Welsh Is Not English: How The Welsh Language Fought Back

What do you know about the Welsh language?

When I first moved to the UK 15 years ago, I thought Welsh was dying out. I moved to England and never considered that people in the UK speak more than English. To me, the Welsh language was a relic from the past.

But did you know that people went on protest marches and even got ARRESTED to keep this language alive?

In this podcast episode, I bring you interviews with Welsh learners and teachers, sharing their own passions for this ancient language.

Where is Wales?

Wales is one of the four nations that make up the United Kingdom. It's a small part of the UK, located on the western border of England.

It covers just over 8,000 square miles (20,722 km²) - that's about the same size as Massachusetts in the USA or half the size of Switzerland. In other words, Wales is not big.

But it's certainly old. The Welsh history begins with the Celts, and just like the bigger British island, it has a whole history of invasions and territorial fighting on its record. Here is a great timeline guiding you through the last few millennia of Welsh history.

What Is Welsh Like? A Quick Introduction

In terms of the language, Welsh is what was here first. The Celts spoke a dialect that would later evolve into Welsh, so this language is now considered a treasured part of Welsh identity.

Welsh is a Celtic language in the same family as Irish Gaelic, Scottish Gaelic, Cornish, and Manx. It's spoken in two dialects these days: Northern and Southern Welsh.

The Welsh alphabet is quite similar to the English one, with a few quirks:

• The vowels of Welsh are a, e, i, o, u, w, and y
• There are no letters j, k, q, v, w, x, and z
• There are extra consonants, namely ff, ll, rh, and ph

The Welsh letters also mutate when you start putting words together, which means that the first letter can change in all kinds of fun ways. Apart from that though, it's quite easy to pronounce because Welsh is phonetic, meaning what you see is what you get.

Find out more about how the language works and looks on Omniglot

But let's get back to our story.

How Welsh Came Under Attack

Welsh was spoken im Wales for thousands of years. But as the nation entered a turbulent period of history in the 19th century, the MPs and lawmakers in London started to wonder "why are these Welsh folks so much trouble?"

They decided that the existence of Welsh must have something to do with it, and introduced harsh measures to start eliminating Welsh from public and school life. On the podcast, you will hear from Morfydd who remembers her mother avoiding Welsh like the plague...for a pretty good reason!

Fighting For Welsh Language Rights

"I want to live in Welsh" - a campaign poster from the Welsh Language Society

So between the 1800s and the 1950s, the use of Welsh decreased and English became seen as the standard language for any part of the UK.

In the 1960s, the activist language group Cymdeithas Yr Iaith was founded. This group campaigned for many of the things that are now bilingual standards in Wales, such as road signs and official council letters, television, and customer service in Welsh.

Many members were arrested, asserting their willingness to go to court for language rights. And over time, this fight for language rights has led to significant changes in law and society. The Welsh language hasn't died out.

In the podcast, you'll hear from Steffan Webb who shares how Cymdeithas yr Iaith started and what they got up to. Until today, the Welsh Language Society remains an active protest movement and Steffan explained that they see a long way to go.

Bilingual Driving Directions
in Wales

What's Next For Welsh?

The Welsh government is a devolved government, meaning they have the power to determine some of what happens in their area. But officially, Wales is still a part of the United Kingdom and they don't get to determine which languages are spoken.

The Welsh language became an official language in Wales in 2011, with the government act stating:

This means it must be treated no less favourably than English.

Fighting For Welsh Language Rights

Welsh is now on Duolingo, and there is a hugely popular online course called Say Something in Welsh, focusing on enabling learners to speak everyday Welsh.

This means that there are independent Welsh learners everywhere in the world now, learning online just like me (read about my own langauge progress).

Do You Want To Give Welsh A Try?

Every Welsh learner becomes a part of this bigger story. If you're interested in trying the language for yourself, you can download my Welsh Starter Kit here and kick off with the resources that I used to start my own journey.

Before you listened to this podcast, what did you think about Wales? Did you already know this story of protesting in the streets for language rights?

Share your thoughts in the comments - I'm excited to hear from you. 

And if you want to support the Fluent Show podcast, make sure you subscribe so you always get the latest episodes and share the story with a friend who loves languages too!

