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#languages

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Duolingo Sucks, Now What?: A Guide

Now that the quality of Duolingo has fallen (even more) due to AI and people are more willing to make the jump here are just some alternative apps and what languages they have:

"I just want an identical experience to DL"

Busuu (Languages: Spanish, Japanese, French, English, German, Dutch, Italian, Portuguese, Chinese, Polish, Turkish, Russian, Arabic, Korean)

"I want a good audio-based app"

Language Transfer (Languages: French, Swahili, Italian, Greek, German, Turkish, Arabic, Spanish, English for Spanish Speakers)

"I want a good audio-based app and money's no object"

Pimsleur (Literally so many languages)

Glossika (Also a lot of languages, but minority languages are free)

*anecdote: I borrowed my brother's Japanese Pimsleur CD as a kid and I still remember how to say the weather is nice over a decade later. You can find the CDs at libraries and "other" places I'm sure.

"I have a pretty neat library card"

Mango (Languages: So many and all endangered/Indigenous courses are free even if you don't have a library that has a partnership with Mango)

"I want SRS flashcards and have an android"

AnkiDroid: (Theoretically all languages, pre-made decks can be found easily)

"I want SRS flashcards and I have an iphone"

AnkiApp: It's almost as good as AnkiDroid and free compared to the official Anki app for iphone

"I don't mind ads and just want to learn Korean"

lingory

"I want an app made for Mandarin that's BETTER than DL and has multiple languages to learn Mandarin in"

ChineseSkill (You can use their older version of the course for free)

"I don't like any of these apps you mentioned already, give me one more"

Bunpo: (Languages: Japanese, Spanish, French, German, Korean, and Mandarin)

#language resources #resource

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-fae

#asl

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#german

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I Can Eat Glass

I Can Eat Glass was a linguistic project documented on the early Web by then-Harvard student Ethan Mollick. The objective was to provide speakers with translations of the phrase "I can eat glass, it does not hurt me" from a wide variety of languages; the phrase was chosen because of its unorthodox nature. Mollick's original page disappeared in or about June 2004.

As Mollick explained, visitors to a foreign country have "an irresistible urge" to say something in that language, and whatever they say (a cited example being along the lines of "Where is the bathroom?") usually marks them as tourists immediately. Saying "I can eat glass, it does not hurt me", however, ensures that the speaker "will be viewed as an insane native, and treated with dignity and respect".

#had a lot of fun reading about this project

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Fran drescher opposes vaccine mandates just fyi

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Stupid-ass takes I've seen about the strike so far:

"Rich actors should keep their mouths shut about this whole thing it's not about them"

How sure are you about that? The idea that the union, which the rich actors are a part of, does not care or need to care about its most financially successful members? Or that those members should not in turn use their finances and clout to assist the union that made sure they got there? It's fucking stupid to say any rich person who supports the strike has no room to talk about it. They have more room than anybody else, because they're going to suffer a lot less while it's going on and they can afford to throw that clout of theirs down like the dueling glove it is.

"Rich actors should get together and make a pool to help fund poor actors through this strike"

That is literally what the union does. That is the entire point of the union. Stop trying to make this into a bizarre class divide. You're literally doing the opposite of helping by asking creatives to fix a problem caused by non-creatives. The only ones that's ever going to help are the assholes they're striking against.

The only ones who should never say a goddamn word about the strike are people who don't understand unions and don't fully understand what the unions are striking about.

#this blog is pro-union

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The pyramids in Illinois is referring to Cahokia Mounds. They are absolutely mesmerizing, although if you just look up photos, you'd be like "um... aren't those just hills?" Go visit those "hills", climb them, look out over the prairie lands and take in the fact that you're standing on ancient lands of a rich culture, and it's beautiful. I highly recommend visiting if you can.

My favorite thing is that Europe is spooky because it’s old and America is spooky because it’s big

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https://twitter.com/Mexicolore/status/1224673865860816897

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Did you know that five, pentagon, and quintuplet are all related?

They come from Proto-Indo-European root “penkwe-” ‘five’.

In Germanic /p/ became /f/ by a sound change called Grimm’s Law (yes the same Jacob Grimm from the Brothers Grimm—he was big into Germanic history), yielding “five”.

In Latin the /p/ assimilated to the /kʷ/ yielding quinque /ˈkʷiːn.kʷe/.

Ancient Greek stuck with the original /p/ sound.

#cool

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7) Don't ever let bigots make you feel bad for having an amazing skill that you put years of hard work into, putting yourself out there and taking learning risks, especially when they have never put that much effort into anything in their lives.

my blog is, and always will be, a safe place for people who are not confident in their english speaking abilities. you will never be judged or mocked here.

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Women's rights are human rights.

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I NEVER want to hear the phrase "first former president to be indicted" again. Isn't the ENTIRE point of this country that the president is Some Dude just like the rest of us? A former civil servant went to prison for doing crimes while in & out of office should be seen as proof that this country is as "principled" as it claims to be... at least in this one specific case. Patriotic Americans should want accountability if they are truly PATRIOTIC.

#so yeah i guess i'm calling myself a patriot #ew #well no #i'll call myself a patriot when he's in prison for 400 years #i'll actually be proud of the country's justice system at that one moment #and then go back to hating it

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Here’s my humble LGBTQ vocab list in modern Greek! It is by no means exhaustive but I think there’s the essential words. It is preceded by a short introduction, because I thought it was important ;)

Of course if there’s any mistake to correct, or a suggestion to be made, please hit me up :)

LGBTQIA vocab in |ΕΛΛΗΝΙΚΑ| |Italiano| |Español| |Français|

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Today is both vyshyvanka day and the remembrance day of the Crimean tartar genocide. I think this is poetic in that way of being unable to escape the tragedy of Ukraine even on a day of pride and unity. It’s like a haunting reminder that no matter what happens, there’s no way to separate horror and honor - tradegy and triumph - Ukraine has become synonymous with the kind of pride that stings.

So here’s your reminder:

Crimea is Ukraine

Russia committed genocide against the tartar people then AND now

The war is not over until Russia is out of the country.

З Днем Вишиванки мої друзі - не забудь Україна 💙💛🇺🇦🌻

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Is this anything: a polyglot cookbook with recipes from around the world with each recipe teaching you some words in the language the recipe is from