Rosetta Stone Blog

Finding a Hobby

Josh Wilberger — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 20:40:20 +0000

Remember how it seemed that, coming up through school, everybody found a hobby-turned-passion? There was the girl who played the violin so well Stradivarius himself would’ve been proud. Another discovered art, blurring the boundaries between paper and subject. You know how it was. There was always somebody known as the kid who did ______ (insert hobby) really well. I wasn’t one of them, though. I mean, how on earth do you make sound (excuse me, music) from rubbing two sets of strings together? And I always thought my stick figures were the pièce de résistance of my short-lived attempt at art. But, you know, critics . . . What can you do?

Then eighth grade brought me a unique opportunity: foreign language study. I always enjoy a challenge, but nobody in my family speaks anything other than English (and even that’s questionable at times). I figured that if learning a foreign language wasn’t a challenge, I didn’t know what was. Armed with an expansive vocabulary of señor, señorita, uno, dos, and tres, I made the plunge into Spanish I.

Years later, I find myself studying Spanish in college, and of all things, minoring in Russian. Ironically, for years friends told me to try Portuguese but I just couldn´t imagine it. I mean, I’ve never met anyone who speaks Portuguese. And could I really learn yet another language? Having conquered Russian 101 this semester, I decided it was time to try my hand at a fourth language. Like I discussed in my first post, self-study and I don’t mix. So, after hearing for years about Rosetta Stone, it was time for me to get in on the action.

In just a few short months, I’m now able to listen to Portuguese radio on my iPhone and read the news in Portuguese. Yeah, Spanish and Portuguese are similar, but that doesn’t count for much if the learning approach isn’t solid. Truth be told, if I’d had this program in middle school, who knows what I would’ve achieved by now? Learning so much so quickly, broadening my passion for language in unforeseen ways, I can’t wait to fill you in on where I go from here!

Photo by Michele Constantini (PhotoAlto) courtesy of Getty Images

Where Theory Meets Practice: Using Language To Help Make the World a Better Place

Danny Hieber — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 18:00:59 +0000

Whenever I tell someone I’m a linguist, the inevitable question I get asked is, “So how many languages do you speak?” Similarly, when I tell people I work at Rosetta Stone, a common response is, “So you speak all thirty-three languages that Rosetta Stone offers?” Or when I tell them I helped create the Rosetta Stone Navajo product, they say, “Wow, your Navajo must be really good.”

The truth is, I know only four languages (English, Swahili, Spanish, and Latin), and none of them are languages I helped create products for (Chitimacha, Navajo, and Iñupiaq). “Then how,” you ask, “can you possibly create language software for a language you don’t even speak?”

For starters, I was hardly alone in the effort. A team of expert speakers—teachers, researchers, and elders—worked tirelessly with us for several years to make these products happen. And we leaned on the work of many academics who had gone before us.

A page from Thomas Jefferson’s comparative vocabulary of Native American languages. Chitimacha can be seen on the second-to-last line.

My contributions with these languages and others come from my training as a linguist. I’ve had to become familiar with the ways different languages operate—the common patterns, the rarest features, the diverse ways of expressing the same concept, and the things that are logically possible but that for some reason we never see. All these are interesting to linguists because they hint at how language works generally. Discovering and explaining these cross-language patterns is one of the fundamental goals of linguistics.

At Rosetta Stone, we carefully analyze the details of a language so our learners don’t have to. For example, do you think all languages have subjects and objects? It turns out they don’t! Using subjects and objects is just one way of indicating who’s doing what to whom in an action; there are several others. Here’s an example from Chitimacha of one pattern that a number of languages have:

nuhc-ik	qasi hect-ik	gaht-ik	guxt-ik	qeh-ik
run-I	man watch-I	gaht-ik	eat-I	arrive-I
“I ran”	“I watched the man”	“I bit (it)”	“I ate”	“I arrived”

dadiwa-ki	qasi hect-ki	gaht-ki	paakins-ki	qeh-ki
cold-me	man watch-me	bite-me	tired-me	happen-me
“I am cold”	“the man watched me”	“it bit me”	“I am tired”	“it happened to me”

What’s going on here? Sometimes -ki is the subject, and sometimes it’s the object! That’s because subject and object are mostly irrelevant in Chitimacha. Instead, the difference between -ik and -ki is that -ik is used when I’m deliberately doing the action, and -ki is used when the action is something I have no control over. Linguists call this agentive-patientive marking or split intransitivity. Once you realize that languages have different ways of indicating the relationship between participants in an action, and you know what those ways are, it becomes (more or less) easy to look at any language and say, “Aha! This language has subjects and objects” or “This language has split intransitivity!”