How To Get Native Speakers To Speak Your Target Language

You may know this feeling: You've spent hours on your own pronouncing words into your phone, studying vocabulary, and when you want to practice your language with friends...they just keep switching back to English!

"Hey, möchtest du vielleicht heute Abend Tatort gucken?" - "Yes, that sounds great. I will bring beer." - "Ähhh, danke."

If you find it frustrating that your friends keep switching back to English, you are not alone. This week on the podcast, I have got a packed episode full of tips to help you stay in control when native speakers don't want to speak their language with you.

The most common issue here is for English speakers. You’re likely to meet the largest number of people who are learning English (because everyone is) and you’re one in a dozen as a learner looking for practice time.

Why Do They Do This?

1. They don’t want to be rude. Most commonly, people will want to include you in their conversations and make this as easy as possible.
2. They are prioritising their own learning - again, it’s unusual that you want to learn their language and they’ve been wanting to practice their English for ages, so you’re just the person they’ve been looking for.
3. They’re busy. You may have chosen a person who just wants to get things done right now. You are speaking slowly and taking 3 seconds between words. You’re hard to understand. You’re looking up words in the dictionary. Ain’t nobody got time for that.
4. They think this is a struggle for you and want to make your life easier. Language learning is effort, and if they see you looking up every other word they may just want to save you the work especially if you drop into English now and then.

What You Must Accept

1. You can’t win them all - even if you had the perfect accent, chances are that you're still over 6 months away from having those fluent, easy, flawless interactions that you're dreaming of in your Vision Goals. That's okay. Remember that rejection is only for the moment, and only relevant to the current situation.
2. You may need to be persistent. This issue will not be resolved even when you get to the higher levels in your language, because it is not just a reflection of you. It’s always about the other speaker and where they are at, so prepare to try several times and start looking for the compromise.
3. You may need to hunt down a person who is the right partner for you. Especially in the early stages of your language learning journey, this may well be a tutor who can support you until you're fast and confident enough to stick with the target language.

What You Can Try

1. Seek out a group - when they have a common language of interaction with each other, they are more likely to slip in and out. You can eavesdrop, join a meeting, or simply go out for drinks and let them know that you’ll try and stay in their language.
2. Set up a clear language exchange or ask them for temporary support such as being 100% in their native language for just 20 minutes.
3. Improve your local flair - this one is great for service and shorter interactions, for travel, and for talking to in-laws. If you are regularly frustrated because you can’t even manage to small talk for 2 minutes before there is a switch, then you’ll get a lot out of improving your language skill so you can fake it til you make it. 2 ways to do this: Pronunciation perfection, and stock phrases (fillers, standard constructions).
4. Wait until you’re more confident and a little faster. You are going to get there. Until then, the person who keeps switching away from your target language just won’t be the right person to talk to.
5. Go with it. Think bilingual conversation, not “battle lost”. Make it fluid, and even if they switch into English you can stay in your own target language and send a signal.

As you've seen there are different ways of dealing with situations like these. Remember to employ empathy when you are speaking to any native speaker of your target language. Consider their own perspective and the situation they are in. Often, it goes a long way just to mention that you are a learner and to say "I could use some practice, can we speak your language?".

Have You Had Good Luck Practicing Your Target Language?

Leave me a comment or say hi on Twitter to share your own experiences of speaking with native speakers. Who switches to English? How have you dealt with it? I'm looking forward to hearing from you guys.

EPISODE SPONSORS

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#clearthelist March2018: Update On My Welsh Language Progress

Welcome to a new kind of blog post here on Fluent - I’ve long been aware that my last personal language update was about a year ago and this blog should include more of that good stuff. So this month, I am joining Clear The List, a monthly language strategies update.

You may have heard me talk to Lindsay about it on the Fluent Show - Clear The List is open to everyone and gives us support and accountability by sharing regular language learning goals and stories.

Every month, I set my goals using the Language Habit Toolkit worksheets and I put them up behind my computer screen to keep them in mind. And this month, I had a LOT of them in Welsh. The mindset was not to expect too much from myself, but to remember the direction I was aiming for.

What Happened in March 2018?

