#language recs

[dove-da-birb]

Bonjour, hello! :)

I'm going to snag the question you asked Sofia and send it back your way: Which languages do you speak? Do you have any you are learning or want to learn?

or, alternatively - if you would like to instead answer something else - do you have a favourite piece of your writing? (One you are most proud of or had a lot of fun creating?)

I'll actually answer both!

Language

Currently, I am only fluent in English, as it was the language I was only immersed in growing up. Je parle un petit peu francais; but the education system is awful at really doing anything to cement it in if you didn't attend a French immersion school. I need to work on getting it back, but that's going to be a long work in progress. Just happy my accent is good (aka not a baguette accent).

As for languages I want to learn;

Spanish will be after French since both are based in Latin.

Ojibwe, as Indigenous languages are dying; there used to be over 3,000 distinct Indigenous languages in Canada and the handful that are left are dying too.

American Sign Language, since it is super useful; currently I just know a few signs. Another reason is that places rarely have someone who can sign and translate signs.

Dutch for family reasons.

Eventually I would like to know a bit of Mandarin, but that is far into the future.

Favourite Piece of My Writing

Right now it would have to be Ruggie's Soul Match story; first off it made me cry in the first 800 words and then I cried again later. I rarely cry while reading books, so I was very surprised that it happened twice.

Jade's Soul Match story is my second favourite and was only demoted off the throne once I finished writing Ruggie's; he got to be a lil shit in his story. Also, it was a great chance to get in his head.

I quite like how all of the Soul Matches came out, and it was my first time in years writing more long-ish form fics; each story is 5K. Had really bad art/writing block for years.

I really need to re-read some of my works; I don't really read them once I 'publish'.... Also in total, there are 69 pages so far for the Soul Match AU, and for the first round, there are 10 characters, 6 of which are now completed.

*Don't be like Dove and write 31K in 34 days. Don't do it. I just have a lot of free time rn

[compasspointlibrary]

Need recommendations!

The little sister of a friend of mine wanted to start learning Norwegian, but all of my personal resources are on the complex side of things and she is 12 and not going to start a serious grammar book or use anki.

Does anyone have any recommendations?

Any apps and books which are fairly chill, any show or music I could tell her about? Youtube channels? Instegram accounts to follow?

Thank you <3

[albaqae]

@ ALL RISE FANS THAT MAKE COMICS & STORIES

So I’ve noticed that in this fandom it’s common to include Deaf/ASL-using-characters into stories, which is honestly AMAZING and makes me SO HAPPY TO SEE, but many of us aren’t deaf we rely on resources, therefore:

My ASL teacher gave us this website cause it’s updates constantly (ASL evolves lots) and it’s a lot more accurate and reliable than just google :))

To work it- type the word, and a word bank will pull up, click on the term u want and a video/description of the sign and word will appear!!!

It’s rlly simple and has most words and if it doesn’t it’s bc it’s finger spelled probs!!!!

If u want more in-depth good grammar, search up “five parameters ASL”, “glossing in ASL” and watch a few videos to see “how sentence structure differs in ASL”

As always, remember it’s ok to make mistakes/notice a mistake, just be mindful and kind :D most of us aren’t out for malice and if someone is it’ll probs be very obv 😭

Happy Creating!!

Edit: A THANK U SO MUCH FOR THE REBLOGS :)) if anyone ever needs any help drop a comment or look at other reblogs!! There’s lot of other resources/tips there!!!

[hedgehog-moss]

as a "beginner" dipping g his toes into nonfiction but as someone who otherwise enjoys pretty much any genre (and as such is open to anything, from educational to biographical), what would you recommend?

Oh, that's vast! You are forcing me to cast a wide net and give a thousand suggestions... I'm going to limit myself to 3 ideas per category so I don't go overboard.

