polyglot in training

So my little brother was being especially snarky little brother-y the other night while we were cleaning the kitchen, as I was telling him how I was really interested in learning Lithuanian. His immediate response to this comment was “Why don’t you master the other 80 languages you study before you start learning Lithuanian?” I responded to him in a way that surprised even me, for a second: “I don’t study every language that I do because I want to achieve fluency. Sometimes I just do it because I appreciate the beauty of the language.” 

And I realized, as I said it, that it’s true. I’ve been learning Spanish for four years, and I am absolutely in love with the language. I want to continue furthering my working knowledge of the language for the rest of my life, and I wish to pass the language onto my children in the future. But that’s not the case with every language that I study/have studied. For example, I love Chinese, but my love for it comes more from a grammatical standpoint than from a communicative one. 

To me, every language is uniquely beautiful. I love Finnish vowel harmony. I adore the mutations in the Celtic languages. I am inspired by the intricacy of Chinese’s measure word system. But just because I study a language, does not mean I have to learn it. I’m a language learner, it’s true, but I think at heart I am more of a linguist. I appreciate languages because they demonstrate to me what the human mind, vocal tract, and hands can achieve, and that is why I will continue to study multiple languages, perhaps dozens, at a time. But I will only attempt to learn the languages that I really connect with.

tl;dr - I’ve decided to differentiate between learning a language (that is to pursue it to a communicative end) and studying a language (simply learning about the language and acquiring a knowledge of its phonology, morphology, and syntax).

Books/Coursebooks

A Guide to Old English (Bruce Mitchell, Wiley-Blackwell) - Very grammar based, also contains texts, used on many courses teaching Old English.

Introduction to Old English (Peter S. Baker) - Also used on many courses, contains sections on grammar and texts.

Sweet’s Anglo-Saxon Primer (Henry Sweet) - This is a grammar based book, written originally in the late 19th century, with texts as well as a glossary (Online version: 1, 2).

Complete Old English (Teach Yourself) - Basic introduction to OE with exercises that teach grammar and vocabulary. A CD is also available.

A User-Friendly Dictionary of Old English (Bill Griffiths) - A basic dictionary which also contains grammar and literature sections (with translations).

First Steps in Old English (Stephen Pollington) - A coursebook based on learning grammar and vocabulary through exercises, it also contains texts. A CD is available.

Æðelgyðe Ellendæda on Wundorlande (Peter S. Baker) - Alice in Wonderland in Old English!

Be þam lytlan æþelinge (Fritz Kemmler) - The Little Prince (Le Petit Prince) in Old English!

Websites

Old English Wordhord - Twitter/Website

University of Calgary - Basic texts, lessons and a grammar section.

Old English Core Vocabulary - University of St. Andrews

Anglo-Saxon Aloud - Recordings in Old English by Michael D. C. Drout.

Omniglot Basic Old English Phrases

Old English Translator

Old English Aids (Royal Holloway)

The Complete Corpus of Old English Poetry

Old English Aerobics (Grammar)

King Alfred’s Grammar Book

Englisc Onstigende Wordbōc

Online Dictionaries  

A Concise Old English Dictionary (John R. Clark Hall)

Bosworth-Toller Anglo-Saxon Dictionary

Dictionary of Old English (University of Toronto)

Youtube

Leornende Eald Englisc - Channel

Other

A basic schematic of why the Korean alphabet is so cool, from Wright House: 

Unlike almost every other alphabet in the world, the Korean alphabet did not evolve. It was invented in 1443 (promulgated in 1446) by a team of linguists and intellectuals commissioned by King Sejong the Great.

In the diagram [above], the Korean consonants are arranged into five main linguistic groups (one per row), depending on where in the mouth contact is made. Notice that there is a graphic element common to all the consonants in a particular row. The first consonant in each row is the most basic and is graphically the simplest; this representative consonant for each group is the building block for the other characters in that group. Certain of these modifications are systematic, and yield similarly modified characters in several groups, such as adding a horizontal line to a simple consonant (a “stop” consonant–such as t/d or p/b–rather than a nasal consonant) to form the aspirated consonants (those made with extra air) and doubling simple consonants to form “tense” consonants (no real equivalent in English).

Notice that the five representative consonants (the ones in the first column in the upper part of the diagram) are also depicted in the drawings that make up the lower part of the diagram showing the relevant part of the mouth involved. Ingeniously, each of these representative consonants is a kind of simplified schematic diagram showing the position of the mouth in forming those consonants.

Taken from Sophia Chua-Rubenfeld, daughter of the Tiger Mother

but

I just need to draw attention to this little gem of a pick-up line

The Greeks had this word, right, we have no idea where it came from, it just kinda popped up out of nowhere, and it could mean either apples, cheeks, or boobs. Problem is it looked and sounded *exactly* like another, unrelated word which could mean sheep, goat, or any animal in general really, which must have got confusing if you were a farmer talking about your livestock, but anyway…

Then the Romans, having stolen practically everything else from the Greeks, thought they’d nick this word too, because Latin isn’t confusing enough without throwing in a bunch of loan words. And they adopted it to mean a pumpkin.

Then the English came along and were all like “when in Rome”, and stole it, where it became our word ‘melon’. Which has now come back to mean boobs.