The World in Words focuses on language. We cover everything from bilingual education to the globalization of English to untranslatable foreign phrases. You’ll learn how to insult someone in Icelandic, among other things. Hosted by The World’s Patrick Cox.
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The World in Words
Defunct place names
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On Monday’s Geo Quiz we wanted to know about geographic names that have disappeared. Here’s an example: Tanganyika. Can you find Tanganyika on the map? It once bordered the Indian Ocean and Lake Victoria, but its vanished! Harry Campbell has written a book called “Whatever Happened to Tanganyika?: The Place Names That History Left Behind.” We speak with him. Download MP3Gaddafi’s translator and Nazi slogans in English
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In the latest World in Words podcast, the top five language-related stories from the past month. Among them: the sad tale of Muammar Gaddafi’s translator at the United Nations; the quixotic tale of the real estate mogul who is trying to export Korean Hangul script to Indonesia; and a German court’s decision to permit Nazi hate speech, so long as it’s not in German.
Free speech around the world
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After Joe Wilson’s “you lie!”, after Kanye West at the MTV awards, after Serena Williams’ outburst at the US Open, you may think: enough already with nasty speech. Well, you ain’t heard nothin’ yet. In this week’s World in Words podcast, a report on some really offensive Dutch cartoons. Also, a South African gadfly-journalist upsets just about everyone. And the Danish tourist bureau stages a faux one night stand.
Russia’s national lyricist, Canada’s language laws, and the rehabilitation of a code-breaker
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This week, a look back at the career of the late Sergei Mikhalkov. During World War Two, Mikhalkov wrote the lyrics to the Soviet national anthem. Decades later, he composed the words for Russia’s national anthem– to the same piece of music. Also, a conversation with Keith Spicer on Canada’s 40-year-old language laws. Spicer was the country’s first enforcer of bilingualism. Finally, the British government apologizes for its treatment of Alan Turing, who helped break the Nazis’ war codes.
Your brain on language
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In this week’s World in Words podcast, a mom-and-pop effort to restore Arabic script to street signs in Israel. Also, author Katherine Russell Rich on learning Hindi at a language school in Rajasthan. Her book “Dreaming in Hindi” is also an investigation into what happens to our brains when we learn a learn a language. Plus, a somewhat shameful expression in Spanish.Download MP3
Rosetta Stone: the method behind the hype, a spelling bee with a twist, and Hillary’s Congo adventure
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In this week’s World in Words podcast, the rise and rise of Rosetta Stone. With big government contracts and a huge advertising campaign, Rosetta Stone is now American’s #1 language teacher. If you learn the Rosetta Stone way, you’ll absorb a language an infant does. Well, that’s the theory. Also, non-native English speakers from around the world take part in an English Spelling Bee in New York. And, Hillary Clinton’s not-so-lost-in-translation moment in Kinshasa, Congo. Download MP3
New rhetoric on Israeli settlements, an international libary of children’s books, and faux French in France
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In this week’s World in Words podcast, Israel’s government tries out some new words to describe its West Bank settlement program. We consider those, and take a look at previous rhetorical attempts to justify Israel’s expansion into Palestinian territory. Then, a conversation with the University of Arizona’s Kathy Short, who manages an ever-expanding collection of children’s books from around the world. Finally, an update on Brooklyn’s finest fake French band, Les Sans Culottes. After more than a decade together, the band is finally performing in France. Download MP3
Diplomatic insults, click languages, Harry Potter in France, and cucumber season
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In this week’s World in Words podcast, the nuanced — and sometimes not so nuanced — world of diplomatic insults: we hurl a few your way, courtesy of Hugo Chavez, Hillary Clinton and Winston Churchill. Then, news of languages that include lots of tongue clicks: linguists have figured out how to decipher and classify click from clack, as it were. Then, the Norwegian for silly season (it involves cucumbers). Finally, many French fans of Harry Potter novels read the books in English. Download MP3
Haruki Murakami’s fans, confessions of a kanji-holic, and kwassa kwassa
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We check out a claim that with the aid of a super-computer, it’s possible to predict which words will become extinct in a few centuries. Also, a report on the extraordinarily devoted fans of Japanese novelist Haruki Murakami. That’s followed by a conversation with Eve Kushner, a devoted fan of those Japanese characters known as kanji. Finally, Vampire Weekend’s Ezra Koenig on his favorite phrase out of Africa: kwassa kwassa.
Banning Hungarian, swearing for pain relief, and dog barks translated
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In the latest World in Words podcast, Patrick Cox and Clark Boyd select their top five language-related stories from July. Among them: Slovakia passes a law banning Hungarian in official communications in some of its Hungarian-speaking regions; new research seeks to show why babies and toddlers are so adept at learning two languages simultaneously; the trangressive nature of swearing helps when it comes to tolerating pain; and Japanese toy maker Takara Tomy has come up with a device that claims to translate dog noises into human language. But do we ready want to know what pooch is saying? Plus, our favorite hated words! Download MP3
David Crystal’s life in language, Moominmania and Nowheristan
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In this week’s The World in Words podcast, the granddaddy of British linguists David Crystal reflects on a life in language. Crystal is an inclusionist: he welcomes slang and textspeak, for example, into the English language. He recalls that as a young academic he was contacted by a shoe company who placed an order with him for several nouns and adjectives. Also this week, the Moomins: they’re as popular in their native Finland as Disney is in the United States. But strange things happen to the Moomins when they are translated into Japanese, Cantonese or English. Finally, we hear from a Lebanese man who has proclaimed himself Emperor of Nowheristan. Download MP3
Esperanto, Klingon, Blissymbolics and 900 others: why we invent languages
This week, a converation with Arika Okrent, author of “In the Land of Invented Languages: Esperanto Rock Stars, Klingon Poets, Loglan Lovers and the Mad Dreamers Who Tried to Build a Perfect Language.” Okrent, herself a linguist, tells the stories of people who dreamed up languages that would replace our own bastard tongues. She also submerges herself, Orwell-style, into the geeky world of invented language societies. The vast majority of invented languages from Lingua Ignota (c.1150) to Dritok (2007) have completely failed to take off. But they tell us much about how we think, how we do not think, and how we love to blame language for our own shortcomings. Listen
More linguist soldiers, selling beer in North Korea, and a beach in Ghana
This week, why a Pentagon program to recruit more foreign language-speaking soldiers is attracting so many Koreans. Then selling beer North Korean style. After that we give thanks to activist listeners in Gagauz, Tongan, Czech and many other languages. Finally, as Barack Obama heads to Ghana, we head to a beach in Ghana, a beach whose name is hotly debated. Listen
Pentagon still kicking out linguists, Ukraine’s Soviet names, and a banquet of foreign idioms
In the lastest podcast, the Obama Administration is moving to boost foreign language speakers at the State Department and the CIA. But at the Pentagon there’s a problem: the Don’t Ask Don’t Tell policy has resulted in early discharge for more than 300 linguists, including 60 Arabic speakers. Also today, Ukraine wants to change the names of cities named after Soviet heroes, many of them Russian. And a conversation with Jag Bhalla, collector of foreign language idioms. Listen to The World in Words Podcast
Iran and translation, a search engine is sick in Chinese, and a drug ring’s Arabic dialects
Patrick Cox and Carol Hills select the top five language-related
stories from June. Among them: Google translation gets to work on the streets of Teheran; Microsoft’s choice of Bing as the name for its search engine to rival Google may not go down well in China; a music festival in Quebec runs afoul of language sensitivies; and a drug ring in Pennsylvannia uses Iraqi Arabic dialects in its communications.Listen
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