Nature / environment: Carl Safina's Beyond Words: What Animals Think and Feel; Paul Kingsnorth's Confessions of a Recovering Environmentalist and Other Essays; Robin Wall Kimmerer's Gathering Moss

Science / medicine: Holly Tucker's Blood Work: A Tale of Medicine and Murder in the Scientific Revolution, Richard Preston's The Hot Zone, Paul Lockhart's A Mathematician's Lament (I mostly enjoyed the first part in which he rants about the current state of maths education and says maths deserves better) or Carl Sagan's Cosmos (if I write "or" between two book recs it only counts as one)

Language: I liked Arika Okrent's In the Land of Invented Languages so much that I won't even nominate anyone else in this category. ... But I'll make up for it by allowing myself additional titles in the next one:

Politics / society / culture: Jodi Kantor's She Said, Frederik & Bastian Obermayer's The Panama Papers, Caroline Criado-Pérez's Invisible Women, Patrick Keefe's Empire of Pain, Michael Meyer's The Last Days of Old Beijing, Barbara Demick's Nothing to Envy: Ordinary Lives in North Korea

History: I'm realising that everything that comes to mind is horribly bleak: Jack London's The People of the Abyss, Timothy Egan's The Worst Hard Time, Svetlana Alexievich's Voices from Chernobyl... I've read some fun historical nonfiction in French but right now the only thing I can think of in English that's not depressing is Matthew Goodman's The Sun and the Moon, the subtitle of which is: The Remarkable True Account of Hoaxers, Showmen, Dueling Journalists, and Lunar Man-Bats in Nineteenth-Century New York.

About literature: Wisława Szymborska's Nonrequired Reading, Alexandra Johnson's The Hidden Writer: Diaries and the Creative Life, Alberto Manguel's The Library at Night.

(I was going to include a philosophy section but I realised I p much exclusively read philosophy in French or Spanish, and it's usually recent stuff that's not been translated... But if you've never read philosophy I recommend Jostein Gaarder's Sophie's World, it's a novel about the history of philosophy so it straddles the line between fiction and nonfiction)

Biographies / memoirs: that's the majority of the nonfiction I read so it could be a whole post, but some I've really enjoyed are: Beryl Markham's West with the Night; Gerald Durrell's My Family & Other Animals; Fatema Mernissi's Dreams of Trespass, Ryszard Kapuściński's Travels with Herodotus, Mary S. Lovell's The Sisters (about the six Mitford sisters; if you enjoy it I'd recommend reading their correspondence next—Charlotte Mosley's "The Mitfords: Letters Between Six Sisters")

Miscellaneous: Emmanuel Carrère's The Adversary; Alexandra Horowitz's On Looking. Currently I'm reading Joan Druett's Island of the Lost because it's nice to relativise your own problems in life by reminding yourself that at least you're not stuck on a subantarctic island having to bludgeon sea lions and eat your own crewmates for survival.

[happypotato48]

A context for this song. in thai wedding there is something calls พ���ธีรดน้ำสังข์ *water blessing ceremony, where the bride and groom's families and friends pours water blessed by monks from a shell on the couple hands.

so i understand why this line got translated to god but in thai it's sky/heaven. so anyways ya'll can put two and two together with this song's lyrics. it's both a joyful and a lonely song about queer love, cause the rain was the only wedding guest for the couple in this song.

anyways fuck you jeff satur i'll be suing you for emotional damage. this song and this movie are reminder that no matter how much thailand progress with queer rights there still will always be inherent sadness about being queer in this country.

[avoicebehindthestars]

SCB - Don't You Know Magic When You See It?

@klikandtuna Oi! Birthday girl! Catch! :D

Here's my humble token of appreciation for another wonderful fanfic: Sky Clear Blue (rated E) by klikandtuna, which, incidentally, has just wrapped up! :)

Colouring page and close-ups below the cut :D

Rules as usual: credit me and link to this post if you share your coloured version; don't erase my signature; don't tamper with the linework (recolouring is okay).

Finally, some close-ups and comparison to reference for Crowley's ridiculous trainers :)

@goodomensafterdark

[vibinwiththefrogs]

Does anyone have any fave German listening material for immersion?

