Apps/sites For Learning Japanese

Linguistics and Language Podcasts

Looking for podcasts about language and linguistics? Here’s a comprehensive list with descriptions! I’ve also mentioned if shows have transcripts. If there are any I missed, let me know!

Linguistics

Lingthusiasm A podcast that’s enthusiastic about linguistics by Gretchen McCulloch and Lauren Gawne (that’s me!). Main episodes every third Thursday of every month, with a second bonus episode on Patreon. (Transcripts for all episodes)

Because Language Every week Daniel, Ben, and Hedvig cover the news in linguistics and tackle a particular topic. (previously Talk the Talk) (Transcripts for all episodes after release)

The Vocal Fries Every episode Carrie Gillon & Megan Figueroa tackle linguistic discrimination in relation to a particular group. (Transcripts for some episodes)

En Clair A podcast about forensic linguistics from Dr Claire Hardaker at Lancaster University. Episodes released monthly, with a range of topics from criminal cases to literary fraud. (Transcripts for all episodes)

Accentricity From Sadie Durkacz Ryan, a lecturer in sociolinguistics at Glasgow University. Season one has six episodes.

Field Notes Martha Tsutsui Billins interviews linguists about their linguistic fieldwork. (Transcripts for all episodes)

History and Philosophy of the Language Sciences sub-30 minute episodes about the history of linguistics from James McElvenny, with the occasional interviews.

The Language Revolution Changing UK attitudes to languages.

Lexis A conversation about linguistics with a topical UK focus, from Matthew Butler, Lisa Casey, Dan Clayton and Jacky Glancey.

Kletshead A podcast about bilingual children for parents, teachers and speech language therapists from Dr. Sharon Unsworth. Also in Dutch.

Linguistics Lounge A podcast about language and discourse with Tony Fisher and Julia de Bres. Transcripts for all episodes.

CorpusCast from Dr Robbie Love, available alongside other shows in the Aston University podcast feed or in video format.

Life and Language Michaela Mahlberg chats with her guests about life and why language matters.

Toksave – Culture Talks A podcast from the PARADISEC Archive, where the archived records of the past have life breathed back into them once again.

Theory Neutral Covering typology and descriptive grammars with Logan R Kearsley.

PhonPod Podcast Interview-based podcast about phonetics and phonology.

Linguistics Careercast A podcast devoted to exploring careers for linguists outside academia.

Language

The Allusionist Stories about language and the people who use it, from Helen Zaltzman (Transcripts for all episodes) (my review).

Grammar Girl Episodes are rarely longer than 15 minutes, but they’re full of tips about English grammar and style for professional writing, and more! (Transcripts for all episodes).

A Language I Love Is… A show about language, linguistics and people who love both. An interview-based podcast hosted by Danny Bate.

Word of Mouth BBC Radio 4 show exploring the world of words with Michael Rosen.

America the Bilingual Dedicated to the pursuit of bilingualism in the USA.

Words & Actions A podcast about how language matters in business, politics and beyond.

Subtitle A podcast about languages and the people who speak them, from Patrick Cox and Kavita Pillay. For those who miss Patrick’s old podcast, The World in Words.

The Parlé Podcast from Canadian Speech-Language Pathologist Chantal Mayer-Crittenden.

Slavstvuyte! A podcast for everyone who is fascinated by Slavic languages from Dina Stankovic.

Subtext A podcast about the linguistics of online dating.

Conlangs

Conlangery Particularly for those with an interest in constructed  languages, they also have episodes that focus on specific natural  languages, or linguistic phenomena. Newer episodes have transcripts.

Linguitect Matt, Rowan and Liam explain linguistic topics and talk about how to build them into your conlang.

Dictionaries

Word For Word From Macquarie dictionary, with a focus on Australian English.

Fiat Lex A podcast about making dictionaries from Kory Stamper & Steve Kleinedler. One season.

Word Matters From the editors at Merriam-Webster, hosted by Emily Brewster, Neil Serven, Ammon Shea, and Peter Sokolowski. 

English

Unstandardized English Interview-based podcast. Disrupting the language of racism and white supremacy in English Language Teaching.

History of English Meticulously researched, professionally produced and engaging content on the history of English. (My reviews: episodes 1-4, episodes 5-79, bonus episodes).

Lexicon Valley Hosted by John McWhorter.