My role in the process of creating Rosetta Stone products is to recognize these patterns and understand all the complicated grammar. My colleagues and I then design lessons that use Rosetta Stone’s Dynamic Immersion method to teach grammatical concepts through intuition and strategies like pattern recognition. Learners don’t have to wade through a bunch of complicated grammar terms—they just find themselves intuitively using the language correctly and communicating naturally.

The classification of languages according to their different patterns is an area of linguistics known as language typology, and I think it’s one of the most exciting areas of linguistics today. In July, Rosetta Stone sent me to Boulder, Colorado, to attend the Linguistic Institute 2011, sponsored by the Linguistic Society of America. I attended seminars on language typology taught by some of the foremost experts in the world. Since then, I’ve been applying what I learned to exciting new projects here in Rosetta Stone Labs, such as creating products designed to better handle cross-language variation, and finding innovative ways to think about parts of speech. It’s a great example of where theory meets practice in helping to make the world a better place through language learning.

A page from the field notebook of Morris Swadesh, a linguist who documented the language with its last fluent speakers from 1930-1934. Here, Swadesh was taking notes on the –ik v. –ki distinction.

Thirteen-year-old learns with Rosetta Stone

Rosetta Stone Storyteller — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 22:47:35 +0000

I am 13 years old and I knew a pretty good amount of Spanish before I bought Rosetta Stone. I had used many different types of learning before. I finally decided to order Rosetta Stone Spanish (Latin America) Level 2. My goal was to learn past and future tense. It was wonderful! I am so excited to visit a Spanish speaking country! My Latin American friends were very surprised at how well I had improved in such a short time. The way you learn with Rosetta Stone is the best way. I hadn’t even realized I was picking so many things up! I would recommend this product to anyone.

-Liza, New Hampshire

The International Man of Dance: Has Rosetta Stone Created a Global Superstar?

Rosetta Stone — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 15:28:03 +0000

The International Man of Dance is on the road to superstardom. His 2012 New Year’s resolution: master the art of movement. Since he loves learning new languages, he hopes to explore new cultures as part of his dance training. Although he’s working very hard to perfect his routine, he still has a little way to go!

You control his dance moves by selecting his outfit, his dance, and the music that he’ll dance to. Remember to share your dance and culture mash-up at the end!

I Can Talk to My Patients

Rosetta Stone Storyteller — Mon, 09 Jan 2012 17:04:21 +0000

I can now, not only understand my patients when they tell me their (sometimes quite convoluted) stories of their symptoms, but I can ask questions about the past, the present and future. I can make conversation with them, joke a bit with them and connect with them on a personal level that I could never do before I started Rosetta Stone learning. It is a very natural way to learn. The ER staff who used to have to translate for me is amazed at my progress. I now plan to vacation in Mexico, South America and Spain, speaking the language.

—Marcey

Las Cruces, New Mexico

Dougal Waters courtesy Getty Images

The First 5 Percent

Joseph Adams — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 18:19:37 +0000

I felt that learning French would be a daunting task as I had no background with the language, and I didn’t understand a single word. Nevertheless, when my Rosetta Stone French Level 1 arrived, I was eager to dive in. A month and a half later, with about 20 minutes of practice three times a week, I’ve completed Unit 1. By my calculations, this is 5 percent of the way through the entire course (four units per level, five levels in total). Putting my progress in this perspective definitely helps because it tempers my expectations, and I just enjoy learning.

Reading French has proven to be the most difficult part so far, as each word seems to have numerous silent letters. The pronunciation, though challenging, has been my favorite part. The words just seem to roll off my tongue, and I love the sound of the language. Learning from native speakers—having each word sounded out, not just printed in a book—has been crucial to my learning process because I learn each word correctly the first time.

Having completed Unit 1, I gathered up the courage to schedule my first live Studio session. I was a bit nervous at first, but my nerves were quickly replaced with confidence, as I was actually conversing in a language that just one month ago, I hadn’t known a word of.

A few days later, I found myself shopping in Zara in midtown Manhattan (which is packed with tourists this time of year), when I overheard a conversation in French. I was excited, even to just identify the language I was hearing. I was even more excited when I realized that I understood the gist of the conversation! Okay, I’ll admit, it was a basic set of words I was picking up: “this coat . . . red or black? . . . too large.” All were words that I happened to learn in Unit 1. Then I remembered that I’m only 5 percent through the course, and my confidence grew even more as I got ready to continue in my journey.

I Met a French Nobel Laureate the Last Time I Was in Paris

Guillermo “el Gallo” Gayoso Jones — Tue, 03 Jan 2012 14:43:56 +0000

The last time I was in Paris, I met a French Nobel laureate. We had a long discussion about how language influences the way we think. One question we pondered was whether English is more rational than French. The Nobel laureate said that languages are closer to animals than to physical phenomena; as animals, they are ruled in part by logic and optimization procedures and in part by history. Our conversation was long and involved. I actually did not understand some of his ideas so I will not try to summarize them. But let me tell you what happened immediately afterward.