Up to the 11th of March, my working life was dominated by sharing and co-running the absolutely wonderful Women in Language conference. If you were there, you’ll know that we had a great time.

Click here to read my full debrief of Women in Language, which includes

• the 5 most important lessons I learnt at the conference
• some behind the scenes details
• tips for you on what to do if you also want to be a speaker
• lessons learnt on what we’ll do differently next time.

Special Guests

English Vineyard Visit

Right after the conference I experienced another unusual week with lots of spoken German as my parents came to visit me in Canterbury. We had a great time pottering around and I did my usual interpreting job and listened to my husband’s German.

If you are visiting Canterbury and want to practice your German on a city tour, do give me a shout through the contact page.

Highlight: A visit to an English winery, showing me that I know more winemaking vocab than I expected. My parents are winemakers, so this always seems to happen when they’re around.

One more unusual event was the news that my favourite ever English teacher had passed away. He was one of a few English teachers who influenced and inspired me as a teenager, spoke lots of English in class, and shared the literature he loved. What a reminder to appreciate those who inspire us.

The Fluent Show

March marked one month since the Creative Language Learning Podcast became the Fluent Show. Thank you so much for listening!

Here’s my favourite episode from this month: In Language, Are Apps All Amazing? Are All Apps Amazing?

My Welsh Goals For March 2018

With so much going on, did I even get ANY language study done?

Contact Goal

On an everyday basis, I have one important goal: Have contact with my target language. So I have a lot of mini-sessions on Duolingo, Clozemaster, with flashcards, with vocab lists. I read tweets in Welsh, look out for books, anything. All these different strategies add up to consistent slow progress, but they are the basis for all other goals.

I track my contact with Welsh using the Streaks app on my iPhone. In March, I logged 22 days of contact.

Here are the Path Goals I set, and how it went:

Listening

Watch S4C every other day for 10 minutes: Did this about three times. I’m not sure my devices have S4C set up to be accessible as easily as possible. Also, 10 minutes is an awkward length for a TV show. I did watch some YouTube clips, so I’ll take that into account as a goal format.

Listen more when I’m having real conversations Listening is the conversation habit I always need to bear in mind. I had one tutor conversation in Welsh this month, and I did shut up and listen to her a little more than usual. A good job with room for improvement.

Transcribe 1 Song from Listening What was I thinking? Not really a goal I’ll go back to.

This month, I resubscribed to the Pigion podcast and listened to the weekly episodes. I discovered that they provide a vocab list with each episode and reviewed the vocab before I start the episode.

Speaking

I wanted to work through the Sylfaen (Foundation Level) exam questions to practice speaking at a higher level, but found the exam paper so boring that I never went back to it. But on the positive side, I feel confident that I could tackle all of the questions on it, so I’m now definitely on that level or even further ahead.

My other goal was to get to 30 minutes all-Welsh conversation, so my tutor session was a 60 minute time slot, and we had nearly a full hour of Welsh conversation. Very exciting! ✅ I also got to the halfway point on Say Something in Welsh level 2.

Reading

Read articles or 1/2 book page in Welsh every 2 days. The goal here was to acquire new vocabulary, and build up my reading capacity to “more than a tweet”. I don’t think I read enough, partly because I don’t know where to find easy Welsh articles online.

Writing

My goal was to write 1/2 a page and share it with my tutor 3 times. This is where the MAGIC happened. Inspired by one of the talks at Women in Language, my writing practice evolved to include poetry in my target language. It’s really fun - one of the best ways I’ve found to use Welsh creatively.

I haven’t shared with my tutor yet, but I did post the poetry on Instagram with #languagpoems and I’ll keep going.

My other goal was to complete Chapters 7-9 in my Grammar exercise book - I’m halfway through chapter 8, so that one’s trucking along.

Goals For April 2018

In Welsh: My listening skills are a little behind and I don’t understand as much as I would like to, so the focus will again be on this core skill so I can get into a routine.

My goals in Welsh are:

Have 3 natural conversations with my tutor/exchange partner and listen carefully: My next tutor session is already booked so I reckon I can smash this one and I’ll continue aiming for 45-60

Practice Welsh listening by playing with no-subtitle TV, and reviewing the Pigion podcast vocab before I listen: These are about listening comprehension, the area I need to improve right now.