That’s What They Say Every week linguist Anne Curzan joins Rebecca Kruth on Michigan public radio for a five minute piece on a quirk of English language.

A Way With Words A talk-back format show on the history of English words, cryptic crosswords and slang.

Words/etymology

Something Rhymes With Purple Susie Dent and Gyles Brandreth uncover the hidden origins of language and share their love of words.

Telling our Twisted Histories Kaniehti:io Horn brings us together to decolonize our minds– one word, one concept, one story at a time.

Word Bomb Hosts Pippa Johnstone and Karina Palmitesta explore one word per week, using particular words for a deep dive into linguistic and social issues. (Transcripts for all episodes)

Words for Granted In each episode Ray Belli explores the history of a common English word in around fifteen minutes.

Lexitecture Ryan, a Canadian, and Amy, a Scot share their chosen word each episode.

Bunny Trails Shauna and Dan discuss idioms and other turns of phrase.

Translation

Troublesome Terps The podcast about the things that keep interpreters up at night. See also back episodes of Alexander Drechsel’s old podcast LangFM.

In Languages other than English

Parler Comme Jamais A French language podcast from Binge Audio.Monthly episodes from Laélia Véron.

Sozusagen A German language podcast of weekly 10 minute episodes.

Språket A Swedish language podcast from Sveriges Radio about language use and change.

Språktalk A Norwegian language podcast with Helene Uri and Kristin Storrusten from Aftenposten.

Klog på sprog A Danish language podcast that playfully explores the Danish language.

Kletshead A Dutch language podcast about bilingual children for parents, teachers and speech language therapists from Dr. Sharon Unsworth. Also in English.

BabelPodcast A Portuguese language podcast from Brazil, hosted by Cecilia Farias and Gruno.

War of Words A Spanish language podcast about linguistics from Juana de los Santos, Ángela Rodríguez, Néstor Bermúdez and Antonella Moschetti.

Con la lengua fuera A Spanish language podcast from Macarena Gil y Nerea Fernández de Gobeo.

Hablando mal y pronto A Spanish language conversational podcast from Santiago, Juan and Magui.

Back Catalogue

These are podcasts that had a good run of episodes and are no longer being produced.

Spectacular Vernacular A podcast that explores language … and plays with it Hosted by Nicole Holliday and Ben Zimmer for Slate. Transcripts available. 19 episodes from 2021 and 2022.

Science Diction a podcast about words—and the science stories behind them. Hosted by Johanna Mayer, this is a production from WNYC Science Friday. 42 episodes from 2020-2022.

The World in Words From PRI (2008-2019)

How Brands are Build (season 1 of this show focuses on brand naming)

Very Bad Words A  podcast about swearing and our cultural relationship to it. 42 episodes from 2017 and 2018.

The Endless Knot is not strictly a language podcast, but they often include word histories, linguistics podcast fans episode may find their colour series particularly interesting.

Given Names (four part radio series from 2015, all about names. My review)

Odds & Ends

There are also a number of podcasts that have only a few episodes, are no longer being made, or are very academic in their focus:

The Black Language Podcast Anansa Benbow brings you a podcast dedicated to talking about Black people and their languages. Five episodes from 2020.

Speculative Grammarian Podcast (from the magazine of the same name, about 50 episodes from Dec 2009-Jan 2017)

Linguistics Podcast (on YouTube, around 20 episodes in 2013 introducing basic linguistic concepts)

Evolving English: Linguistics at the Library (8 episodes 2018), from the British Library.

Language Creation Society Podcast (8 episodes, 2009-2011)

LingLab (very occasionally updated podcast from graduate students in the Sociolinguistics program at NC State University)

Hooked on Phonetics five episodes from Maxwell Hope from 2019 and 2020.

Glossonomia Each episode is about a different vowel or consonant sound in English. 44 episodes from 2010-2014.

Distributed Morphs An interview-based podcast about morphology, from Jeffrey Punske. Eight episodes in 2020.

Word to the Whys a podcast where linguists talk about why they do linguistics. Created by TILCoP Canada (Teaching Intro Linguistics Community of Practice). 10 episodes in 2020 and 2021.

The Weekly Linguist An  interview podcast about the languages of the world and the linguists who study them from Jarrette Allen and Lisa Sprowls. 21 episodes in 2021.

