Applied Linguistics websites

Here are some websites on Applied Linguistics. You may find valuable information or even articles on these websites. Just click on the links.

http://iteslj.org
http://www.baal.org.uk
http://devoted.to/corpora
http://www.aila.info
http://www.thelinguist.org
http://www.cal.org
http://www.aaal.org
http://www.tesol.org
http://www.lingforum.com/forum
http://www.iraal.ie
http://www.appliedlinguistics.org
http://www.linguistics-journal.com

distemper, dis-temper, or this temper

I love translation, but I seldom immerse myself in it. But when I decide to translate an article, I translate it with vim and vigor.To be honest, our translation classes at university were awful. Let me tell you a real story about our oral translation class.

One day our instructor brought a tape with herself and asked us to transcribe and then translate it. I listened to the tape and put down everything on my notebook. Something was wrong with a line in that text. The line, which knocked me for a loop, was this:

Her cat had been given its distemper shot.

Unaware of the real meaning of "distemper" and being lazy enough to look the word up in a dictionary, my instructor and classmates translated the word incorrectly. They thought the word meant "behaving badly". Do you get what I mean?

No one in the class paid heed to this mistranslation. During listening to the tape again and reviewing my notes for the exam, a question came to my head. Was it distemper, dis-temper, or this temper? The first one, of course, seemed to be the answer. And my trusty dictionary approved that.

Distemper: a serious infectious disease that affects animals.

Oscar Wilde once said it is always a very dangerous thing to tell a story with a moral. I cannot give the moral of this story a miss, however. Some translators, no matter where they come from or what their native language is, do not take translation very seriously. They do not want to thrash the problems of translation out. Please add the number of some students of translation and their teachers to the list.

Regards,

Zahra

My American Accent!

Some people believe that there is a region in the United States which is very unique. Its uniqueness is due to the fact that people from there speak English without any accent.

Do you believe this story? Me? I do not believe it. I cannot believe it. Not for all the gold in the world. It is totally understandable that everyone has his or her own accent. Generally, people's accent shows that which country or part of the country they come from. As a result, the story which has been spread by some rumormongers is an out-and-out gossip. To my mind, those guys must take some courses on linguistics to revise their knowledge.

Let me tell you something weird and somehow interesting. I took a small quiz to realize what American accent I have. Here is the result:

What American accent do you have? Your Result: The Northeast Judging by how you talk you are probably from north Jersey, New York City, Connecticut or Rhode Island. Chances are, if you are from New York City (and not those other places) people would probably be able to tell if they actually heard you speak.
The Inland North
Philadelphia
Boston
The Midland
The South
North Central
The West
What American accent do you have? Quiz Created on GoToQuiz

You, too, give it a try. The quiz and its result are indeed off the hinges.

Regards,

Zahra