, lunch, dinner, sugar, salt, bottle, food

• Home: table, chair, bed, dream, window, door, bedroom, kitchen, bathroom, pencil, pen, photograph, soap, book, page, key, paint, letter, note, wall, paper, floor, ceiling, roof, pool, lock, telephone, garden, yard, needle, bag, box, gift, card, ring, tool

• Electronics: clock, lamp, fan, cell phone, network, computer, program (computer), laptop, screen, camera, television, radio

• Body: head, neck, face, beard, hair, eye, mouth, lip, nose, tooth, ear, tear (drop), tongue, back, toe, finger, foot, hand, leg, arm, shoulder, heart, blood, brain, knee, sweat, disease, bone, voice, skin, body

• Nature: sea, ocean, river, mountain, rain, snow, tree, sun, moon, world, Earth, forest, sky, plant, wind, soil/earth, flower, valley, root, lake, star, grass, leaf, air, sand, beach, wave, fire, ice, island, hill, heat, nature

• Materials: glass, metal, plastic, wood, stone, diamond, clay, dust, gold, copper, silver, material

• Math/Measurements: meter, centimeter, kilogram, inch, foot, pound, half, circle, square, temperature, date, weight, edge, corner

• Misc Nouns: map, dot, consonant, vowel, light, sound, yes, no, piece, pain, injury, hole, image, pattern, noun, verb, adjective

• Directions: top, bottom, side, front, back, outside, inside, up, down, left, right, straight, north, south, east, west, direction

• Seasons: Summer, Spring, Winter, Fall, season

• Numbers: 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 30, 31, 32, 40, 41, 42, 50, 51, 52, 60, 61, 62, 70, 71, 72, 80, 81, 82, 90, 91, 92, 100, 101, 102, 110, 111, 1000, 1001, 10000, 100000, million, billion, 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, number

• Months: January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August, September, October, November, December

• Days of the week: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday

• Time: year, month, week, day, hour, minute, second , morning, afternoon, evening, night, time

• Verbs: work, play, walk, run, drive, fly, swim, go, stop, follow, think, speak/say, eat, drink, kill, die, smile, laugh, cry, buy, pay, sell, shoot(a gun), learn, jump, smell, hear (a sound), listen (music), taste, touch, see (a bird), watch (TV), kiss, burn, melt, dig, explode, sit, stand, love, pass by, cut, fight, lie down, dance, sleep, wake up, sing, count, marry, pray, win, lose, mix/stir, bend, wash, cook, open, close, write, call, turn, build, teach, grow, draw, feed, catch, throw, clean, find, fall, push, pull, carry, break, wear, hang, shake, sign, beat, lift

• Adjectives: long, short (long), tall, short (vs tall), wide, narrow, big/large, small/little, slow, fast, hot, cold, warm, cool, new, old (new), young, old (young), good, bad, wet, dry, sick, healthy, loud, quiet, happy, sad, beautiful, ugly, deaf, blind, nice, mean, rich, poor, thick, thin, expensive, cheap, flat, curved, male, female, tight, loose, high, low, soft, hard, deep, shallow, clean, dirty, strong, weak, dead, alive, heavy, light (heavy), dark, light (dark), nuclear, famous

• Pronouns: I, you (singular), he, she, it, we, you (plural, as in “y’all”), they.

The original blogpost I copied this list from (it includes more tips & tricks to learning vocab) : https://fluent-forever.com/the-method/vocabulary/base-vocabulary-list/

I’m going to be making my own vocab lists using these words for my target languages of Korean, Mandarin Chinese, and Japanese. I’ll be posting the vocab by theme on my blog, so make sure to follow me https://asian-lang-stubyblr.tumblr.com if you are interesting in seeing those!

So useful! I really want to use this for Spanish now!

systlin:

I honestly always find the term ‘spinster’ as referring to an elderly, never-married woman as funny because you know what?

Wool was a huge industry in Europe in the middle ages. It was hugely in demand, particularly broadcloth, and was a valuable trade good. A great deal of wool was owned by monasteries and landed gentry who owned the land. 

And, well, the only way to spin wool into yarn to make broadcloth was by hand. 

This was viewed as a feminine occupation, and below the dignity of the monks and male gentry that largely ran the trade. 

So what did they do?

They hired women to spin it. And, turns out, this was a stable job that paid very well. Well enough that it was one of the few viable economic options considered ‘respectable’ outside of marriage for a woman. A spinster could earn quite a tidy salary for her art, and maintain full control over her own money, no husband required. 

