Why is it so Hard to Find Pop Music in Other Languages?

This podcast goes into so much detail - it's an exploration of pop music in languages and language learning.

  • Why does pop music matter for language learning?
  • What influence does the industry have for which music gets made and which doesn't?
  • Why is English such a convenient language for pop music?
  • How should you incorporate pop music into your language learning routine...or should you?
  • Where can language learners find music in their own target language?
  • Who are our favourite artists in other languages?
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Learning Languages at Intermediate Level: My Language Goals, Routine, and Progress in Detail

Feeling stuck on that plateau of "invisible progress"? Here's how to keep going! Here's a snapshot of how I make progress in my target language step-by-step, even after 18 months of study. You’ll learn about my goals for April 2017, and how I fit in learning 2 languages at the same time.

I use the Language Habit Toolkit, a study system I created for learners like me who are self-guided and want to track flexibly.

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What Gets Easier When You Study More Languages?

People often ask me how many languages I speak. But recently, I was asked one question that made me think more deeply about why and how learning more languages works for me:

Does it get easier when you are learning more languages?

The short answer is "yes". It definitely does.

Here are the things that are helpful, relevant, and different when you are learning your 7th language.

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The Secret Languages of Great Britain (with Simon Ager from Omniglot)

languages of britain

Episode 37 is brought to you by italki, where you can find a language partner for any language. We tested it with rare languages like Icelandic, and it totally delivered. Get an awesome free lesson deal at italki.

Today's Topic: Multilingual Britain

Britain is not monolingual at all, but in fact it is teeming with languages. In this episode, we present you the real landscape of languages spoken in the British Isles.

Can you guess how many languages are indigenous to this country?

We discovered some amazing things, not lastly you'll NEVER guess what Irish and Spanish bears have in common!

You'll be surprised to find that more than 2 million people in the UK speak British languages other than English. Here is a quick summary of the bigger groups of languages spoken in the UK - not just British languages, but also the immigrant languages most popular in the UK today, for example Polish, Gujarati and Urdu.

Listen to our podcast episode to get a wonderful tour of the British languages, including:

  • What does it take to keep a minority language alive?
  • Did you know there was a Scots dictionary - and how it's influenced the English language?
  • Our pondering of the true official languages of Great Britain
  • Turns out children really are the future when it comes to reviving languages that don't have native speakers anymore, for example Cornish

Lindsay does some amazing demonstrations of the Scottish language and accent. And Kerstin says her first "goodbye" in Welsh!

Which British Languages Did You Know?

You can get in touch with us and tell us what you thought by

1) leaving us an iTunes review by visiting our itunes page and clicking "Ratings and Reviews"

2) using hashtag #cllp on Twitter (I am @kerstinhammes and Lindsay is @ldlanguages.

And once again, thanks so much to our sponsors Italki - please support our show by visiting that link today.