#language vocabulary

[er-cryptid]

Christmas Decorations (Norwegian)

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[abyssalaquarist00]

the body in arabic and spanishFREELANCE INFO // SKETCH REQUEST

[unboundprompts]

Pirate Terms and Phrases

-> Pirate Lingo

-> A Pirate's Glossary

Batten Down The Hatches - tie everything down and put stuff away for a coming storm.

Brig - a prison on a ship.

Bring a Spring Upon 'er - turn the ship in a different direction

Broadside - the most vulnerable angle of a ship that runs the length of the boat.

Cutlass - a thick, heavy and rather short sword blade.

Dance with Jack Ketch - to hang; death at the hands of the law (Jack Ketch was a famed English executioner).

Davy Jones's Locker - a mythical place at the bottom of the ocean where drowned sailors are said to go.

Dead Men Tell No Tales - the reason given for leaving no survivors.

Flogging - severe beating of a person.

Gangplank - removable ramp between the pier and ship.

Give No Quarter - show no mercy.

Jack - flag flown at the front of the ship to show nationality.

Jolly Roger - black pirate flag with a white skull and crossbones.

Keelhaul - a punishment where someone is dragged under the ship. They are cut by the planks and barnacles on the bottom of the ship.

Landlubber - an inexperienced or clumsy person who doesn't have any sailing skills.

Letters of Marque - government-issued letters allowing privateers the right to piracy of another ship during wartime.

Man-O-War - a pirate ship that is decked out and prepared for battle.

Maroon - to leave someone stranded on a. deserted island with no supplies, typically a punishment for any crew members who disrespected the captain.

Mutiny - a situation in which the crew chooses a new captain, sometimes by forcibly removing the old one.

No Prey, No Pay - a common pirate law that meant crew members were not paid, but rather received a share of whatever loot was taken.

Old Salt - experienced pirate or sailor.

Pillage - to steal/rob a place using violence.

Powder Monkeys - men that performed the most dangerous work on the ship. They were treated harshly, rarely paid, and were expendable.

Privateer - government-appointed pirates.

Run A Shot Across the Bow - fire a warning shot at another boat's Captain.

Scurvy - a disease caused by Vitamin C Deficiency.

Sea Legs - when a sailor adjusts his balance from riding on a boat for a long time.

Strike Colors - lower a ship's flag to indicate surrender.

Weigh Anchor and Hoist the Mizzen - an order to the crew to pull up the anchor and get the ship sailing.

If you like what I do and want to support me, please consider buying me a coffee! I also offer editing services and other writing advice on my Ko-fi! Become a member to receive exclusive content, early access, and prioritized writing prompt requests.

[goodplan-ipromise]

[german-enthusiast]

In my L1-acquisition class two weeks ago, our professor talked about how only 9% of the speech a baby hears is single words. Everything else is phrases and sentences, onslaughts of words and meaning!

Thus, a baby not only has to learn words and their meanings but also learn to segment lots of sounds INTO words. Doyouwantalittlemoresoupyesyoudoyoucutie. Damn.

When she talked about HOW babies learn to segment words our professor said, and I love it, "babies are little statisticians" because when listening to all the sounds, they start understanding what sound is likely to come after another vs which is not.

After discussing lots of experiments done with babies, our professor added something that I already knew somewhere in my brain but didn't know I know: All this knowledge is helpful when learning an L2 as well:

Listen to natives speaking their language. Original speed. Whatever speaker. Whatever topic.

It is NOT about understanding meaning. It is about learning the rhythm of the language, getting a feeling for its sound, the combination of sounds, the melody and the pronunciation.

Just how babies have to learn to identify single words within waves of sounds, so do adults learning a language. It will help immensely with later (more intentional) listening because you're already used to the sound, can already get into the groove of the languge.

Be as brave as a baby.

You don't even have to pay special attention. Just bathe in the sound of your target language. You'll soak it up without even noticing.

[luvelydelilah]

Struggling with emotional scenes? Here are some tips for writing emotion!

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1. While you’re writing, try to build an explanation for their feelings. What triggered their emotion? Is their reaction rational or are they overreacting? Do they fight, flight, fawn or freeze when provoked? Do they feel threatened? 

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2. Show, don’t tell. Describe what is happening instead of plainly stating the situation. Try not to use words like sad, happy, devastated, in pain, angry, nervous, scared, or worried. They cut back on the emotional integrity of the scene and make it hard for readers to connect with your characters. Here are some different behaviors for different emotions.

