Esperahol

The thing that got me about Hindi is that I am used to -o being masculine and -a being feminine with -i following on either side of gender depending on circumstance. But with Hindi -a was masculine and -i was generally always feminine and neither -e nor -o really came into it. But perhaps I should get back into the practice of studying Hindi... if nothing else I have a forum for practice.

There are two sets of words that I have trouble with whenever I try to use them. My problem is not with their meaning but instead how I apply them. They are,practise and practice and council and counsel. I find that I always have to stop to figure out whether or not I used the correct one or in the correct way.

Not too surprising considering they not only look the same, but relate to the same sort of meaning. That said:

The difference between practice and practise relates to differences between American and British spelling/usage. In American English you will only use the spelling practice whether speaking of noun or verb. In British English you will use the spelling practice for the noun and the spelling practise for the verb. I can see why this is confusing.

In terms of council versus counsel it's about the same. A council is a group of people meeting to discuss policy or whatever i.e. it is a noun. To counsel is to provide advice i.e. it is a verb.  The difference here of course is that this convention works in both America and British English.

I would have to say so - I'm actually pretty bad for it myself. I only need a few minutes with someone who happens to have an accent in order to catch it myself. Worse there are some accents so engrained in me that I've actually taken to writing the way I would speak it. It's rather weird actually... funny, but weird.

Reminds me of the Monty Python skit this thread does:

You see this parrot... well he um....

He's passed on.

He has ceased to be.

He's expired and gone to meet his maker.

He's a stiff.

He rests in peace.

He'd be pushing up daisies.

He's off the twig.

He's kicked the bucket.

He's shuffled off his mortal coil.

Run down the curtain and joined the choir invisible.

To add a bit further - he's gone and keeled over, departed this life, entered upon an eternal sabbath of rest, was summoned to appear before his judge, has assumed room temperature, kicked off, died with his boots on, bit the big one, bought the farm, cashed in his chips, fell off his perch, gave up the ghost, went to the big cage in the sky, pegged out, was promoted to glory, decided on a dirt nap, put on his pine overcoat and caught the last train to glory.

And if that isn't enough ways to say someone has gone off this mortal stage I haven't anything more then a

shrug for you.

Here are a few others to add to the list of music idioms.

-Strike a cord

-Blow your own trumpet

-Hit the right note

-Set the night to music

To strike a chord is to touch upon something significant to another as in speaking of love to one who has lost it.

To blow your own trumpet is to brag about yourself and it is not a flattering epithet.

To hit the right note is to successfully select the correct tone of voice or action.

To set the night to music is... well actually I've never heard of this one. Hmm.

I don't have much of a preference really - if the movie has subtitles available then I may watch it that way first, but I like the dubs. In fact when it comes to anime I will only generally use dubs because the Japanese version tends to irk me. Girls tend to come off as whiny, guys are narmtastic, and if the show is about kids the voices are always... weird. I mean I thought Gaara was 12 not 36, and someone needs to kill Sakura because that voice... yeesh. That said when learning the language subs are better, but if you just want to enjoy it then dubs are great.

Unless you're a religious zealot, I don't think it's necessary to learn a language like Latin. No one speaks it any more so there's no point in learning unless you want to read some old writings [mostly religious or outdated philosophy] which isn't that helpful because most of those writings have been translated to modern languages.

Well actually Latin is quite useful - not least because science and medicine both use it in their terminology. Knowing Latin give context and therefore aids quite a bit in learning and more importantly retaining the meaning of say the name for a particular bacteria.

Furthermore translations are seldom entirely correct. As the (horribly sexist) saying goes: "Translations are like women - the pretty ones aren't faithful and the faithful ones aren't pretty." Many, many, many misunderstandings of older works exist because people err on the side of pretty verse on the side of faithful.

Also "outdated" philosophy? Really? Alright.

It depends really on the context as well as the writer - I myself am prone to using terms like whereforth and fortnight and persnickety and brouhaha - however these words aren't exactly included in common usage. More likely is my usage of obsolete definitions as relates to a word as in "Sport" being used to describe an abnormal genetic presentation or "Nice" being used to describe someone as simple-minded. It's awful of course, because I get accused of being a hipster... and me without a boss mustache.

Tone deaf - related to a person who is apparently incapable of understanding the situation i.e.

"When it comes to women Mark is completely tone deaf."

Swan song - related to the end of something or someone i.e.

"So Paul just gave his swan song, he'll never work in this town again."

Clear as a bell - something that is easy to understand i.e.

"You're coming through clear as a bell"

And that's all I've got off the top of my head.