Write a longer Welsh poem and continue playing around with different poetry formats: Last month I tried a Haiku. Maybe this month I’ll attempt poetry that rhymes. I’m loving my poetry focus this month and am also reading more of it in English and German.

Finish my easy reader novel and read all of the latest Lingo Newdyy magazine - these are all offline, can anyone recommend easy Welsh websites?

Book a day in Wales: I keep looking at this list of courses and not booking, even though they’re so cheap. Time to dive in!

One Last Thing: Other Languages

A post shared by Kerstin Cable (@kerstin_fluent) on Mar 2, 2018 at 9:15am PST

This month, I also dabbled in Swedish and spoke a lot of French. I’m still on the hunt for my new language to play with.

Swedish was the first language in which I've tried an official Memrise course and I'm so impressed. WAY better than the usual.

So now we’re caught up, let me assure you that future Clear The List articles will be a little shorter. I will continue setting goals using the framework of 4 core skills, and I always use the Language Habit Toolkit to set and track quality goals that will challenge me without driving me crazy.

Is there anything you’re curious about?

How was your month?

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If you want to join the linkup and share your own goals for the month, hop on to Clear The List with Lindsay Williams and Shannon Kennedy. Would love to see what you’re up to!

De-Brief From An Organiser: Women in Language 2018

A few weeks ago, I was proud to co-organise and witness the first ever Women in Language conference, a unique online event designed to champion, celebrate, and amplify the voices of women in language learning. It was not my first online conference about language learning, but certainly the first I partly created and the first one ever to feature an all-female line-up of speakers.

In today’s article, I am going to lift the curtain and share my official de-brief as one of the three members of our organising team.

What I Felt at Women in Language

Let me start with the most important thing: I enjoyed every single presentation that I saw. And as I was often online making sure everything went smoothly, those were almost all of them. The quality of our many speakers at Women in Language was excellent, and the range of topics kept things interesting and inspiring.

Women in Language delivered on a few extra levels too. It felt as inspiring and intense as every offline conference could feel, with the added bonus of allowing me to sleep in my own bed. I adored seeing #womeninlanguage posts on social media, and to hear from our attendees in the live chat and Facebook group. And most importantly, I got SO inspired and motivated to learn languages in a brand new way!

What I Learnt About Language Learning

A lot of the impact of four days of language love cannot be put into words. It’s a boost in motivation, a renewed commitment, a burst of energy. And at Women in Language, I got all of those out of it and more. I got to know more of our conference attendees and boosted my own desire to learn and teach languages in new ways.

Here are the most important lessons from Women in Language that will be essential for all language learners:

1) Dabbling Is Legit

At Women in Language, we celebrated the huge diversity of how people learn languages. You can choose whatever language you want to learn, and you can learn it for 2 weeks or 20 years, and you can dabble in a handful of languages at once if you want to. This is all “allowed”, and won’t make you any less of a language lover or polyglot.

Sometimes it’s easy to feel self-critical as a language learner, and to tell yourself that you’re doing this wrong if you don’t use Anki or speak from day 1 or spend many hours on your project. But dabbling is perfectly legit, and you are allowed to feel proud of it.

2) Compassion Matters

Leading on from the previous point, compassion was a regular theme of the conference. When you’re faced with so many blog articles and Instagram posts and YouTube videos and language books telling you what to do, it’s sometimes hard to remember that everyone has a bad day.

You can’t always be happy and you can’t always be 100% gold in Duolingo. Compassion means allowing understanding and empathy for yourself when times are tough, but also for other language learners. No one method is the right one. Allow other people to feel good about themselves, and extend that same kindness to yourself.

3) Everyone Loves Transcribed Audio

Finding something interesting to watch or listen to, at the right level, and then with a transcription…that’s difficult. But it’s also what a lot of our conference attendees wanted, and you certainly CAN find it online. If you want to get a few ideas, check out Speechling, Glossika, Rhinospike, and Movieclips on YouTube.

And by the way: Just listening is NOT enough. If it’s just a wall of sound, you’re not doing much good. You’ll need to know what you’re hearing. Find input that you can engage with, and check against your own skills. For more about this, listen to my podcast episode about listening skills.

