this post was submitted on 26 Dec 2023
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Today I Learned

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[–] bionicjoey@lemmy.ca 71 points 1 year ago (7 children)

"Courses" is a strong word for what Duolingo offers. It just shows you flashcards, but never explains grammar/syntax rules. Lingodeer is far superior.

[–] Canadian_Cabinet@lemmy.ca 26 points 1 year ago (3 children)

Perdonally I've heard a ton of good things about Language Transfer despite not using it myself

[–] LunchEnjoyer@lemmy.world 7 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Thanks for the recommendation! Difficult to find genuine and good language apps these days that don't cost to much money and or are riddled with ads and intrusive tracking.

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[–] steal_your_face@lemmy.ml 6 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Thank you for sharing this it looks great. They’re iOS app requires minimal permissions too which seems to be rare for language apps

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[–] Akuchimoya@startrek.website 21 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Duolingo does have that function. It's much more obvious on desktop web, but in the phone app, you tap the notebook icons to the right of the headings. I mean, they're not necessarily excellent explanations, but they're there.

[–] Belazor@lemmy.world 7 points 1 year ago (3 children)

They removed that feature, at least for Finnish.

[–] clay_pidgin@sh.itjust.works 11 points 1 year ago

They removed the comment section a few months ago too. There were some really excellent explanations in there!

[–] bionicjoey@lemmy.ca 6 points 1 year ago

You might say that feature is finnished

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[–] sharkfucker420@lemmy.ml 41 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Fascinating that Duolingo tries to teach Navajo. The language is incredibly tonal and with sounds not native to most languages. I imagine it's incredibly difficult to teach through an online service

[–] ApathyTree@lemmy.dbzer0.com 7 points 1 year ago

Idk how duolinguo works (at all), but if the app can play the sounds for you and judge on your pronunciation, that would be quite enough to do the job. If it can handle mandarin (idk if it can) than any tonal based language is fair game.

I would think any decent speech to text could do a decent job determining pronunciation, if there isn’t a dedicated thing for that.. either it registers or it gets garble and you try again.

[–] smuuthbrane@sh.itjust.works 30 points 1 year ago (2 children)

I almost found a way to get university credit for learning Klingon. My downfall was that the Klingon Language Institute was not an "accredited" learning institution. I wonder if that's changed yet…

[–] Klear@sh.itjust.works 9 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Try the Khan Academy next time.

[–] Akasazh@feddit.nl 5 points 1 year ago
[–] name_NULL111653@pawb.social 8 points 1 year ago

Duolingo probably has an accreditation programme by now, considering most high schools use it.

[–] crashoverride@lemmy.world 27 points 1 year ago (1 children)

High Valerian also doesn't have all the ingredients to become an actual language. All I did was translate words in sentences into the language for the show, but Klingon, it is an actual language and has been developed enough that you can call it a language

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[–] dimath@ttrpg.network 27 points 1 year ago (3 children)

But still no European Portuguese 😠

[–] library_napper@monyet.cc 15 points 1 year ago

Prolly more people who want to learn elvish than European Portuguese. Oh, leaderboards

[–] 7of9@startrek.website 11 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Last time I looked it still did a weird mix of American and European Spanish, too

[–] Catoblepas@lemmy.blahaj.zone 10 points 1 year ago (1 children)

It had me pick Latin American or Castilian Spanish when I started using Duolingo, I couldn’t tell you exactly how accurate it was though.

[–] 7of9@startrek.website 4 points 1 year ago (3 children)

When was that? Last time I tried it was a couple of years ago.

As for the difference, outside of Spain the conjugation of Vosotros (you, plural) isn't used, but speaking to strangers is much more formal. Also, there's a lot of vocabulary differences which can be confusing for non-native speakers.

Good luck with your learning, it's a great language :-)

[–] Stoney_Logica1@lemmy.world 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

As somebody who doesn't naively speak Latin American Spanish but was exposed to it a lot growing up, the "th" sound for some words with "c" (like "gracias") in Castilian Spanish really disturbs me. It sounds like everybody has a lisp.

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[–] BlessedDog@lemmy.ml 5 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Wtf is European Portuguese, Portugal is in Europe.

[–] my_hat_stinks@programming.dev 14 points 1 year ago (3 children)

Wtf is British English, England is in Britain.

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[–] Kodemystic@lemmy.kodemystic.dev 10 points 1 year ago (2 children)

There's brazilian Portuguese

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[–] BB69@lemmy.world 26 points 1 year ago (3 children)

Also courses for the language of the imaginary land of Finland.

[–] NoIWontPickaName@kbin.social 7 points 1 year ago

I mean come on they call themselves Finnish.

Finnish, finish, finish line. It’s like they think we’re all stupid.

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[–] rab@lemmy.ca 25 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I'm waiting for them to add Icelandic

[–] sagrotan@lemmy.world 24 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Language learning apps work only to give you an overview over a language, to look if a language is worth learning. You really wanna learn? Search for someone who's mother tongue it is in your vicinity and contact him. You'll be surprised, how much fun that'll be, your friendly Klingon in the neighborhood, crashing your door in at 3 a.m., hellish drunk, just to show you his new Gagh recipe, or you'll find yourself as a slave in the fictional world of an obese old creep. Learning new languages is awesome, right?

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[–] nutsack@lemmy.world 17 points 1 year ago (2 children)

i wish they would spend more time fixing vietnamese instead of shit like this

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[–] ReiRose@lemmy.world 14 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Anyone know a good place to learn Farsi (Persian). Duolingo doesn't have it yet, if ever

[–] Aldn@lemmy.world 5 points 1 year ago

It's a real shame duolingo doesn't have Farsi (or none of the other apps I'm routinely using, for that matter). Let's hope it becomes a thing sooner than later

[–] GhostMatter@lemmy.ca 4 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

I used Mondly fully free a few years ago. It was good. I don't know how it is now.

I also used Anki flashcards.

[–] humorlessrepost@lemmy.world 14 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Still more native speakers than Navajo.

[–] chaogomu@kbin.social 30 points 1 year ago (4 children)

That's what multiple genocides get you. A language rated as Vulnerable in UNESCO.

Still, there are about 170,000 people who speak Navajo, with about 8000 who only speak Navajo.

[–] BulbasaurBabu@lemmings.world 6 points 1 year ago

And there are only 2000 fluent speakers of Hawaiian, let's go colonialism!

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[–] Rambomst@lemmy.world 10 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Does anyone happen to know of an app or site that is good for learning Tagalog?

[–] WhistlingGhost@lemmy.world 6 points 1 year ago (1 children)

The app Tandem (Language Exchange) has Tagalog as an option! It's a pretty cool app. It connects you to native speakers so that they can have conversations with you and help you learn your chosen language.

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[–] smuuthbrane@sh.itjust.works 7 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I'm still hoping for a course in Mando'a.

[–] Mirshe@lemmy.world 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I'm unsure if there's enough words for it to count as a full spoken language yet.

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[–] draedron@lemmyhub.com 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Can I put it on my resume?

[–] Patches@sh.itjust.works 7 points 1 year ago

I saw a resume with just 'Military Spouse: 27 Years' on it.

You can put whatever you want.

[–] Voyajer@lemmy.world 4 points 1 year ago

Let me know when they get Phyrexian

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