http://www.canyouspeak.com Languages and cultural differences explored Sat, 19 Sep 2009 07:24:02 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en Most language students spend year after year plugging away trying to learn a new language. No matter what the language, it's expected to take some time to pick it up... and I know this from first-hand experience learning a language "the slow way." I sat in language classes and studied grammar ... http://www.canyouspeak.com/how-to-learn-a-language-fast/ I saw this interesting story about the French jeweler Mauboussin trying to draw in the Japanese to it's new store in Tokyo. And while free diamonds appeal to me (well, technically to my girlfriend... I'm just interested in the brownie points they'd buy me) I'm writing this post for another ... http://www.canyouspeak.com/brands-and-languages/ A few French people are a little ticked off after they found out the French song to be performed at the Eurovision song contest has only two lines in French. It seems the country isn't too keen on being represented in English. And who can blame them? I'd want my country ... http://www.canyouspeak.com/french-song-not-in-french/ It's no secret that over the last 6 months or so my Spanish learning efforts have been less than impressive. Well did I get punished for that over the weekend! It'd been ages since I met up with my Spanish friends from down south so I decided to go and pay ... http://www.canyouspeak.com/my-brain-hurts/ I saw on digg there was an article where a city board decided it was ok that a shop had a sign stating: "This is America: WHEN ORDERING 'PLEASE SPEAK ENGLISH'" Now without going into how stupid this is or reopening the whole debate on making English the national language of the ... http://www.canyouspeak.com/tourism-becomes-impossible/ Mainly because I'm not doing it, but also because learning new things is difficult and I like to whine! Too many times have I said I'll start posting regularly again and it just hasn't happened. So I won't promise anything until you see some results. Between you and me, I did ... http://www.canyouspeak.com/learning-spanish-sucks/ One of my rules for learning Spanish is to always live with Spanish speakers. This has been a good rule and resulted in a lot of the improvement. While I've stumbled off the optimum language learning path by having an English speaking girlfriend, things are about to get much worse. Currently ... http://www.canyouspeak.com/where-are-my-spanish-flatmates/ I've recently became involved in a project for language teachers in Spain. It's a website that helps teachers find English teaching work in Spain, with an initial focus on Madrid. The websites been around for a while but I'm helping to promote it and make it more popular. Our vision is ... http://www.canyouspeak.com/english-teaching-work-in-madrid-and-spain/ I came across an article today called "why we don't like English classes." Apart from initially amusing me, I found I agreed with a lot of the points in the article. I like to think I'm one of the teachers that are 'different', so I thought I'd share a little ... http://www.canyouspeak.com/english-classes-suck/ The hands down best way I've learnt Spanish has been though my super secret new technique. Curious? You bet! Now the best way for my technique to work is to be without a current partner. If you have a partner, this technique may cause you more problems than you'd like. Oops, ... http://www.canyouspeak.com/the-best-spanish-course/