4) There’s So Much to Talk About

It’s never enough to practice speaking by doing the “Hello how are you where do you live” dance over and over again. Speaking practice is best when you’ve prepared something interesting to talk about. And lucky for us, there are tutors and learners who already discovered this too, and they’ve even put together lists (like this one) of questions and conversation prompts.

5) When Your Brain Is Having Fun, You Learn

All too often we think of language learning as a STUDY activity, in all caps. But it’s just not necessary to do things this way. Language can be learnt through story, through fun activities, through play. The most important things are exposure and repetition, not how hard you study or how much your language experience feels like work.

Though some of these lessons may read as happy-clappy positivity notes, I found that they often helped to ease a learner’s mind and allow them to take a break and come back to language learning with new energy and enthusiasm. After all, we want to get fluent while having fun, right?

What Do You Think?

Whether you attended Women in Language 2018 or not, what do you think about those lessons above? Are you a dabbler, or a hardcore study nut? Leave me a comment below to join the conversation.

In part 2 of this blog article, I will put on my co-organiser hat (a very stylish hat, for sure) to tell you more about how Women in Language was organised, what we learnt in the process, and what you should consider if you want to run or contribute to an event like this in future.

Organising A Successful Online Conference

I’ll start with what we looked for in our speakers and talks.

For this first ever conference, we used our own network of interesting women to ask if they wanted to speak at Women in Language. Their social media accounts, blogs, youtube channels, relationships with us were what put them on the radar. So if you’re dreaming of speaking out yourselves, making yourself very visible is good advice.

Before contacting our speakers, we considered some guidelines about the types of talks we would be looking for. In addition to practical topics featuring tips and techniques for language learners at “Beginner” and “Advanced” levels, we also chose the tracks “Living with Language” and “Working with Language”. Each speaker we contacted let us know which of the four themes they would like to address in their presentation, and was allocated one. This way, we ensured that no topics would be repeated and we could offer a varied programme on every single conference day.

Here are just three of the 25 talks we saw at Women in Language:

Some of our speakers came to us with a firm idea of the talk they wanted to present, while others found themselves unsure at the start. As our programme officer, I found myself receiving several messages saying “I don’t know, maybe I have nothing to say after all.” If you have ever hesitated to put yourself forward for an opportunity, here is the thought process that does stop them in their tracks: “Maybe I don’t have anything to say here.” Meaning “Maybe my experience, my voice, my passion are not valid. Others will have more to say.”

I extended offers of a little “talk surgery” to those who needed an idea boost, and without exception it was the speakers themselves who came to me with fantastic topic ideas, and who delivered on them 100%. In fact, I found that the most intriguing topics came from a place of passion and excitement in each speaker’s mind. Topics like “Learning With Crime Novels” and “Managing Motherhood and Language Learnings” are not a language learner’s most burning question, but that’s exactly why they make incredible conference topics: They are real, and invite us to think differently.

Some People Voiced Different Opinions

I won’t lie to you, at times it felt hard to be out there putting together this positive, kinda feminist event. Some commenters felt that it was a wrong move towards equality, unnecessarily excluding male voices. To those guys, I want to remind you that we welcomed and celebrated male voices throughout the event - it’s just that this time only women got to speak “on stage”, and every single one of them brought expertise, commitment, quality, enthusiasm, and outstanding topics. We set out to show the language learning world from a different angle, and I was so encouraged to hear from several male attendees who were enjoying the conference just as much as everyone else.

If You Want To Be a Conference Speaker

If you are considering applying to speak at a language conference, please don’t hesitate. Even if you were to hear a no, don’t worry and keep putting yourself forward - maybe the programme is full already or the conference can recommend a future event for you to try.

Don’t be shy about suggesting a topic outside the memory-boosting-fluency-fast-track-performance mainstream. Don’t wait until you’re fluent in 16 languages. You’re good enough right now, as long as you have a cool topic. And what’s a cool topic? Your own experience!

You are so cool when you are yourself.

I want to give kudos here to all those women who agreed to speak and trusted Shannon, Lindsay, and me with Women in Language. You absolutely killed it, and we appreciate all the hard work you put into giving a great online talk at an event you’d never heard of before.

