Why Bilinguals Are Smarter
Speaking two languages rather than just one has obvious practical benefits in an increasingly globalized world. But in recent years, scientists have begun to show that the advantages of bilingualism are even more fundamental than being able to converse with a wider range of people. Being bilingual, it turns out, makes you smarter. It can have a profound effect on your brain, improving cognitive skills not related to language. Evidence suggests that the bilingual experience improves the brain’s executive function — a command system that directs the attention processes used for planning, solving problems, and performing various other mentally demanding tasks. These processes include ignoring distractions to stay focused, switching attention willfully from one thing to another, holding information in mind, and a heightened ability to monitor the environment.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/18/opinion/sunday/the-benefits-of-bilingualism.html
Arabic, you crazy!
I would like to stand up for the language nerds and give some reasons for studying Arabic that have nothing to do with politics. The language of the National Designated Other is bound to switch to Chinese in a couple of years, but until colleges start teaching Martian, Arabic is going to remain the strangest, most interesting language you can study in an undergrad classroom. And do not fall for the bait and switch with Chinese or Japanese! They might tempt you with an exotic writing system, but after a few months you find out that the underlying language is pretty vanilla, and meanwhile there is a stack of three thousand flash cards standing in between you and the ability to skim a newspaper. Arabic, on the other hand, twists healthy minds in twelve ways.
Lost in translation
ILUNGA: From the Tshiluba language spoken in Congo, often chosen as the world's most untranslatable word. "Ilunga" indicates a person who is ready to forgive any abuse the first time, to tolerate it the second time, but to neither forgive nor tolerate a third offense. MAMIHLAPINATAPEI: From Yagan, the indigenous language of Tierra del Fuego. This word has been translated in several ways, always implying a wordless yet meaningful look shared by two people who both desire to initiate something but are both reluctant to start. TORSCHLUSSPANIK: From German, this word literally means "gate-closing panic" and is used to describe the fear of diminishing opportunities as one ages. This word is most frequently applied to women who race the "biological clock" to wed and bear children.
http://dayriffer.com/category/34/l/1863/i-go-with-ilunga-though-it-s-hard-to-argue-with-mamihlapinatapei-or-for-that-matter-with-torschlusspanik
Newborn babies cry with accent
German researchers say babies begin to pick up the nuances of their parents' accents while still in the womb. The findings suggest that unborn babies are influenced by the sound of the first language that penetrates the womb. The French newborns cried with a rising accent while the German babies' cries had a falling inflection. It was already known that foetuses could memorise sounds from the outside world in the last three months of pregnancy and were particularly sensitive to the contour of the melody in both music and human voices.
http://factlets.info/babyaccents
Stop the baby talk
Babies can understand many of the words that adults are saying. Scientists at the University of California show that babies process words they hear with the same brain structures as adults, and in the same amount of time. Moreover, the researchers found that babies were not merely processing the words as sounds, but were capable of grasping their meaning. "Babies are using the same brain mechanisms as adults to access the meaning of words from what is thought to be a mental database of meanings, a database which is continually being updated right into adulthood," said the study's first author, Katherine Travis, of the Department of Neurosciences and the Multimodal Imaging Laboratory at UC San Diego.
http://www.physorg.com/news/2011-01-babies-language-grown-up.html
Glottopedia - Free Encyclopedia of Linguistics
Glottopedia is a freely editable encyclopedia for linguists by linguists that is currently being built up. It will contain dictionary articles on all technical terms of linguistics and is multilingual. In addition, there are survey articles, biographical articles and language articles, potentially on all linguists and all languages.
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