Silly Linguistics (ad hoc episode posting, but episode 7 is an interview with Kevin Stroud for History of English fans)

Linguistics After Dark Eli, Sarah and Jenny answer your linguistics questions in hour-ish long episodes.

WACC Podcast (guest lectures at Warwick Applied Linguistics)

Sage Language and Linguistics

Let’s Talk Talk

Queer Linguistics has a couple of episodes, with a bit of classroom vibe

GradLings An occasionally-updated podcast for linguistics students at any stage of study, to share their stories and experiences.

Canguro English A podcast about language for people learning languages. 103 episodes from 2018-2021.

Why is English? A podcast about how the English language got to be the way it is, from Laura Brandt. Seven episodes from 2020 and 2021. 

Animology Vegan blogger Colleen Patrick Goudreau uses her love of animals as a starting point for exploring animal-related etymologies. 27 episodes from 2017-2020.

Wordy Wordpecker Short weekly episodes from Rachel Lopez, charting the stories of English words. 14 episodes from 2018.

Speaking of Translation A monthly podcast from Eve Bodeux & Corinne McKay. 10 episodes from 2020-2021.

Se Ve Se Escucha (Seen and Heard) Language justice and what it means to be an interpreter, an organizer and bilingual in the US South, from the Center for Participatory Change. Episodes from 2020.

This is an updated listing from October 2023. I’m always excited to be able to add more podcasts to the list, so if you know of any linguistics/language podcasts not here, please let me know! I wait until a show has at least 3 episodes before I add it to the list, and I like to let people know when transcripts are available.

We should turn Speak Your Language Day into Speak Your Language Week, in my opinion. Maybe Month. Que tal?

RB if you agree :)

#reminders #that i needed to hear

Spoiler: it absolutely does workout for you, and even better than you anticipated.

#LearningMandarinChinese #sstellestudiess 1

Like with any language, there are several resources and tools for those looking to learn Mandarin Chinese. I know because I’ve been there. And in this guide, I’ll set out some of the main things to know when starting your language learning journey and key resources to master Chinese grammar and vocabulary

The amazing Jaenelle, who did her thesis in Mandarin Chinese and studied in China, wrote up this post for beginners.

The world is a little happier with you in it.

It’s a bright and beautiful sunny day a cool breeze and the sun shining down warmly on your face. You go for a drive. Bikini/beachwear on,you grab a cooler some drinks maybe some lunch. You park the car and you open your door and head for the trunk you grab your stuff and maybe you brought a dog. So you harsh your dog and start walking. You head for the sandy hill you go through the little bit of trees and past the picnic tables, the bbq grills and the bathrooms. You getting closer and closer to the hill. Now for the real exercise you make sure you have everything in the right position and start your climb. Once you reach the top there’s no going back. Fighting the sand and using all your leg muscles you reach the top. From here it gets easier you start towards the beach but before you can go to the water you have to find a place for your stuff. Usually you have little hills that are nice and private as most people usually choose to be closer to the water. You get situated and head towards the water. You feel the wind blowing in your face and you can see the waves crashing and the seagulls flying above. You dip your feet in the water. It’s ice cold but it feels amazing. After about two seconds the water gets warmer and you go even further out and the water starts hitting your face and getting you soaked. But you feel like a kid. You splash in the water and run your fingers through the water. You watch as wave after wave approaches you and you looks in the water to see the sand at the bottom. You look to see if you can spot any little animals. Whether it’s jellyfish,sand dollars and even crab,sometimes little fishies. It depends on the season. With ever step you take you feel the salt from the water touch your legs. Seaweed shells and other things picked up from the water brush up against your legs too. You stand in the water and stare at the bright blue sky with few clouds and the sun hitting your face. You feel at peace here. As beach lovers do.

This is a post about masterposts about resources and books for studying many languages. I made this since many people do not know about all the resources that have been posted.