-Eager-

Bouncing up and down

Unable to sit still

Breathing deeply

Fidgeting

Pretending to do something

Trying to stay busy

Constantly looking at the clock

-Nervous-

Red and hot face

Sweaty palms

Voice cracks

Shaky hands

Biting nails

Biting lips/inside of cheek

Wide eyes

Shallow breathing

Heart racing

-Excited-

Wide smile

Squeal/scream

Bouncing up and down

Fidgeting

Playing with hands

Tapping foot

Talking fast

Tapping pencil

Pacing back and forth

-Scared-

Curling up/bringing knees to head

Closing eyes

Covering ears

Stop breathing or breathing quickly

Biting nails

Shaking

Gritting teeth

Hugging/squeezing something tight

-Frustrated-

Stomping

Grunting/mumbling/yelling

Deep breaths

Red and hot face

Hitting/kicking something

Pointing

Straining/veins become more visible

-Sobbing-

Eyes filling up with tears

Eyes burn/turn red

Red cheeks

Face becomes puffy

Pursed lips

Holding head down

Hyperventilating

Fast blinking

Trying not to blink/holding back tears

-Happy-

Smiling wide

Laughing loudly

Cheeks hurting

Talking loudly

Higher pitched voice

Animated/expressive

-Upset-

Walking slowly/shuffling feet

Head down/avoiding eye contact

Biting inside of cheek

Dissociation

Keeping quiet

Fidgeting

-Bored-

Pacing back and forth

Sighing loudly

Complaining

Fidgeting

Blank face

Looking for something to do

Making up stories

Talking about random topics

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3. Try and bring some trauma into your character’s emotions. For example, something might happen that reminds them of a suppressed/traumatic memory. This is an easy way to hook your reader and have them really feel like your character is a real person with real emotions. They might have some internal conflict they need to work through and a certain situation reminds them of that. They might become irritable at the thought of their traumatic experience and they might snap at whoever is nearby. 

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4. Most characters won’t dump their entire backstory or feelings in a conversation. Try and reserve your character’s emotions to make more interesting scenes later on. For example, your character may be triggered and someone may ask them what’s wrong. Will they give in, soften up and share? Or will they cut themself off and say they’re fine? Also take into account that your character might not know the other character very well and won’t be comfortable sharing personal information with them, like details regarding their trauma.

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5. Last but not least, you don’t need to have a major event happen to connect emotionally with your audience. You don’t have to kill off a character every time you need to spice up your story, even simple interactions can just help your readers understand your character better. Show how they react to certain topics or situations. Describe their feelings, their surroundings, their body language. Their defense mechanisms will help the audience to better understand what kind of person they are.

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[a-word-a-day-for-writers]

𝐀𝐧𝐧𝐞𝐚𝐥

uh-NEEL

1. To set on fire, kindle, inflame, lit. and fig.   

2. To subject to the action of fire; to alter in any way with heat; as, to ‘fire’ or bake earthenware, fure ores, vitrify or glaze a surface 

3. To burn in colours upon glass, earthenware, or metal, to enamel by encaustic process. arch.

4. a. To toughen anything, made brittle from the action of fire, by exposure to continuous and slowly diminished heat, or by other equivalent process 

b. loosely, To cool down from a great heat  

c. transf. Applied to the action of frost. rare. 

5. fig. To toughen, temper 

6. Microbiology. To combine to form double-stranded nucleic acid

[typhlonectes]

via: Merriam-Webster Dictionary 

[mythalism]

call me crazy but there is a difference between treating your adult players like they are new to the world and treating your adult players like they have the memory of a goldfish and the vocabulary of a 9 year old

[luthienne]

Tony Hoagland, Application for Release from the Dream: Poems

[er-cryptid]

Clothing Vocabulary Variations (Spanish)

Patreon

[bogleech]

I still can't fathom what in the entire world I could have ever said or done to make that gerrysherry (also known as spot-the-antisemitism) person come after me, and try every possible way of reframing every anti-war feeling I have as somehow, secretly, anti-jewish. Unless they don't actually believe that, but they hope saying it enough will make people believe it?? I don't know them, never did anything to them, and yet this person has reportedly still spent weeks and weeks boosting the same thread over and over, in which they urge people to boycott my book - something I'm depending on to even be able to afford my home in the future - because they apparently insist I have only antisemitic reasons for wanting to support Palestinians. How would that even make sense?! Jewish people aren't doing anything to Palestinians, a government is. They failed to make any dent in my follower count which just keeps jumping up every day, and I'm technically making more income off my art than ever (even if it still only barely covers cost of living), but I can't get over the sheer principle of someone hoping they could spread misinfo like that with the hope of impacting my ability to live. I've never run into anything that personally vicious before, all over sentiments they just up and pretend I have? For what??