Many of our speakers were new to presenting online. From my perspective as a blogger and podcaster, I’m used to speaking to an empty room and waiting until later to see if anyone connects with my words. But these guys were new to the whole environment, and they handled it brilliantly.

Tickets

When we put together our event, we knew that it was a risk to ask for payment from attendees of an online event. Many other online events are open to attendees for free, but we wanted to create an atmosphere where the sales pressure is off, and where our audience members were just as invested in having a great time as we were.

We found that the ticket sales achieved this goal, and allowed over 250 audience members to join us from all over the world. This reassurance also helped us relax and increase our commitment to Women in Language. So on the ticket selling front, we are happy to note that all went well and we are now able to give a donation of over $400 to our chosen charity, Kiva. The charity supports entrepreneurs who do cool things to alleviate poverty around the world.

Here I want to say thank you to our audience members, who went ahead and trusted us organisers with a brand new conference idea. Some purchased a ticket and even took time off work, others were unable to attend but joined the conference to support celebrating and amplifying women’s voices in language learning. We appreciated your trust and support.

About The Technology We Used

In terms of technology, we used a setup of Google Hangouts on Air for our live broadcasts and embedded them in individual Teachable lectures via YouTube. We also added individual Chatango chat boxes in each lecture.

At the end of any session, the viewers could click “Complete and Continue” at the top and move on to the next session in our packed programme. Credit here goes to Shannon for leading us on the setup of a gorgeous page and ensuring the information was up to date.

Inside Women in Language

Combining technologies to create the conference experience

This format added to the feel of hosting a real conference, where you would often walk into the next room for another talk. But in addition, it made us into the Netflix of language learning, where any previous talk could be streamed from the beginning right after it was published.

All talks were offered on a single track (no two at the same time), which kept the conversation focused and helped create a live chatroom community. We also added an “after hours” experience through a dedicated Facebook group for Women in Language attendees.

Marketing Women in Language

Our marketing campaign, headed up by Lindsay, made it easy for Women in Language to get seen. We obviously talked about Women in Language in our own blog, podcasts, social media, newsletters, youtube, and wherever you see us.

Lindsay also prepared some beautiful pictures and tweets for the speakers and the attendees, so that everyone could easily spread the word about our event. We are so grateful that you guys supported us and shared your excitement before the event. It helped us so much.

Shout out to our friends How To Get Fluent, Language Learning Summit and Langfest for inviting us to present our new event, and to Mezzofanti Guild for hosting a guest post written by Shannon. Check those guys out - they are doing amazing work.

The Organising Team

Between three organisers, we found that we were able to play to our strengths and largely handle the large workload of running a conference like this one. We stayed in contact with each other through direct messages, but also weekly meetings, and the project management software Asana. When your organising team is living on three different continents, it’s helpful to ensure online communications are as good as they can be.

Our track record of collaborations was a key to our success. Lindsay, Shannon, and I were no strangers to each other’s work. We knew already that we appreciate each other’s work and that each of us knows how to use all parts of the technology and marketing setup. We had also met in person before and solidified our friendship. Throughout the organising process, we were able to stay supportive and open to suggestions from each other.

Sometimes, it can take courage and grace to reach out to a colleague and trust that they’re on board with your idea. From the minute Lindsay first mentioned the idea of Women in Language and Shannon hopped on the first Skype call to join us, that was something we committed to.

I am grateful that I had the opportunity to run such a cool project with two colleagues and friends that I respect so much.

What We’ll Do Even Better Next Time

So we were excited, we were buzzing, we enjoyed four days of a successful conference full of tips. But that doesn’t mean that there weren’t any mistakes to learn from.

On the technology front, a few hiccups taught us the following lessons. Maybe you’ll find them useful one day, so I’m sharing them here:

• When you want to embed your YouTube events in another page, it pays to set up a dry run so that you’re double sure the embed will show up the way you want it to.
• When you are planning to invite someone to a Google Hangout, you cannot send them a “join link” in advance because the software will discard that link the minute you close the video window in your browser. And then your speaker’s link will be useless and they’ll be confused.
• Don’t click “eject” when you want to reset your Hangouts partner’s setup as they joined your Google Hangout. They won’t be able to join again, and you’ll have to create a new event.
• Power Point going full screen in Google Hangouts is a bit of a gamble, so stay calm, have a dry run, and prepare trouble shooting notes to make sure all goes smoothly.

