Saim's log 2017-2019

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Re: Saim's blog 2017

Postby Saim » 2018-05-19, 12:16

I'm going to compile interesting subtitled videos I've found on YouTube.

German
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCWLPwZ ... w2pSjMzrGQ (German transcription; English and Dutch translation)

Basque
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PUjOZgRm-Bc (video in Spanish with Basque translation)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qvPCk4NQU9A (video in Spanish with Basque translation)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6PwIl0vnqhw (Basque transcription)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=92_j7c_YkYo (Basque video with Spanish subtitles)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z2qxpX_-u2Q (Basque transcription with Spanish translation)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3SNzfI5DK1M (Basque transcription with Spanish translation)

Arabic
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCt7Ykv ... d6oCE9g7iA (Syrian Arabic videos with English translation)

Hungarian
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC22ykW ... w/featured (Hungarian transcription with English translation)


vijayjohn wrote:Yeah, but where on the Internet? :doggy:


From following language-learning blogs and stuff, I guess.

By the way, the Polyglot Conference was in New York in 2015 and there's also a yearly event in Montreal it seems. I get that's far from Texas but I thought you might be interested to know.

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Re: Saim's blog 2017

Postby vijayjohn » 2018-05-20, 20:02

I am interested to know. Even if it was in Austin, I doubt it would make much of a difference to me, though. Either I go or I don't. :P

Btw I had a moment a little earlier today that reminded me of what I said about using monolingual dictionaries. I said something (in Malayalam) to my dad about how he has ear hair but I don't, but I wasn't really sure what the appropriate word for 'hair' was in this case. I guessed മുടി [muˈɖi] because head hair is തലമുടി ([t̪əˈləmuɖi], literally 'head-hair'), but I also know that 'pubic hair' at least is a completely different word. :P So he told me the appropriate word for 'hair' in this context was actually രോമം [ˈɾoːməm], a Sanskrit loanword that can also mean 'body hear' in general or even 'fur'. I said I wondered whether രോമാഞ്ചം [ɾoːˈmaːnd͡ʒəm] was a Portuguese loanword in Malayalam because I was positive it meant 'romance'. My dad said it doesn't and it means the feeling you get when you have goosebumps (which makes sense since that's when your body hair stands on end). I was skeptical and said, "Let's look it up in the dictionary!" Then I did, read out: "ഭീതി, ആഹ്ലാദം മുതലായവകൊണ്ടുണ്ടാകുന്ന വികാരവിക്ഷോഭം, പുളകം [ˈbʱiːd̪i], [aːˈhɭaːd̪əm mud̪əˈlaːjəʋəgɔɳɖɔɳɖaːgun̪n̪a ʋiˈgaːɾəʋiʈʃoːbʱəm], [puˈɭəgəm]," and finally admitted that he was right. He said, "പിന്നെന്താ [pɪnnɛn̪ˈd̪aː]!" which, roughly translated, means 'duh!'. :lol:

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Re: Saim's blog 2017

Postby Saim » 2018-05-28, 7:24

I don't know what gave me the idea that I have time to focus on Russian. I have too much assessment coming up to really be able to dedicate much time to language learning, so essentially I'll just keep dabbling, besides making sure I'm consistently consuming Serbian and Polish media. I'm also not going to the Bratislava event anymore.

That said, since I'm probably going to write my MA thesis on something related to Ukraine, I'll definitely have a concrete reason to put a lot of effort into Russian once I have more free time again. I'll start focusing on Russian in the second half of summer, and once I'm back in Poznań I might sign up for classes at one of the language schools here depending on what my uni timetable looks like.

Why not Ukrainian? Well, I've noticed that despite having studied much more Russian than Ukrainian, I still understand Ukrainian better (especially in the written form), probably because of its lexical proximity to Polish. In any case I'll still study Ukrainian (mostly through passive exposure) while working on my Russian, just not anywhere near as intensively.

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Re: Saim's blog 2017

Postby Car » 2018-05-28, 9:09

What exactly are you studying?
Please correct my mistakes!

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Re: Saim's blog 2017

Postby Saim » 2018-05-28, 10:07

Car wrote:What exactly are you studying?


The degree is called Empirical Linguistics and Language Documentation (we do a lot of technical stuff related to transcription and archives and copyright and such) but I can write my thesis on language policy or sociolinguistics if I want.