[prokopetz]

Honestly, my Scrabble vocabulary isn't that great. My ability to consistently play hyper-obscure words that just happen to be in the dictionary is less a matter of prior knowledge and more a matter of being able to look at a seemingly random sequence of letters, think "I have no idea if that's a word, but the English language would absolutely pull some horseshit like this", and 90% of the time I'm right.

[mehilaiselokuva]

hi, random and oddly specific question i know, but could you possibly share some finnish slang thats like english "lol/lmao/wtf/istg" basically just like phrases or abbreviated words that can help me sound less like a robot cuz rn my finnish is so formal it hurts

Hi!

Finnish people use lol, lmao, wtf, and istg (and all the other English abbreviations) in texting. Most people will understand them as long as you aren't talking to a grandma or something.

However, when speaking, people WILL pronounce many of them as one word, not separate letters. "lmao" will often be pronounced as L-mao (älmao) to conform to Finnish syllable rules. Wtf or istg are never pronounced as words and people will give you "vattefak" or "aisveertugaad" (or something more English-sounding if they are bothered to)

There aren't really many "native" Finnish shortenings, people usually tend to just type everything out (I think we are used to it since our language has so many long words)

ookoo/okei is the longer way to type OK in Finnish.

evvk - "ei vois vähempää kiinnostaa" - I couldn't care less

kvg - "kato vittu googlesta" - fucking google it

mitvit / mit vit - "mitä vittua" - what the fuck

If you really want to sound less like a robot when texting, use puhekieli! (Or a local dialect if you live in Finland!) The unfortunate reality is that if Finnish people want to sound more casual when texting, they often use English and English abbreviations.

If any Finns know some common Finnish texting abbreviations, send them under this post! I genuinely couldn't think of more!

[german-enthusiast]

✨"Sehr geehrte Besucher, aufgrund Ihres hohen Alters ist unsere Leopardin leider gestorben"✨

The marking on the picture around the word "Ihres" points to the importance of proper capitalization of the formal you in German to distinguish it from her/your

ihr = her (feminine singular possessive pronoun) / your (plural personal pronoun; this doesn't make sense here though)

aufgrund ihres hohen Alters -> because of her (the female leopards) old age

Ihr = you (formal)

aufgrund Ihres hohen Alters -> because of your (the readers)visitors) old age

Dear visitor, due to her old age, the female leopard has unfortunately passed away.

vs.

Dear visitor, due to your old age, the female leopard has unfortunately passed away.

[luvelydelilah]

Struggling with descriptors? Here are some synonyms to make your scene more interesting!

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Afraid

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Apprehensive

Dread

Foreboding

Frightened

Mistrustful

Panicked

Petrified

Scared

Suspicious

Terrified

Wary

Worried

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Annoyed

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Aggravated

Dismayed

Disgruntled

Displeased

Exasperated

Frustrated

Impatient

Irritated

Irked

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Angry

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Enraged

Furious

Incensed

Indignant

Irate

Livid

Outraged

Resentful

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Aversion

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Animosity

Appalled

Contempt

Disgusted

Dislike

Hate

Horrified

Hostile

Repulsed

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Confused

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Ambivalent

Baffled

Bewildered

Dazed

Hesitant

Lost

Mystified

Perplexed

Puzzled

Torn

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Disconnected

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Alienated

Aloof

Apathetic

Bored

Cold

Detached

Distant

Distracted

Indifferent

Numb

Removed

Uninterested

Withdrawn

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Disquiet

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Agitated

Alarmed

Discombobulated

Disconcerted

Disturbed

Perturbed

Rattled

Restless

Shocked

Startled

Surprised

Troubled

Turbulent

Turmoil

Uncomfortable

Uneasy

Unnerved

Unsettled

Upset

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Embarrassed

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Ashamed

Chagrined

Flustered

Guilty

Mortified

Self-conscious

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Fatigue

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Beat

Burnt out

Depleted

Exhausted

Lethargic

Listless

Sleepy

Tired

Weary

Worn out

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Pain

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Agony

Anguished

Bereaved

Devastated

Grief

Heartbroken

Hurt

Lonely

Miserable

Regretful

Remorseful

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Sad

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Depressed

Dejected

Despair

Despondent

Disappointed

Discouraged

Disheartened

Forlorn

Gloomy

Heavy hearted

Hopeless

Melancholy

Unhappy

Wretched

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Tense

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Anxious

Cranky

Distressed

Distraught

Edgy

Fidgety

Frazzled

Irritable

Jittery

Nervous

Overwhelmed

Restless

Stressed out

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Vulnerable

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Fragile

Helpless

Insecure

Leery

Reserved

Sensitive

Shaky

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Yearning

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Envious

Jealous

Longing

Nostalgic

Pining

Wistful

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