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Mizali

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About Mizali

  • Birthday 11/04/1981

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  • Currently studying
    Japanese, French, German
  • Native tongue
    English

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  1. What are some of people's favorite authors in the Science-Fiction genre? Since this is the English Literature section, let's stick to authors who write primarily in English for this particular discussion, though I suppose that authors who have translations from other languages available would be okay too. As for myself, I think that my favorite series of Science Fiction books is the Vorkosigan Saga by Lois McMaster Bujold. She happens to be one of my favorite Fantasty writers as well, but this particular series of books is one that I finished recently and really enjoyed.
  2. Chiming in with some of my own, I think that there are a few interesting ones. For a single word that can be hard to repeat, I think the best one might be 'toyboat'. Trying to say it over and over starts to get really hard! For phrases that are hard to say, I think the one that wins is: The sixth sick sheik's sixth sheep's sick My favorite in another language is probably: Niwa no niwa ni wa niwa niwatori wa niwaku ni wani o tabeta, which is a Japanese one that translates more or less to 'In Mr. Niwa's yard, two chickens suddenly ate an alligator'
  3. I've always enjoyed these, especially when trying to learn them in other languages. I guess that I enjoy the challenge of trying to wrap my tongue around certain phrases that seem designed to trip the speaker up, whether they're purposefully made that way or just common phrases that are accidentally hard to say. What are some of your favorite tongue twisters in English?
  4. Yeah, that's mostly what I mean. We Americans tend to be a little bit insular when it comes to language. In Europe, for instance, other languages tend to be more prevalent because in many cases countries are the size of many of our states, and so it's not as common for people to have so little exposure to people who are from other countries and cultures, and who speak other languages. In those cases where other languages are pretty common, like Spanish in many portions of the country, people aren't very interested in learning those languages and think that the other people should learn English to get by.
  5. Those are some good ones! Since this is a language forum, even if this is the English area, I figure it won't hurt too much to share some from other languages too. One of those that I like is: Engage le jeu que je le gagne It translates more or less to 'start the game so I can win'
  6. Like others have said, this is a really common mistake even for people who speak English natively. The misuse of apostrophes is frequent, though there are a few tricks to remember in order to know whether you should be using one or not. For the most part you can ask yourself: 1. Is this being put into the word to show ownership, such as in "my friend's car" or 2. Is this a contraction, where the single word means two other words, such as in "they've gone to the store" being short for "they have gone to the store" The problem with this particular situation is that "its" shows ownership, so people tend to look at rule one and think that it fits. It's an unfortunate exception in this case, and just one of those things that people seem to have to learn by rote to get right.
  7. Does anyone know of better, more interactive ways to learn German? I've tried some applications/sites like duolingo, but I'm looking for something that's less about rote memorization and repetition and more interactive. Something that encourages the use of grammar and vocabulary that have already been learned. It seems like this kind of thing would be difficult to develop, and there might not be anything out there, I'm just curious whether anyone has heard of something like this (potentially even for other languages than German).
  8. 1Q84 was a good book, but I listened to the audiobook for that one during my previous long commutes. I wasn't a very big fan of the woman that they got to read those parts, though the guy was pretty good. I think that the narration not being all that great kind of hindered how much I really enjoyed it. Kafka on the Shore was also pretty good, but it wasn't one of my favorites. It's definitely worth reading, I think everything by Murakami is, but it's probably below average in my opinion. Granted, that's only my opinion, and other people might like it more!
  9. The length of his books can vary quite a bit. Some of the shorter ones are fantastic too, though they might not have as much depth as the longer ones do. Even when they're short, they're usually very good. Probably my favorite of his books was Hard Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World. It's a bit strange, but a lot of Murakami's books have surreal components to them. That particular book was also a major source of inspiration for the anime Haibane Renmei, so I guess the writers of that anime enjoyed the book too
  10. Yeah, long sentences in English aren't necessarily bad, you just have to make sure that they're easy to understand despite the length. Sometimes a sentence can start to be hard to follow when it becomes too meandering, and that's when short and concise ones are better.
  11. Is anyone else a fan of this author? I started reading his books back when the English release of The Wind Up Bird Chronicle came out, and I immediately fell in love with his writing style. The fact that TWUBC ended up becoming one of his books that I like the least, despite having liked it so much when I first read it, says a lot about how much I like his work. This man seems to understand the human mind and heart in a way that most people don't, and has a very unique way of expressing it. He's ended up being one of my favorite authors, and one that I watch for every new book from so that I can run out and pick it up (or run to the kindle store and grab it, anyway)
  12. I'd really like to learn German, since it's where a lot of my ancestry comes from. The rest of it comes from the UK, and I already speak English. The fact that I don't have any friends or family that speak German makes it a little harder to learn, since I don't have anyone to practice with.
  13. The only time that I use that particular abbreviation is when I'm actually laughing out loud, or when I'm trying to be ironic. The latter is probably kind of silly, but in those cases I'm usually doing it because the particular friend that I'm using it with gets annoyed by it, and it's fun to tease them. In general, I tend to mostly use those kinds of acronyms when I'm actually trying to communicate something important and want to shorten it. That tends to boil down to mostly things like 'afk' or 'brb' The sentiment of lol is usually not one that I feel is best communicated with an acronym, though.
  14. I think that google translate has its place, and it can certainly be a useful resource in certain circumstances. In the few cases I've had to use it for minor things, or needed a translation of a page that might be accurate enough to get me through with a general idea of what's being said, it's been able to get the job done. I've found it more useful for translating something from a language that I don't speak into one that I do, rather than the other way around. At least when it's translating from another language into English for me, I can figure out more or less what it's getting at when it inevitably fails a little bit and doesn't get things quite right.
  15. Hello everyone, I'm Mizali! I've always had an interest in languages and learning them, and have the misfortune of growing up in a country (America) that doesn't really seem to do very well at creating interest in studying other languages and encouraging people to be multi-lingual, like a lot of other places do. Despite that, I studied both Spanish and Japanese in high school, even though I had to go to the local community college for the Japanese classes. I even spent a summer on a language study program abroad in Osaka, Japan. I have an interest in other languages too, and have started trying to learn French and German as well.
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