I'm aware of EasyGerman on YouTube and various programs aimed at learners, but I'm looking more for TV shows, YouTube series, or streamers. Podcasts are fine too.

[casscainmainly]

hii, do you read fanfics? and if yes, do you have any fic recs for cass, either as a solo character or focused on her relationships with the rest of the batfam?

Hi!!! I'm not the most well-versed in fanfics, but I have read some great Cass ones. These are mostly going to be solo Cass focused, since I haven't found that many great ones with the Batfam.

Volving by @shobogan

This short fic kills me everytime. Set after the end of Batgirl (2000), it's honestly the conclusion I wish we'd gotten. The dialogue for Cass is on point, and I'm quite picky about Cass dialogue! I also recommend shobogan's equally amazing Equinox, which is a Brenda/Cass story.

Hot Girl Shit (The Feminine Urge To Die Young) by @havendance

An astonishingly clever fic that places Claire Clover (Gotham Girl) into the events of early Batgirl (2000). No knowledge of Claire is strictly needed though, the author makes it really easy to follow along. The parallels are unmatched, the feels are tremendous, it's just a great fic everyone should read. Also recommend havendance's Cassandra Cain vs. The World!, where Cass has to fight Kon's seven evil exes (it's as hilarious as it sounds).

Nourish by Ptelea

This fic is as sweet as its theme - Cass gets a moment with each of the Batfam, bonding over fruit. The writing is beautiful, and the Jason section in particular is stellar. The fluffiest fic on this list by far!

what's past is prologue by Icestorm238

Cass only appears in the sixth story in this series, but the entire thing is worth reading. A Dick-goes-back-in-time-to-save-Jason fic, the character twists and turns are so good, and there's an excellent Steph-centric story here too! Even if you don't care for the other characters, Cass is incredibly well-written in her section, a rarity for whole Batfam fics.

When Pinioned Birds Take Flight by @iowriteswords

This series (Robin and Other Flightless Birds) is well known, but this story is the most Cass-focused, and doesn't necessarily require knowledge of the prior fics. Though this is an AU, Cass is anchored in canon, and her relationship to Babs in particular gets a lot of development in the last part of the fic.

Not as Cass-centric as any of these, but bad signal by prismatical is an excellent story with some great Cass moments. The fic is definitely more focused on Dick, Jay, and Tim, but Cass isn't just a prop here and is actively involved, so I'd still check it out!

I wish I had more recs, I know there's some great Cass stuff out there I haven't found yet. Thanks for the ask, hopefully other people can chime in with their own recommendations!

[linghxr]

Welcome to linghxr

For my 250th post on this blog, I created a new pinned post to introduce myself!

About me:

I’m a Chinese American learning Mandarin Chinese to connect with my family and heritage.

I started learning Chinese at a young age but became more serious about it in college. My native language is English.

Interests: Cpop/Mandopop, Chinese idol survival shows & reality singing shows, cdramas (mostly suspense/mystery/crime genres)

My top resources:

Pleco Chinese dictionary app

Anki flashcard software & mobile app

MDBG Chinese dictionary

教育百科 Chinese dictionary

Zhongwen browser extension

Readibu app

Chinese Grammar Wiki

Chinese Zero to Hero YouTube channel

每日中文课Free To Learn Chinese YouTube channel

If you are on my blog, click the tags below to see posts on topics I often post about!

