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In this week’s World in Words podcast, the newest star of Germany’s national soccer team is an ethnic Turk. His popularity is one of the reasons why Turkish has become just a little more accepted in Germany today. Also, the Georgian government pulls down a statue of Joseph Stalin in his hometown, but people there use the language of extreme denial to describe the town’s most famous son. And a British politician calls French a “useless” language to learn. Download MP3
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In this week’s World in Words podcast, an attempt to get Belgians to adopt families online from across that country’s language divide. Also, in Montenegro, the government is promoting what it calls the Montenegrin language, formerly considered a dialect of Serbo-Croatian. Plus, a discussion on what happens to spelling in the age of Spell Check and Google.Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
In the latest World in Words podcast, it’s not just Brazil vs Spain at the World Cup. It’s Bafana Bafana vs Les Elephants, soccer vs football, cleats vs boots and the coach vs the gaffer. We have stories on the new adidas ball and its globally correct corporate name; on the race to rename streets in South African cities; and on the US-English confrontation off the field: the linguistic battle over soccer terminology. Download MP3
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In this week’s World in Words podcast, Anamika Veeramani won the National Spelling Bee by correctly spelling the word “stromuhr”. It’s one of many English words in the contest that sound decidedly unEnglish. After a report on that, we speak with David Wolman, whose book “Righting the Mother Tongue” traces the anarchic evolution of English spelling. English is barely policed: foreign words, often with foreign spelling intact, migrate unhindered into the language. Download MP3
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In the latest World in Words podcast, our top five language stories of the past month: translating Iceland’s economic collapse, document by document; magnificently bad translations in Shanghai and at the Eurovision Song Contest; a language for communication with extraterrestrials; Arizona moves against accented schoolteachers; and Costa Rica’s new president Laura Chinchilla is one of millions of people who are named after animals.Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
Translators are proving their worth twice in this week’s World in Words podcast: in New York, they’re helping elderly Russian speakers fill out their census forms; in Louisiana and Mississippi they’re interpreting for Vietnamese-American fishermen whose livelihoods are threatened by the big oil spill. Also, which tastes better: Silverfin, Kentucky tuna or Asian carp? Plus, a conversation about counting: some languages are more numerate than others.Download MP3
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In this week’s World in Words podcast, a language-learning marathon is over, as the author of a blog called 37 Languages decides which one to learn for real. Also, a new film documents a year in the life of an elementary school in Turkey. The kids speak only Kurdish, their teacher only Turkish. And we profile one of Ukraine’s most beloved performers: the cross-dressing Verka Serduchka, who is popularizing a hybrid Ukrainian-Russian dialect.Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
Three people have been killed in the Greek capital, Athens, where protests against big cuts in government spending have turned violent. The austerity program is being brought in so that Greece can receive an international financial bailout and avoid defaulting on its debts. Marco Werman speaks with one of the protestors, Despina Koutsoumba, who’s an elected official with the Greek Civil Servants’ Trade Union. Download MP3
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It’s the last day of campaigning before the British general election on Thursday and the leaders of the three main parties are travelling across the country in last-minute bids to win votes. Opinion polls put the main opposition Conservative party of David Cameron ahead, but suggest he won’t win an outright majority. Many voters are thought to be still undecided. Laura Lynch reports from London. Download MP3Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
In this week’s podcast, the U.S.Census Bureau is firing on all linguistic cylinders to ensure that non-English speakers are counted in this year’s census. Things don’t always go smoothly: in Vietnamese, the word “census” got translated into something closer to “investigation”. Also, how to pronounce that unpronounceable Icelandic volcano, Scrabble obsession beyond the English-speaking world, and five unique Japanese expressions.Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
Our top five language stories this month: Why Google Translate rules, and why human translators shouldn’t feel threatened; a weight-loss company advertizes for Product Testing Associates, whose sole task is to eat more food — not the first time an employer has over-egged the job title pudding; there’s evidence that certain accents are less welcome than others in corporate boardrooms; India’s economic rise and linguistically mixed marriages mean that fewer young Indians speak the languages of their parents; and French citizens vote on new words for “buzz”, “chat”, and “newsletter.” Download MP3
Marianne Hirsch and Leo Spitzer’s monumental book “Ghosts of Home” is a stunning marriage of intellectual curiosity and personal search, a compelling historical reconstruction of the German-Jewish Central European culture of the embattled city of Czernowitz, once known as the “Vienna of the East.”
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Unemployment in Europe has reached a record high. It’s now at 10 % among the countries that use the Euro currency. As jobs disappear the number of people on the street across Europe has risen. And more are seeking shelter in airports. In Spain airports are a relatively safe sanctuary. The World’s Gerry Hadden explains from Barcelona. (flickr image by Arrels Fundació)Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
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Iceland is struggling with a severe economic crisis. Even so, lawmakers in the country’s Althingi parliament house (flickr image: putneymark) had another pressing matter to deal with: striptease! This week, they voted to ban strip clubs in their island nation. Marco Werman talks with Gundun Jonsdattor whose organization Stigmot provides information against sexual violence. Download MP3