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Re: Saim's blog 2017

Postby Car » 2018-05-28, 11:14

Wow, I didn't even know that was a thing. That sounds really cool. What was your BA?
Please correct my mistakes!

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Re: Saim's blog 2017

Postby Saim » 2018-05-28, 11:48

Car wrote:Wow, I didn't even know that was a thing. That sounds really cool. What was your BA?


It's not common but I have a friend who studies more or less the same thing at SOAS (London), although there it's a one-year course and they've had it for much longer.

My BA was just Linguistics (with a "menció" in Polish and Hebrew).

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Re: Saim's blog 2017

Postby vijayjohn » 2018-05-28, 15:26

Huh, that sounded like documentary linguistics to me. :hmm: But I guess not quite?
Saim wrote:once I'm back in Poznań

From where, Ukraine? (If you don't mind me asking, are you not in Poznań now?)

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Re: Saim's blog 2017

Postby Saim » 2018-05-28, 15:40

vijayjohn wrote:Huh, that sounded like documentary linguistics to me. :hmm:


You're right, that's what it is. Dunno why they decided to give it such a convoluted name.

Saim wrote:From where, Ukraine? (If you don't mind me asking, are you not in Poznań now?)


Yes, I'm in Poznań. After assessment I'll go to Serbia because my parents and sister will be there too (since I've been living in Europe I've gone to Serbia pretty much every summer). I'll probably also go to Hungary for a bit. Then after summer it'll be the second year of uni, so back in Poznań again.

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Re: Saim's blog 2017

Postby vijayjohn » 2018-05-28, 15:52

Saim wrote:
vijayjohn wrote:Huh, that sounded like documentary linguistics to me. :hmm:


You're right, that's what it is. Dunno why they decided to give it such a convoluted name.

Oh, what languages do they work/focus on? Where I went to grad school, they seemed to be focused on Mesoamerican and (especially) Amazonian languages.
Yes, I'm in Poznań. After assessment I'll go to Serbia because my parents and sister will be there too (since I've been living in Europe I've gone to Serbia pretty much every summer). I'll probably also go to Hungary for a bit. Then after summer it'll be the second year of uni, so back in Poznań again.

Nice! Does "assessment" mean final exams or qualifying exams or something?

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Re: Saim's blog 2017

Postby Saim » 2018-05-28, 16:11

vijayjohn wrote:Oh, what languages do they work/focus on? Where I went to grad school, they seemed to be focused on Mesoamerican and (especially) Amazonian languages.


Honestly it's kind of chaotic. Our Typology professor is an Indologist so he used lots of examples from Hindi, Bengali and Nepali, whereas in Spoken Language Analysis we mostly look at examples from Polish and English. Besides that they often hold up Wymysiöeryś as an example because the guy who designed the programme also kind of ran the documentation of Wymysiöeryś (I've probably seen this documentary four times by now :lol: ).

Nice! Does "assessment" mean final exams or qualifying exams or something?


Semester exams + assignments + in-class tests + meeting my supervisor (for my thesis). All the stuff that I need to do to pass the semester. We tend to call it zaliczenie even when speaking English, so maybe this is me doing a calque (but I do kind of remember this expression used in high school).

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Re: Saim's blog 2017

Postby vijayjohn » 2018-05-28, 18:52

Saim wrote:Honestly it's kind of chaotic. Our Typology professor is an Indologist so he used lots of examples from Hindi, Bengali and Nepali, whereas in Spoken Language Analysis we mostly look at examples from Polish and English. Besides that they often hold up Wymysiöeryś as an example because the guy who designed the programme also kind of ran the documentation of Wymysiöeryś (I've probably seen this documentary four times by now :lol: ).

Huh, the only movie I've ever seen in grad school is a Jamaican movie called Dancehall Queen (at the end of a course on pidgins and creoles, because the language in it is mesolectal and a relatively accurate representation of how people in Jamaica normally speak). :lol:
Semester exams + assignments + in-class tests + meeting my supervisor (for my thesis). All the stuff that I need to do to pass the semester. We tend to call it zaliczenie even when speaking English, so maybe this is me doing a calque (but I do kind of remember this expression used in high school).