[metamorphesque]

food as a metaphor for existence, food as a love language, food as just food (poetry recommendations)

September Tomatoes by Karina Borowicz

Ode to Tomatoes by Pablo Neruda

I Ask My Grandmother If We Can Make Lahmajoun by Gregory Djanikian

Here, There Are Blueberries by Mary Szybist

The Orange by Wendy Cope

Oranges by Gary Soto

From Blossoms by Li-Young Lee

Persimmons by Li-Young Lee

Eating Together by Li-Young Lee

Self-Portrait as So Much Potential by Chen Chen

Chasing Utopia by Nikki Giovanni

In the Kitchen by Chen Jun

Food by Brenda Hillman

Miss you. Would like to grab that chilled tofu we love. by Gabrielle Calvocoressi

I love you. I want us both to eat well by Christopher Citro

Baked Goods by Aimee Nezhukumatathil

Bread by W. S. Merwin

buy me a coffee

[soracities]

hii words cannot describe how much i adore your blog!! i was wondering if you had any favorite arab poets whose works deeply moved you/whom you’d like to suggest? i would love the recommendations as an arab girl who’s trying to expose herself more to arab lit :) thank you!!

i do!!!! ngl i think i am always just reccing the same poets in different variations but i loved all of these, and hope you find some joy in them also (not all of them are works of poetry but all the authors themselves are poets) 🤍

Women of the Fertile Crescent: An Anthology of Modern Poetry by Arab Women

Paris, When It's Naked / Shifting the Silence / The Cost for Love We Are Not Willing to Pay (Etel Adnan)

Without an Alphabet, Without a Face (Saadi Yousef)

Pages of Day and Night (Adonis)

The War Works Hard / The Iraqi Nights (Dunya Mikhail)

A Red Cherry on a White-Tiled Floor / Barefoot Souls (Maram al-Masri)

The Neverfield (Nathalie Handal)

Miracle Maker: Selected Poems (Fadhil Al Azzawi)

Revolt Against the Sun (Nazik al-Malaika)

Flawed Landscape (Sharif S. Elmusa)

I'Jaam: An Iraqi Rhapsody (Sinan Antoon)

Memory for Forgetfulness / Almond Blossoms and Beyond (Mahmoud Darwish--or anything by him, really)

additionally @barcarole has a lovely list of arabic poems here which i also hope you enjoy. also honourable mention to Badr Shakir al-Sayyab because by god what i wouldn't GIVE to finally have an English translation but for now am consoling myself with "Rain Song" and these two

[marley1031]

“It was Remus who turned Grimmauld Place from a house to a home. Sirius wasn't coming home to someplace, but someone.” -Language Lessons by MsAlexWP

@languagelessonswolfstar has gifted us with such a wonderful fic, that I had to draw one of my favorite moments.

I love MsAlexWP's work, and this fic is something special. Reading about these two falling in love (and realizing that maybe they always were), and navigating war, life, and friendship has been so lovely, and I can not wait for the final chapter.

Thank you MsAlexWP for sharing this story with us!

[all-eyes-no-dragon]

I wanted to rec this for a while. This is the most amazing humans are space orcs story I've ever read. It's called, "In Search of Home".

It's an original work so there's no fandom you need to know to read it, it's over 362,000 words, which is more than decently long, and has an ongoing sequel that's surpassed the word count of the first story (we love getting closure 💞). It has a happy ending (not a spoiler, it says in the tags) so don't worry about your heart breaking too much.

I'm rereading the first story and I feel kind of cool knowing the alien words.

I cried reading it, I laughed, I felt victorious. I love it so much and want more people to know it exists because original works aren't as popular on ao3.

Mind the tags!

Link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/43547319

Summary:

[itshype]

This guy's been developing a (tonal, whistle) bird language for a while but it just hit me that this is straight up a Bats that sing like Birds vibe. (Also if you get lost you can also be found is another good Batfam use birdsong to communicate fic)

[oceanic-sunsets]

english teacher Mike Wheeler who comes across as this Serious Intimidating and pretentious jerk until you discover he's just a nerd who all the Troubled and 'Difficult' kids surprisingly love and look up to. No one knows how he does it. (he was, once, that angry troubled teen).

art teacher Will Byers who absolutely every student loves. You cannot hate him. Queer kids are especially drawn to him and he's the best at reassuring them and helping them feel comfortable and safe. He's always followed by at least two or three students and he gets the most notes, gifts and hand-made crafts during holidays.

and yes they're married

[idlesuperstar]

My. Sounds like a love story.