Journey to the Omo Valley to meet the Dhaasanac people of Ethiopia, whose language defies easy categorization. Instead of marking…
Is your target language a "Lego" language or a "sculpture" language? This practical framework introduces language typology (isolating, agglutinative, fusional)…
Ever wonder why English sounds rhythmically different from Spanish or Japanese? The answer lies in a fascinating linguistic concept: the…
In languages from Thailand to Ghana, you can say "go buy bring the book" and be perfectly grammatical. This fascinating…
We all know onomatopoeia, but many languages have something far richer: ideophones. These "adverbs of the senses" don't just mimic…
Imagine a world without 'left' or 'right,' where you'd say "there's a bug on your south leg." This post explores…
Why do we count in tens? While it seems natural, many cultures from the Mayans to the Basques developed sophisticated…
What happens when unrelated languages live side-by-side for centuries? In the Balkans, languages as different as Albanian, Greek, and Romanian…
Ever tried to say "two dogs" in Thai and been corrected? That's because you can't just count nouns; you need…
In languages like Inuktitut or Mohawk, a single, complex word can convey a thought that requires a full sentence in…
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