Good luck then! :)

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Re: Saim's blog 2017

Postby Car » 2018-05-28, 20:19

Saim wrote:It's not common but I have a friend who studies more or less the same thing at SOAS (London), although there it's a one-year course and they've had it for much longer.


I see. Thanks.
Please correct my mistakes!

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Re: Saim's blog 2017

Postby Saim » 2018-06-07, 11:48

I've exported all my Anki decks to a folder on my computer (along with the attached media of course, that's one of the main reasons I want to save them), and then deleted them from Anki. I'm sick of my old decks (I think I had too many as well) and want to make a couple of new ones.

So far the only new deck I've made is one for Hungarian. I've only been adding sentences from bab.la and WikiSzótár (for the WikiSzótár ones I have to provide my own English translation, but I'm at a level where that shouldn't really be a problem) after I look up new words. I've recorded myself saying the Hungarian sentences; my pronunciation is already alright so I'm more interested in using recordings to make it easier to remember the sentences than for practising correct pronunciation.

This week I had to use Memrise to cram a rather large wordlist I had to learn for my Hungarian exam, and it ocurred to I could use Memrise primarily for isolated words (but only in languages I'm weaker in / aren't mutually intelligible with other languages I know, at least if I'm not cramming for an exam), and use Anki primarily or even exclusively for sentences. I think that plays to the two programs' strengths quite nicely.

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Re: Saim's blog 2017

Postby Saim » 2018-06-12, 13:36

https://genius.com/Capital-t-pasha-jeten-lyrics

O pasha jetën
Me ty ton kohën
Jom kon i sinqerti
O pasha jetën
Nuk kom ditë me t'rrejt
Ta kom thonë t'vërtetën
O pasha jetën
Shpesh ty t'kom dashtë
Ma shumë se veten
O pasha jetën
Kur jom kon me ty
Për mu s'ka ekzistu tjetër

https://lyricstranslate.com/en/pasha-je ... z5IDX5SNMk

O I swear on my life
All the time with you I was being sincere
O I swear on my life
I didn't know how to lie, I told you the truth
O I swear on my life
Often I loved you more than myself
O I swear on my life
with you, no one else existed for me

jetë - life (-n accusative ending?)
me - with
nuk - not
jom - ?
t'rrejt - related to rrenë?
kohë - time
thonë - not sure what conjugation this is although the verb seems to be them
shpesh - often
dashtë - related to dua?
shumë - a lot
ma - me
se - than
vetë - oneself
s'ka - ?
tjetër - other, another

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Re: Saim's blog 2017

Postby vijayjohn » 2018-06-12, 23:37

You're doing Albanian now?

EDIT: Never mind. :lol:

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Re: Saim's blog 2017

Postby Yasna » 2018-06-14, 3:46

Thought you might find this interesting.

Censorship and Stereotypes: China’s Hip-Hop Generation
Ein Buch muß die Axt sein für das gefrorene Meer in uns. - Kafka

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Re: Saim's blog 2017

Postby Saim » 2018-06-17, 8:16

vijayjohn wrote:You're doing Albanian now?

EDIT: Never mind. :lol:


I wish! :cry:

Actually, it's more that I've come to the conclusion that if I really like a song and am listening to it again and again and there's already a translation available on the internet it's probably a good use of time to at least try and get some vocabulary out of it, instead of waiting for some undefined point in the future where I will be able to actively study that language.

Yasna wrote:Thought you might find this interesting.

Censorship and Stereotypes: China’s Hip-Hop Generation


I do indeed, thanks!

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Re: Saim's blog 2017

Postby Saim » 2018-06-17, 15:01

I've decided that for now I'll only use Anki to make cards with example sentences from glosbe and such. I won't try to memorise them (too much effort for limited gains), only training recognition, but I will record myself saying all the sentences in the target language. The point of this is to artificially increase the amount of times I'll see certain words and constructions as a supplement to extensive input, as well as seeing new words in several different contexts, namely the context I originally come across them in and sentences from dictionaries, either example sentences or things taken out of bilingual corpora like in glosbe, linguee or bab.la (I also had the idea of plugging in sentences from grammar books). Memorising isolated vocabulary does work but I don't find it much fun and it's not that efficient.