So, naturally, women who had little interest in marriage or men? Grabbed this opportunity with both hands and ran with it. Of course, most people didn’t get this, because All Women Want Is Husbands, Right?

So when people say ‘spinster’ as in ‘spinster aunt’, they are TRYING to conjure up an image of a little old lady who is lonely and bitter. 

But what I HEAR are the smiles and laughter of a million women as they earned their own money in their own homes and controlled their own fortunes and lived life on their own terms, and damn what society expected of them. 

Please explain the difference between terrifying and horrifying! I’ve never heard that before

dearorpheus:

xshayarsha:

Terrifying: forthcoming, unnerving, never seems to fully materialize, pitch-black, veiled, formless, bloodcurdling in its subtle obscure way, devouring; it teases and haunts you when you can’t even name it. It’s overall psychological – you strive to make it take shape in your mind while it feeds on suspense, indeterminacy and ignorance.

Horrifying: stark, manifest, blood-soaked in front of your very eyes, sadistic, wild, frenzied, of a shining crimson; it shocks, menaces and assails you to the point of paralysis and dementia. It’s of a more visual, physical nature and brutally unambiguous; it doesn’t depend on anything else – it’s what follows the unveiling of the terrifying.

Terror/Horror were not meant to be synonyms but to convey distinct impressions – so choose your words wisely if you want to make good old Ann Radcliffe proud! xx

I researched this for my major work!

Stephen King has three different forms of fear (as he sees them) that really capitalise on what @xshayarsha said:
1) The Gross Out: the sight of a severed head tumbling down a flight of stairs, when the lights go out and something green and slimy splatters against your arm –> irrelevant for the terror/horror discussion, but interesting nevertheless.
2) The Terror: when you come home and notice everything you own had been taken away and replaced by an exact substitute, when the lights go out and you feel something behind you, you feel it’s breath against your ear, but when you turn around there’s nothing there. As above: subtle, devouring, psychological.
3) The Horror: the unnatural, spiders the size of bears, the dead waking up and walking around, when the lights go out and something with claws grabs you by the arm. As above: manifest, menacing, visual.

Further than that, even, consider that ‘horror’ transfers similar meaning to the adjective ‘horrific’, but ‘terror’ and ‘terrific’ are seemingly opposed. 
It’s because of a semantic change called amelioration—when a word’s meaning is elevated; opposite being ‘perjoration’, which is when a word’s meaning is degraded.

The words “horror,” “horrible,” and “horrific” have their roots in the Indo-European base ghers- / ghrs- (to become stiff), according to the Chambers Dictionary of Etymology.
The terms “terror,” “terrible,” and “terrific,” Chambers tells us, are rooted in the Indo-European base ters- / tres- (to shake).
Those Indo-European roots gave Latin the verbs horrere (to bristle with fear) and terrere (to fill with fear), which inspired the Old French, Middle French, Anglo-Norman, and Modern French words that gave English such frightening language.

The meanings of all six words reflected their scary or hair-raising roots when they entered English from the 1300s to the 1600s, according to written examples in the Oxford English Dictionary:
The dictionary’s earliest citation for “terrific” in this sense is from Milton’s Paradise Lost (1667), which describes the Serpent in Paradise as a subtle beast “with brazen Eyes And hairie Main terrific.”
In less than a century, Oxford says, “terrific” took on a weakened sense: “Of great size or intensity; excessive; very severe.”
The earliest example of this new usage in the dictionary is from a 1743 translation of Horace’s lyric poetry: “How cou’d … Porphyrion of terrific size … stand against the Warrior-goddess?”
It took another century, according to the OED citations, for “terrific” to take on the modern sense of “an enthusiastic term of commendation: amazing, impressive; excellent, exceedingly good, splendid.”
The first example of this sense is from an advertisement in the Oct. 21, 1871, issue of The Athenaeum, a journal of science and the arts:
“The last lines of the first ballad are simply terrific,—something entirely different to what any English author would dream of, much less put on paper.” (x) 

It’s really interesting to approach the popular culture you consume with this knowledge, esp. the horror genre and gothic literature. 

Note: you can learn more about the theory behind it here if you’d like. 

studiyng:

hey guys!!! someone asked me if i could tell them some tips for studying a new language so i thought i’d make a masterpost so everyone could see it and use it!!! happy learning ❤️📚 (x)

i wanted to add more things but it was going to be too long, so if you want me to add anything else tell me and i’ll make another masterpost with it!!

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Making the most of Duolingo

leahrning:

Here’s a list of what I do that really helps me learn the language using Duolingo; it’s extra work than the app gives you, but it helps me get my answers right most of the time and I feel like I know the language much better than I would have normally.