Resources for Many Languages: thelanguagecommunity

General

Language Pile

Free Online Language Courses 

Huge Language-Learning Collection

Language and Linguistics Resources 

Language Families/Groups

Resources for West African Languages

South Asian Languages Resources

Classics Resource Masterpost  

Online Latin & Greek Resources

Celtic Languages Resource List

Celtic Family Language Resources

Germanic Languages Resource List

Dutch, Afrikaans, West Frisian, Limburgish

Scandinavian Language Masterpost

North Germanic Language Resources

Resources for Finno-Ugric languages

Finnish, Estonian, Saami, Voro  

Alien Languages of Star Trek 

Afrikaans

Learn Afrikaans Masterpost  

Afrikaans Masterpost

Ainu

Ainu Resources

Albanian

Albanian Language Masterpost

Amharic

Amharic Resources

Amharic Movies & Shows

Arabic

Arabic Learning Resources  

Arabic Language Masterpost

Arabic Language Apps

Moroccan Masterpost  

Free Arabic Resources

Armenian

Armenian Language Masterpost 

ASL

American Sign Language Masterlist

ASL Masterpost

Azerbaijani

Azerbaijani Resources 

Belarusian

Belarusian Resources

Belarusian Resources

Basque

Ultimate Basque Resource List

Euskera Free Resources

Learn Basque

Bengali

Bengali Language Resources

Bulgarian

Bulgarian Resources

Catalan

Catalan Resources

Recursos per aprendre català

Resources to Learn Catalan  

Cantonese

Cantonese Language Resources

Mandarin Chinese

Mandarin Chinese Resource Masterpost  

Chinese Learning Resources I  

Chinese Language Resources II

Chinese Pinyin Masterpost  

Intermediate Chinese Resources 

Ultimate Mandarin Resource List

Cornish

Cornish Language Masterpost

Crimean Tatar

Crimean Tatar Resources

Croatian

Croatian Resources

Czech

Czech Resources for Beginners

Czech Resources

Danish

Ultimate Danish Resource List

Dutch

Great Resources for Dutch 

Dutch Resources

Dutch Resources Masterpost

English

English Online Courses  

English Language Masterpost

Estonian

Intermediate Estonian Resources

Faroese

Faroese Resources

Finnish

Masterlist of Finnish Resources

Finnish Language Resources  

Finnish Resources: Beginner 

Finnish Learning Resources

Finnish Language Resources

French

Ultimate French Resource List

French Resources Masterpost  

French Masterpost  

French Review

Galician

Galician Resources

Free Galician Masterpost

Georgian

Georgian Language Masterpost

German

German Learning Tools  

German Resources  

German Resources  

German Resources  

German Masterpost

Gothic

Gothic Language Masterpost

Greek

Greek Masterpost 

Ancient Greek Masterpost  

Ancient Greek Resources

Greenlandic

Greenlandic Resources  

Guarani

Guarani Masterpost

Hawaiian

Learn Hawaiian  

Hebrew

Hebrew Language Masterpost

Hebrew Masterpost

Hindi

Hindi Language Masterpost

Hindi Audio & Video

Hungarian

Hungarian Masterpost

Hungarian Learning Resources

Hungarian Resources  

Icelandic

Icelandic for Everyone  

Icelandic Resources 

Icelandic Masterpost

Indonesian

Indonesian Resources

Italian

How to Learn Italian 

Italian Resources  

Italian Masterpost  

Italian Resource Masterlist  

Italian Culture Masterpost  

Irish

Irish Resources

Irish Masterpost

Japanese

Free Japanese Resources  

Japanese Resources  

Studying Japanese  

Japanese Resource Masterpost  

Japanese Language Learning Resources

Kannada

Kannada Resources  

Kazakh

Kazakh Masterpost  

Khmer

Khmer Language Masterpost

Kikongo

Free Kikongo Resources  

Korean

Korean Textbook Masterpost 

Korean Resources 

Korean Resource Masterpost  

Korean Language Masterpost 

Ultimate Korean Masterpost 

Kyrgyz

Kyrgyz Resources

Latin

Learning Latin

Latin Resource List

Masterpost of Latin Video Resources  

Latin Resources 

Lithuanian

Lithuanian Resource List

Malay

Malay Resources  

Maltese

Maltese Resources  

Mongolian

Mongolian Resources

Nahuatl

Nahuatl Language Masterpost  

Nepali

Nepali Masterpost

Norwegian

Norwegian Masterpost

Norwegian Resources  

Norwegian Sources

Norwegian Masteprost

Norwegian Masterposts

Occitan

Occitan Resources

Old Church Slavonic

Resources

Pashto

Pashto Masterpost

Persian

Persian Language Masterpost

Where to Start Learning

Polish

Polish Self-Study Masterpost  

Polish Resources

Polish Resource List

Portuguese 

Portuguese Resources  

Portuguese Starter Pack

Portuguese Resources

Punjabi

Punjabi Masterpost