In terms of the programme, we tried a new format of round table discussions which was successful at large. The two-hour time slot did discourage some audience members from watching it though, and that’s something I had not expected and we will look into providing shorter round table discussions next time.

Finally: I feel fired up to expand our commitment to diversity and ensure we include more global voices. Our line-up was international but still looked largely like us: white women who speak English a lot. Even if each of them is different in nationality or language line-up, this still gives our attendees an unintentional impression of what the “norm” is. We can add to that during future events, and I’m excited that we now have 27 speakers who can help us grow our network and look for polyglots and language experts from more diverse backgrounds.

What About You?

Did you enjoy the online conference?

Have you ever thought about becoming a conference speaker?

I’d love to hear from you in the comments below.

In Language Learning, Are Apps All Amazing? Are All Apps Amazing?

Welcome to Fluent Show episode 79, where co-host Lindsay joins me to catch up, talk about language, and discuss the hot topic of language learning apps.

If you've ever downloaded and used a language learning app, and then wondered "Am I doing this well? Could I learn more from this?", then our discussion will help you swipe and tap your way to fluency.

The Language You Use When She's Giving Birth

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Source: British Medical Journal Blog

The British Medical Journal recently published a blog article sharing guidelines on how to speak respectfully to women during childbirth. Is this "political correctness gone mad", or does it matter how we refer to people in these settings? Would you expect that less dramatic and violent language can help mothers stay calm in labour?

Also, as ever: The important theme of "use her name", and how we'd expected to be addressed in different language environments.

If I got to the stage where I'm having a baby, I would expect to be called signora..not the equivalent of 'girl'

Tune in to our discussion to find out, and leave a comment below to share your own views.

How To Make Good Use of Language Apps

In this episode, we talked about language learning apps and how to use them.

Practical Tips

• Use different apps on different devices if you have them, for example you could make your iPad your reading resource while you use the phone to text language exchange partners
• Take most of the promises that come from language learning apps with a grain of salt - using an app without effort does not mean learning a language without effort
• Customize your experience: Apps are not all you need to learn a language, but it can help you create a language learning environment that is unique to you. We find that when an app is not the only way you're learning a language, your experience and results gets be better.
• Don't ever feel ashamed or embarrassed about your app choices and what works for you!

The Essential Language Apps To Try On Your Device

Apps can be roughly sorted into a few categories, and it's worth trying a few to find your personal preference

1. A good dictionary app like WordReference, LEO, or even Google Translate
2. A flashcard system like Memrise, Anki, or Smartcards+
3. A language course app (often gamified) like Speechling or Duolingo 4. Our sponsors Clozemaster of course!
4. A non-language related app that can help you stay productive like 30/30, Timeglass, Pomodoro, or Streaks

Which language learning apps do you use regularly? Can you manage without them?

Leave us a comment below or tweet @thefluentshow.

EPISODE SPONSORS

• CLOZEMASTER

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EPISODE LINKS

• Code-switching - Wikipedia
• italki - where people can find online language tutors
• Humanising birth: Does the language we use matter? – The BMJ
• 12 Ideas For Making the Perfect Language Learning App by Fluent Language
• After Duolingo? : Esperanto
• The Welsh-Dictionary App: Language Technologies Unit, Canolfan Bedwyr
• The Fluent Show: Gabriel Wyner is NOT a Robot (with Fluent Forever author Gabriel Wyner) — Interview with Gabe Wyner, the creator of the Fluent Forever app
• Gboard - the Google Keyboard - Android Apps on Google Play
• STREAKS. The to-do list that helps you form good habits. For iPhone.
• 30/30 | You have never experienced a task manager like this!
• Gretchen Rubin: The Four Tendencies — Cool personality quiz that can tell you more about your habits. See also Fluent Show 32
• clear the list Archives - Eurolinguiste
• Language Learning Goals: Clear The List - March 2018 - Lindsay Does Languages