There is something strange about the idea that learning for it's own worth is somehow odd. I personally enjoy the idea of learning a language just because it interests me - and Gaelic is one of my top picks for interesting languages. Maybe we can practice it some time or just stare in horror at Finnegan's Wake... it's about the same thing really.

There is a stereotype that Southern people have a drawl (a heavy drawl) and are apparently retarded. There is a stereotype that anyone with a Jersey Accent must be either Jewish, Italian, and/or from a Mob family. There is also the stereotype that every British person must speak the Queen's English or Cockney because that's what it's like in movies.

I'm always up to practice English with anyone who needs it. Just drop me a PM, I'm generally always online anyway so I should be here sooner rather than later.

Isnt it fairly difficult to get accepted onto a content mill? I have heard that even native speakers have difficulty getting accepted due to their being so many unemployed college students that they get the choice of a fairly talented crop of people.

It depends - for the lower level ones like Textbroker it's actually rather simple in nature. For the more intensive ones like The Content Authority it's actually seriously difficult for anyone to get in the door. That said there are many, many sites out there if you're looking to give it a try. In fact, if you'd like you can P.M. for a list of sites that I've had experience with. I'm trying not to hijack the thread here.

I am rather poor at the whole "nasal" quality thing - I just can't get my pronunciation to come out right and it erks me. Apparently I am just much, much better at Spanish and Latin and even Japanese (although I suck at putting the right emphasis on all my vowels).

While it isn't as friendly as Russian sometimes is I wouldn't call German aggressive or even rather rough. In my experience it is a strong language, but it is also a lovely language... like metal work. Metal is not soft, but it can be fine and bent into something lovely.

No. I don't use terms like LMAO or LOL or ROFL because I'm not a texter... well no. I text, but I don't use text speech. Rather I tend to use regular English. But then again I honestly feel like anything I can write is generally something I can just say...

Yes I am in fact a bajillion years old and I walked to school uphill both ways in the snow while carrying all 19 of my siblings and milking a cow. It was really complicated.

I spent a large period of my childhood seriously enjoying 19th century works of literature. Therefore my vocabulary is littered with lots of older terms such as persnickety, brouhaha, and rigamarole. There are times when I think I need to grow a really boss mustache to go with my antiquated terminology. But then I realize I'll just look like a hipster and that kills it for me.

I tried Klingon once and a couple of the video game languages I've come across. Heck I actually tried to invent a couple of languages - I just never really stick with it because there simply isn't any real gravis to it... So I don't tend to stick with it. That said I do enjoy learning languages for language sake.

I personally don't think I have an accent, but apparently I do - and depending on who I happen to be talking to... it's rather thick? Also it may or may not sound Caribbean or Southern or Californian or Creole or some ungodly mixture of all of the above. It honestly is rather hilarious to be asked where I happen to be from as soon as I open my mouth.

Have you tried:

www.learn-japanese.info/grammar.html‎

http://clix.to/gumi

nihongo-e-na.com/eng/site/tag/Grammar/keyword/Beginner/‎

These are just three sites, but I feel that they can be of at least some help to you. Also have you tried simply listening to the dialogue in first English and then with the Hearing Impaired subtitles and then in Japanese with Subtitles and finally to just the Japanese? I did that as a kid and it actually helped to establish basic grammar as well as get me used to the rhythm.

Consider dialect and accent can do a lot to make one language sound like a thousand it shouldn't be too much of a surprise to have entirely different languages be radically different. At the same time it's rather surprising how similar two languages can appear whether spoken or at times written. That's half the reason I am so utterly fascinated with learning new languages.

I am in fact a fast reader in English, Spanish, Latin, and Portuguese. I am however a slow reader in Japanese, French, and Hindi. I do not however read aloud, because I was taught not to at an early age and that has apparently stuck with me. That said I am not a fan of the concept of speed reading, because I feel as though information is lost if only due to lack of analysis while reading.

It is something that requires specific circumstances - for instance, if you are going to translate something from Chinese to English then you can expect quite a few errors. That said you should still be able to get the basic gist of the work. It also helps if you are using rather more mainstream sources rather than more estoric things i.e. using more common forms rather than something off the wall. So I honestly don't have an real issue with the software and actually don't mind using it for a quick look over something.

I am an excellent reader in most of my languages, however I am only an adequate writer in anything besides English. That said I can speak fairly well with my best results in Spanish, but I sometimes have difficulty with listening depending on the language and unfortunately the dialect.

So I'm Esperahol and I love the spoken Word and the written Word and basically all the Words. I enjoy learning now just how words are shaped, but how words shape the cultures they belong to. That said words gain their power through the connections they build between us - and that is why I register to this forum. I feel like I will learn so much more from trying (and probably failing) to talk to you all.

So thank you for having me and I hope to  become a valued member.

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