Punjabi Resources

Romanian

Romanian Resources  

Romanian Learning Resources

Useful Romanian Resources 

Romanian Masterpost   

Romanian Resources

Russian

Russian Learning Tools  

Russian Textbooks   

Some More Resources  

Russian Masterpost 

Northern Sami

Northern Sami Resources

Northern Sami Masterpost

Scottish Gaelic

Learn Scottish Gaelic Masterpost

Scottish Gaelic Masterlist

Serbian

Serbian Masterpost  

Language Resources  

Sinhala

Sinhala Resources

Slovak

Slovak Resources

Slovak Masterpost

Slovene

Slovene Resources 

Somali

Somali Language Masterpost

Spanish

Spanish Resources: Oxford  

Spanish Resources  

Learning Spanish 

Spanish Resources Masterpost  

Swahili

Swahili Resources

Swedish

Swedish Resources 

Swedish Resource List

Swedish Resources  

Tagalog

Tagalog Masterpost

Tagalog Resources

Tamil

Tamil Masterpost

Tatar

Tatar Resources

Thai

Thai resources + books

Tibetan 

Tibetan Resources 

Turkish

Turkish Resources

Turkish Masterpost

Turkish Resource List

Ukrainian

Ukrainian Language Masterpost 

Ukrainian Resources

Urdu

Urdu Masterpost

Uzbek

Uzbek Resources

Uzbek Mastepost

Vietnamese

Vietnamese Resources

Xhosa

Xhosa Resources

Yiddish

Yiddish Language Masterpost

Yoruba

Yoruba Resources

Zulu

Zulu Resources

**Last Updated: June 2019**

Well... this year has been... I really feel like i half assed my goals but at the same time i ended up tired of all the things i did ... So... I really don't know how to feel SJDJJDDK

I want to get the most the last week of the year i will try to organize my goals and be more especific with what i want....

I accepted that i have a problem with accepting that my job occupies almost my whole day and the very fews hours that i have for me isn't enough for the things that i want to do and that my goals need to be more specific and also i need to remember that little steps are still steps :)

Ugh... i hate/love adulting

I want to rant for a moment. Which if you're following me, I hope you are used to this lol.

This is for the people using comprehensible input to learn Chinese:

Pinyin IS NOT ENGLISH. IT IS NOT ENGLISH TRANSCRIPTION. IT HAS IT'S OWN PRONUNCIATION AND DOES NOT MATCH ENGLISH LETTERS PRONUNCIATION. (Chinese is not pronounced like English, the sounds in pinyin do not match English sounds any more than French letters/pronounciation match the sounds of English - which if you don't know, NO French is not pronounced like English). This is a pronunciation guide for how pinyin sounds and is pronounced.

Pinyin is used in Chinese elementary schools. Pinyin is learned by native speakers, and used to type on phones and computers. Or Zhuyin is learned in elementary schools in Taiwan, and used to type on phones and computers. This is a zhuyin pronunciation guide for how zhuyin sounds and is pronounced.

If you are trying to do a pure Automatic Language Growth approach to studying, pinyin is just a transcription system used for Chinese! It is okay to start reading pinyin whenever you start reading hanzi. It is NOT English translation, or English 'estimation' of pronunciation. (Not any more than the French alphabet or German alphabet is 'English' - and be so for real, I know you know German alphabet isn't pronounced like English so stop pretending Chinese pinyin is pronounced like English). Native speakers see pinyin when they're in school. In some educational materials for native speakers, you'll run into pinyin! You don't need to avoid pinyin once you have gotten to the point in ALG where you're okay with yourself reading hanzi! Once you have acquired enough language to start reading, pinyin and zhuyin are just as 'normal' for native speakers learning to read as hanzi is. You will ultimately NEED to learn pinyin or zhuyin to type.

I am not saying to read Everything with pinyin above the hanzi, once you start reading. By all means skip the pinyin as soon as you are able when reading things. Hanzi is what books are written in, and websites, and you'll need to develop the skill to read hanzi ASAP. You'll want to LOOK at pinyin when learning new words/hanzi, as you'll need to learn how to type it and what sounds match up to the pinyin, or zhuyin, writing system. So learning material like Lazy Chinese's videos that include pinyin? Useful for teaching you how the pinyin matches to sounds, and how to type the new hanzi she teaches you in each lesson.