Completing the tree

  • The first thing you should do is complete the tree! Most people think they stop using Duolingo after that – this is absolutely not the stopping point! There’s a reason I listed this as step one.
  • To complete the tree, set a goal for yourself. One lesson per day, one unit per week, etc. Experiment a little and find one that works for you.
  • The XP feature on Duolingo helps me stay on track by measuring my frequency, not my learning. Use this to make you motivated to start each day, but don’t use it as a measure of how well you’re doing. It’s like a homework grade that gives points for completion but not accuracy. But, because of this, you can choose any goal you want. I’m on the “insane” goal (50pts per day) but I often go way past the limit. Trust me, if you’re following these steps, that won’t be a problem.
  • THIS IS AN IMPORTANT RULE!!!! Before ever starting a new lesson, all of your previous lessons must be golden.
    • Duolingo builds off of previous skills in a fairly linear way. You’ll notice especially as you get farther in the tree that whenever you learn new nouns, they will always be practiced in the context of the most recent verb tense you’ve learned, and they will always mix up adjectives and phrases that you’ve also recently learned. Because of this, if you’re even a little shaky on a previous lesson, you’re screwing yourself over if you don’t review that first.
    • When you first open Duolingo, use “Practice Weak Skills” – this will give you a random lesson to run through and practice, and often it will mix multiple to allow you to strengthen multiple skills at once.
    • Keep using “Practice Weak Skills” until every lesson is golden. This takes about 3-4 times if you get most of the questions right, 5-6 if you’re getting most of them wrong – and it will get you past your XP goal. When you’re done, scroll through to check that every lesson is golden. Feels nice, don’t it?
    • Your lesson strength deteriorates quickly. It often feels like you’re taking one step forwards and two steps back. This is the case for a short while – the more you practice, the longer your skills will stick there. When you need to strengthen them again, all you have to do is prove that you know it from before. Instead of 15 questions on the same lesson, you’ll get about 3 – if you get all of them right, the skill goes straight back up to golden!
    • HOWEVER:
      • If you are having trouble with a certain lesson, maybe you find yourself constantly tripping up on it? Practice these lessons individually.
      • I constantly mess up on verbs, and now that I’ve finished the tree, whenever I review it mixes up to 4 tenses at once. What happens then? I get mixed up.
        • Personally, I rushed through the tree when I shouldn’t have. Whoops.
        • Because of this, I review each verb lesson on its own before using “Practice Weak Skills.”
        • When I feel confident enough, the next day I might test myself using “Practice Weak Skills” and see how it turns out. It’s your personal judgement call on when you should stop isolating lessons!

Grammar time!

So, if you’re anything like me, you love learning languages. If you’re even more like me, you have a preference for doing it, and it is not memorizing vocab (though this is necessary!). Duolingo is nice for vocab and grammar….practice. To practice, you have to learn it first, right? It teaches you the vocab well, but there’s one huge problem I found while finishing up my Spanish tree:

The farther you get, the less grammar lessons there are.

This is crucial! How am I supposed to know what’s going one with he/habia/habias when I don’t even know what the tense is?

So, I prepared a list of grammar resources/courses that I think do a good job of walking you through, step-by-step, the lessons in a similar order to Duolingo.

My recommendation for using these requires looking ahead. Look at your next Duolingo lesson and, before taking it, look at the corresponding lesson on one of these websites. Take notes on it! Go back to Duolingo and now that you actually know what you’re doing. (If you get things consistently wrong, you can then review the grammar lesson on whatever website – in case they’re out of order). These apply to any website or program other than Duolingo, especially self-teaching, since they’re all basic grammar lessons.

The ones I’ve listed are mainly Spanish and German; these are the languages I’m studying. I can’t speak on other websites and their ease/comprehensiveness if I’m not studying that language! Please feel free to edit this post and add your own websites/languages when you reblog.

Spanish

  • StudySpanish.com (This is my personal favourite! Separated into units that progress from basic to advanced.)
  • SpanishDict.com (good for referencing what you got wrong. Organizes by subject of lesson rather than easy-hard)
  • Bowdoin (Another one that goes through basic-advanced. Has lessons written in Spanish and exercises to practice! Also has more information than most of these other links, however this can be confusing and that’s why it’s not my favourite.)

German

  • German-Grammar.de (Has a TON of information and exercises; can be hard to navigate.)
  • Dartmouth Review (A little chart to separate very broad categories; once you pick a section, it goes on for a while.)
  • Deutsch Lingolia (Left column has a list; the top part is the important tenses, nouns, etc. grammar stuff.)

All Languages