I will do this for some of my more advanced languages (Serbian, Polish, Urdu, Hungarian) as well as two that I would like to see a lot of progress in over the next year (German, Russian). Unfortunately the Urdu corpus on glosbe doesn't seem to be very good (a lot of it seems to be from the Urdu translation of the Bible and the Qur'an, which is not a register I necessarily need to get so used to), and I can't find any good monolingual Urdu dictionaries with example sentences on the internet, so I've also added some sentences directly from articles I've read (I'm advanced enough that I can more-or-less trust my own translation).

I'm going to abandon Hebrew for the time being, because even though I love the language and I have a really strong base in it, I've noticed that any time I spend on Hebrew inevitably takes time away from Urdu or Hungarian, two languages which I have much stronger external reasons for learning. I'm not going to go to Israel any time in the near-to-mid future, but it's likely I'll keep visiting Pakistan and Hungary. Hungarian won't be too hard to progress in because I'll have one class a week at university (although I'll still do my own study of course). For Urdu on the other hand I'll make sure to do one intensive activity a week (mostly reading news articles; I want to get that formal, Perso-Arabic vocabulary down). So Hebrew's not worth it just for the 1~ time a year I happen to come across Israelis, especially if that means slowing down my progress in Urdu and Hungarian.

If nothing changes over the summer, German and Russian are the only two languages where I'll work on all four core skills (listening, speaking, reading, writing). I've spent a lot of time studying them passively and I think I'd benefit a lot from cranking it up a notch. I also kind of need Russian for my MA thesis. To give them more time I'm going to put away French, which is a shame because I've only recently started getting OK at active production, but I don't see any reason to prioritise Romance languages at the moment.

Turkish is the only "hard" language I'm going to keep working on. This means taking a break from Arabic, Basque and Finnish. It was fun working on so many non-IE languages at once but obviously if I want to get to B1 in any of them I'll have to focus on one, and since I'm by far the best at Turkish I decided to give that a go. This is the only language for which I'll make flashcards (on Memrise) for isolated vocab items, because I find this method actually a pretty effective way to get used to word roots in a completely alien language (I mean, it helped with Hebrew and Hungarian). I'll do lots of "fast study" sessions once all the vocabulary has been "watered" (because I find this little game on Memrise fun), but I'll also constantly delete and remake the deck because I find big decks with lots of random unrelated words too boring. I might start working on spoken production, but if I do take end up doing iTalki lessons I'll make sure to plan discussion topics in advance so I can memorise words likely to come up in preparation for the class. If I can be bothered I will also put examples sentences in Anki.

You could ask why I would bother with flashcards for Serbian or Polish given the level I'm at. I feel like my progress has kind of plateaued a bit and doing some more intensive study might help push me a bit further. There are definitely some rap songs that I'd like to understand better (lots of random words that I don't know), so that could be a good place to start. In any case, there won't be any rote memorisation, all I'm going to do is expose myself to sentences (and record myself saying them, which as far as I can tell makes me more aware of my pronunciation errors rather than fossilising them).

I'm also allowed to dabble in languages like Romanian or Albanian (or any of the aforementioned abandoned languages) IF I find some interesting input to use (a fun song ideally with an English translation already available, an interesting article, a video with subtitles, etc.) and all I do is look up words or listen to the audio several times. I am banned from making any flashcards or using any textbooks -- if I am really curious I can skim a textbook but I'm not allowed to take any notes or try to actively memorise words. IME this is a better way of dealing with distractions than fully giving into it (because then the language loses its allure and becomes a chore) or trying to suppress it (because that takes energy you could use to study).
Last edited by Saim on 2018-06-17, 19:40, edited 4 times in total.

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Re: Saim's blog 2017

Postby vijayjohn » 2018-06-17, 15:23

Saim wrote:I want to get that formal, Perso-Arabic vocabulary down

This makes me wonder why rap/hip-hop versions of ghazals don't seem to be a thing yet. They shouldn't be too hard to create. I mean, the lyrics are widely available... :hmm:
Turkish is the only "hard" language I'm going to keep working on. This means taking a break from Arabic, Basque and Finnish.

Somehow I totally forgot you were doing Turkish, and I didn't even know you were doing Finnish! I think you'll be missed as far as Arabic goes for now, but hey, at least I'm doing Turkish, too! :)


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