Pinyin is just an estimate of pronunciation, just like spelling in any language (English spelling is not a perfect guide for how to pronounce English words, French spelling is not a perfect guide for how to pronounce French words, and Chinese pinyin is not a perfect guide for how to pronounce Chinese, like Japanese hiragana is just an estimation - it doesn't capture some sounds in spoken Japanese). You should listen to how actual people are pronouncing words over what pinyin says (for example, some people will say pinyin 'ng' as 'n', or 'shi' as 'si', or 'r' as 'l'). You'll still need to learn pinyin/zhuyin to type and write things digitally.

This post is because I see so many people studying Chinese through comprehensible input, thinking they need to desperately avoid pinyin. I'm sick of it. Pinyin or zhuyin are going to be NECESSARY at some point if you want to know how to type anything!

And unlike English, and French, Chinese language IS very phonetically similar to pinyin's estimates of pronunciation. (For example in English letter 'a' is not ONLY pronounced like 'cat' sometimes it's like 'ate', versus Chinese initials and finals which are quite consistent 'shi' is generally always pronounced the same as any other 'shi' if we're talking Standard Mandarin and not regional accents). If you can learn pinyin or zhuyin, you can type so many words just by hearing them! It took some practice to hear Chinese sounds correctly (obviously) but I can type most every word I have learned in Chinese in pinyin and then select the hanzi I want, just because I've heard the words. I sure couldn't fucking say that about English or French, the way words sound in English or French might not match the spelling much at all.

I'm just... really sick of the misunderstanding that pinyin is a tool for language learners, and no native speakers use pinyin. Native speakers use pinyin or zhuyin, if they're young enough to be using phones and computers. Some native speaker children use pinyin for a little while.

Native speakers also use hanzi to read in all media, and to write on paper, so learn hanzi obviously. You'll need hanzi. Don't try to avoid hanzi.

Hanzi are often phonetic, so knowing pinyin 'qing' for some hanzi with 青 in it, will help you realize how to read, look up, and type: 情 晴 清 蜻 请 青 箐 請 鯖 . Now again, like English, don't assume pronunciation is exactly like the Chinese pinyin, listen to the actual words pronounced. But it sure is a nice regular spelling for typing to pick up and learn.

As someone who learned to read, I do think it's fine and good to move right to reading hanzi directly, or hanzi while listening to matching audio, as soon as possible. You'll need to develop the skill of reading hanzi. Pinyin spelling is fairly regular, and once you get the sense of pinyin's spelling/pronunciation, you'll be able to type most hanzi in pinyin just by hearing the word's pronunciation. You can skip textbooks made for foreigners that use only pinyin for tons of pages (or whole volumes - I hate these textbooks). You can get textbooks that include hanzi from day one (probably with pinyin or zhuyin provided for brand new hanzi so you can sound out the hanzi if you don't have provided audio).

My point is: Don't avoid pinyin just because you're trying to 'learn Chinese in only Chinese.'

I mean, unless you want, in which case sure fuck yourself over and come back in 5 years and let us know how not being able to text or find anything online is going. I'm all for people doing whatever they want. It's your life. Maybe it will go so well, and you'll be able to come back and insist to learners everywhere and native speakers to stop learning pinyin as one learns to read hanzi. Maybe you'll have some awesome benefit to show us, that is acquired by avoiding pinyin. Maybe you come up with a new writing system that's more accurate and easier to write, like the Korean hangul writing system, and it replaces pinyin, zhuyin, and hanzi worldwide.

#LearningCzech #sstellestudiess

Learning Czech

Here are some tumblr posts i collected for learning Czech:

Resources:

Online Resources for learning Čeština (Czech)

Czech Resources

Masterlist by @multilingualpotato

Some vocab lists & grammar:

Czech month names

Czech prepositions of place

Czech nouns, their genders and declensions

Czech culture:

Children's books (look in the comments & tags)

Czech Christmas traditions

Czech Christmas carols

Czech Easter traditions

Some Czech langblrs:

@czechnotebook

@multilingualpotato

@ffaari

@mediocrelanguagelearner