PJ Taylor courtesy of Getty Images

After talking with this Nobel laureate I was in a splendorous bliss. My spirits were flying high. We were not discussing anything close to what got him the prize, but the fact that he was not bored by speaking about philosophical matters with me made me feel proud. A few streets away from where we met I entered an old store of antiques. Most of the items in the store were clocks from the early twentieth century or even before. The store was like a labyrinth taken from Alice in Wonderland. Everything around me was ticking—ticktock, ticktock. I started talking to the shopkeeper. He inquired about my time in Paris, and I said I was having a great time. I had spent the previous two months in New York, and I planned to go back for another month before going back to Switzerland.

I mentioned that people seemed much more open and willing to interact in Paris than in New York. His gaze changed as his eyes met mine. “Girls?” he asked.

“Yes,” I replied. “They seem so willing to talk to me.”

“Yes, they want to get out of Paris. Have you been talking to them in English or French?”

“Sometimes English, sometimes French,” I answered.

“Well you should stick to English. You are better at it. And say you are going back to New York. French girls like that.”

I was a bit offended by the comment. He was questioning my attractiveness and saying that French women would prefer my English, insulting both them and me. I mentioned that it was not only young women that were willing to talk to me but also Nobel laureates. I meant to impress him by throwing in that fact. I elaborated by musing that both the shopkeeper and the Nobel laureate liked to discuss the intricacies of languages in rather different ways.

Here comes the amazing part of the story. It turned out that the shopkeeper’s brother-in-law was a computational physicist working in Lyon. The brother-in-law happened to be friends with the same Nobel laureate, and—of all the shopkeepers in the world, and of all the people in the neighborhood—this shopkeeper had met and had dinner with (or had gone to the opera, I don’t remember) the Nobel laureate just the week before. We couldn’t believe the coincidence. The subject of our conversation switched, and we talked about how charismatic the Nobel laureate is from then on.

When I left the shop, I wandered around the streets of Paris and got lost. I eventually asked a girl for directions—in English.

Santa Responds to Your Wishes!

Rosetta Stone — Sat, 24 Dec 2011 16:51:23 +0000

When we asked you to tell us what you were wishing for this holiday season, we were blown away by the number of responses we got. Of course, we sent them straight along to Santa Claus. In the videos below, you can see what he had to say about your holiday wishes.

Alex Keith Pearce: ik wil een voetbal, kleding, en nieuwe schoenen

Lulu LovesYhuu Perry: je veux de la neige =[

Sharhonda Mahan-Photographer Oro: que todos los niños a través del mundo, se sienten que ningún dolor y sólo adoran todo a través de su vive. ¡También, dar una oportunidad justa tener éxito! Dios bendice.

Chris Denman: Ich wünsche für meine persönliche Elf.

Michael B. Palazzolo: Voglio salute per la mia sorellone ed i miei genitori…ma anche vorrei vincere la lotteria

RainbowTea Micheal Cde: Je veux un nouveau television mon tv c’est tres petit

Connor Nielsen: I would like the value of the Euro to go down so I can experience more when I study abroad in Italy next semester.

Chayna Bailey: yo deseo que pueda viajar a Venezuela y a Brasil para estudiar y volunteer (Spanglish lol)

Amya Vince Carter: I wish no school

Rachel Hite: Voglio una macchina nuova per Natale

Kia Krause: Ich will zeit meine familie!

Jen Shillingburg: Je voudrais une nouvelle anneau de mon copain.

Tara Buhr: I wish I had a piano so I could play tunes for kids.

Christopher Kling: Spero per la mia famiglia problemi essere risolto in modo che possiamo godere della nostra vacanza indieme…I think?

Mandy Montgomery: Que mi novio podria visitar por la Navidad o el ano Nuevo.Creo que el no puede porque el tiene que quedar a la casa de sus padres Para cuidar sus mascotes…Perl esta bien xq espero que en este momento el ano siguiente, vamos a estate maridos!

Kelvel Tucker: i #wish that every family in the world will be blessed all year round

Happy Holidays everyone! Don’t forget to check out the Holiday Tweet Map to see what people around the world are saying this season! Merry Christmas!

The Borrowing Dilemma: How Should I Pronounce a Foreign Word That I Insert into My Conversation?

Xin Shan — Mon, 19 Dec 2011 13:34:06 +0000

The words for “coffee” in English, Korean, Chinese, Japanese, and Spanish all point to the same thing, and yet their pronunciations differ ever so slightly in each language. These words, called borrowings, all have a common origin, and sometimes it’s easy to figure out the definition of a new word in one language with knowledge of a borrowing in another language.

This phenomenon is fairly common for nouns like place names and people’s names, so, for the few languages I speak—Chinese, Japanese, Spanish, and English—I can easily notice those trivial details of diversity.

