Language Museum Blog

In a rare piece of good news for languages in the UK, a project to encourage more people to study languages at university has been awarded extra funding.

The Routes into Languages project has been allocated an extra £1.2 million by the Higher Education Funding Council for England (Hefce), allowing it to continue until July 2012. The project organises sixth-form events and sends student ambassadors into schools with the aim of encouraging pupils to continue with modern languages after the age of 14. Led by the University of Southampton’s Centre for Languages, Linguistics and Area Studies, the project is run by nine regional consortia universities across England.

Sir Alan Langlands, chief executive of Hefce, said: “Languages are vital for the social and economic future of the country and graduates with language skills make a major contribution to the UK economy in an ever-changing global context.

“This additional funding demonstrates our ongoing commitment to supporting modern foreign languages and I hope that it will enable the Routes initiative to build on the many benefits it has brought for schools, colleges, universities and students.” (Source: Times Higher Education Supplement)

So, you’re at the pub and see an attractive man or woman that you’d like to get to know. Do you try a cheesy pick up line? Or a simple hello?
According to this new infographic, you use body language as it accounts for 55% of “our overall effective communication”. Intrigued? Take a look:

(From 100 Best Dating Sites via Daily Infographic)

I love travelling. I’ve even been known to throw in some travel lingo when out with non-traveller friends to try and impress them. But I’m pretty sure I’d never use any of the ridiculous travel terms that MSN has compiled. Here’s the list:

– Bleisure travel
– Glamping and tramping
– Minimoon, weddingmoon, babymoon
– Staycation
– Flashpacking, gap-packing and brokepacking
– Daycation
– Haycation
– Mancation
– Gramping
– Traincation

You can probably guess what most of these are, but if not, take a look at the article. What’s the most ridiculous travel term you’ve heard?

The dialect of people living on the Gower Peninsula, Wales is set to be recorded in a dictionary.

The project has been earmarked for Heritage Lottery Funding (HLF) through its landscape partnership programme, lead by Swansea Council. In addition to the dictionary, conservation work will take place and volunteers will be given IT skills training to create a website for a virtual visitors centre.

… the dictionary is a mixture of Welsh and English with specific names for plants and animals, not heard anywhere else in Wales.

Peculiarities of Gower dialect are thought to have developed due to its geography and were recorded in the mid 19th Century. (Source: BBC News)

Some examples of Gower dialect include “umman” for woman and “soul” for cheese or butter.

If successful, the HLF bid will encourage the local community to get actively involved in preserving their culture and heritage.

I always find it slightly disconcerting (but cool!) when I hear someone speak in a different language, when I’m used to hearing them speak English.

It’s especially odd when that person is a celebrity and you’d never have guessed they were fluent in a second language. So this feature from People magazine is really fun – videos of celebrities speaking in their second languages. Did you know Natalie Portman is fluent in Hebrew and French? I love the video of Joseph Gordon-Levitt as he to me he looks like a Frenchman!

What’s really interesting though is that most of the celebrities learned their second language through immersion programmes whilst at school. They seem to have retained the language learned through adulthood (Bradley Cooper for example). So perhaps a period of immersion is good for your language skills long-term?

The annual list of popular baby names was released this week by the Office of National Statistics. Which names were top? Olivia and Oliver (for the second year running).

Others in the top 5 were Jack, Alfie, Harry and Charlie for boys and Sophie, Emily, Lily and Amelia for girls.

Ollie was the fastest rising name in the boys’ top 100 while Olly was 113th.

When looking at the figures just for Wales, Oliver and Ruby were the most popular boys’ and girls’ names.

In eight of the English regions, Oliver was the most popular name, however Jack came top in the North East.

Among baby girls, Olivia was the top name in seven English regions, Sophie was the most popular in the East and Lily in the South West. (Source: BBC News)

Names go through trends – when I was born ‘Michelle’ must have been very popular as 3 other girls in my high school form group were also called Michelle! I’m not sure why it’s become less popular, as the Hebrew meaning of the name is apparently “who is like God?” (not sure why there’s a question mark there either).

A few years ago a company did a survey on ‘traditional’ British names and found they were dying out. Perhaps instead of Olivia and Oliver, parents could consider Ethel or Gertrude and Percy or Clifford?

Fresh from South Korea is the news that the latest kids craze is Taeglish – an educational combination of English and Taekwondo.

Kim Sung-hoon, creator of Taeglish, explains:

Taeglish is a combination of the words Taekwondo and English.
 Normal English education is boring with no fun and they do not understand why
they have to learn it. After English is combined with Taekwondo practice,
 children can learn English with fun and in high spirits. (Source: Macmillan Dictionary Blog)

Taekwondo is a popular martial art and in this video, it looks like a lot of fun!

Recently I started Zumba classes and some of the songs are in Spanish (Daddy Yankee’s Gasolina for example). I often find myself trying to work out what the words are. Perhaps I could start my own Zumanish class?

This is a great (and funny) poem by Taylor Mali, the typography by Ronnie Bruce definitely enhances it.

In possibly my favourite story of the week, apparently Jane Austen is going to throw down in a new video game called Word Fighter.

Instead of using conventional fight-game methods, the character will cut down her enemies using the power of words.

Inspired by Boggle, Scrabble, Words With Friends and Super Puzzle Fighter, the object of the game is for players, as famous authors personified by their literary works, to spell words quickly on separate tile grids. The better the word — based on length and letter value — the more damage you do to your opponent. Special power-ups like attack multipliers and tile shufflers are added to the mix, so it can be anybody’s game. Players will be able to battle each other locally or online in real-time, and the developers even plan to have cross-platform play, which means iOS users will be able to battle against their Android friends. (Source: Forbes blog)

It sounds like a great way to increase vocabulary at the same time as having fun (and feeling superior to your friends when you beat them). The game will be available later this year, and I for one cannot wait.

Image: Feel Every Yummy

A new series of Fry’s English Delight is back on BBC Radio 4.

The first programme, titled ‘The Mouth’ talks about the origins of speech and language. Stephen Fry asks “if you were an intelligent designer, would you combine the food processor and the word processor in the same unit?”

The programme also hears from

Ventriloquist Nina Conti explains how she has learned to over-rule the automatic functions of her mouth. A facial surgeon gives us the tour of the inside of the mouth and a psychologist discusses humanity’s earliest form of happy oral communication – or language. (Source: BBC)

The new series is on BBC Radio 4 on Monday’s and also available on iPlayer.