I’ve even started to understand borrowings in the Korean that I’m learning. Therefore, I strive to pronounce words as close to their original pronunciation as possible to do their origins justice. If I’m talking to my Chinese mom about Hollywood, for example, instead of using the Chinese pronunciation “hǎoláiwù,” I say “HAH-lee-wood.” And, if I’m talking to my American friends about Tokyo, instead of the three-syllable English “TOH-kee-oh,” I say the two-syllable Japanese “tōkyō.”

But such decisions have betrayed me. Neither my mom nor my friends were able to understand what I said when I referred to the Japanese city. Even though the Japanese and English versions sound similar, to my American friends the sounds “tōkyō” didn’t link to a city in Japan as “TOH-kee-oh” probably would have. I was surprised that such a small difference in pronunciation would prevent Americans from understanding me. Perhaps if I spoke English with a Japanese accent throughout, “tōkyō” would sound more like an English word than if it popped up randomly during an English conversation. Thus, I concluded I should just stay with English pronunciations.

And yet, that choice also came back to bite me. One day I was chatting with a friend who understands Japanese, and the word karaoke came up. Confidently, I chose the English pronunciation to insert into our conversation. However, as soon as the word left me, my friend fired back, “Wow, Xin, that hurts my ears. I know you speak Japanese, so say it the right way!” Now, when I need to use a foreign word during a conversation, I go through a mini-flowchart in my head (see below)—or just change the subject.

International Santas: Iceland’s Mischievous Elves

Allison Harper — Fri, 16 Dec 2011 14:04:19 +0000

Tiptoe. Tiptoe. It’s Christmas Eve, and a merry soul slides happily down the chimney. He relishes the smell of still-warm cookies, baked by tiny hands that very night. Quickly. Quietly. Through the hallway, around the corner, to the kitchen door!

A nose enters the kitchen first. A plump hand reaches out and grabs the note resting atop the cookie plate. Is it addressed to him? No! Alas, the delicious treats are meant for “Dearest Santa,” just like last year. Dejected, humbled Gáttaþefur, the door sniffer, retreats to another part of the house (but ultimately decides to gobble the cookies anyway, leaving none for Saint Nick, a newer addition to Icelandic holiday culture).

Illustration by Lucy Burrows

Not the night-before-Christmas tale you’re familiar with? In Iceland, it’s the thirteen mischievous Yulemen who bring children gifts during the holidays, placing small trinkets (or potatoes for those girls and boys who’ve been bad) in their shoes. One is Door Sniffer, who takes advantage of kitchen cabinets and doors left ajar. His long nose aids him in truffling out the sweetest desserts.

The other twelve have names that also hint at their holiday habits: Pot Scraper delights in the burnt dregs of a dinner; Candle Beggar, Sausage Snatcher, and Meat Hook pilfer their respective household namesakes; and shy Window Peeper enjoys all the fun from a safe distance.

One elf arrives each night starting December 12, and they leave in the same order in which they arrived, the last one bidding goodbye on January 6.

In modern times, the thirteen Yulemen are inquisitive tricksters who imbue the holidays with a lively sense of fun. In past traditions, their visits weren’t quite as benign. Long ago, they were thirteen elf brothers who lived in the mountains with their troll parents, Gyrla and Leppaluoi. Each holiday season they might bring naughty children back to their mother’s hungry (and presumably enormous) cat, Jolakottur.

In Iceland, tales of the “hidden people,” like the thirteen Yulemen, have been part of the culture for centuries. Álfar, creatures we might call “elves,” are known for their fondness for interfering. Even in the last few decades elves have been informally implicated in a variety of construction mishaps, general accidents, and natural disasters in Iceland. The following clip from a National Geographic documentary shows the extent of elf mythology in modern Icelandic culture.

For more on elves and the tradition of the Yulemen, check out the following sources. Send the Yulemen or another international Santa to a friend using our Global Santa Sender on Facebook.

Sources

Bourie, Ric. “Every Yuleman has his weakness.” Boston Herald, December 25, 2005.

Eygló. “Ask Eygló.” Iceland Review, November 29, 2011. Accessed 2011. http://icelandreview.com/ask_eyglo/?ew_news_onlyarea=1000&ew_news_onlyposition=2&cat_id=29623&ew_2_a_id=355695

Emling, Shelley. “Old World Grinch/Gryla, Yule Lads keep kids in line at Christmas Story of mean hag is part of Iceland’s holiday tradition.” Houston Chronicle, December 23, 2008.

Hafstein, Valdimar Tr. “The Elves’ Point of View: Cultural Identity in Contemporary Icelandic Elf-Tradition.” Fabula 41 (2000), 87-104.

Robinson, Janie. “Tricky trolls tell who’s naughty or nice.” Toronto Star, December 21, 2006.