Wednesday 15 February 2012

New Finnish Grammar

Fantastic! Thank you so much for all your entries!

Some comments on them:
A big well done to Phil who, not only, ‘blogged’ for the first time, but also is the only student of German amongst all the italianists! :)
Message for Jonathan: ‘blog’ in Italian is…’blog’, but you need to say it with an Italian accent - we will practise in class on Thursday! (Ah, ah…I’m joking!!!)
The verb (= to blog) is ‘bloggare’ and I assume is a regular verb, given that it’s taken from another language.
Message for Avril: 10/10 for your choice of TV programmes! I LOVE Montalbano! I would really recommend watching it if you have some time.

I am reading a new book at the moment.

It’s called New Finnish Grammar and it’s written by Diego Marani. A friend of mine gave it to me as a present as, he said: ‘I am a linguist and, obviously, interested in grammar’.

It’s a novel, though, so I am not sure if he knew what the book was about! I have generous, but inaccurate friends! :)

Anyway, I liked the book immediately as it opens in Trieste, my hometown. The more I read of it, though, the more I like it, as it explores cultural identity and how much our language makes us who we are. Or does it?

In any case, even if you do not like the story, reading the book will make you feel better as you will be grateful the language you are studying is not as complex as Finnish! :)

(You can read Nicholas Lezard’s article for a better review than mine:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2011/may/26/finnish-grammar-diego-marani-review)

I also noticed that Topping has chosen it as their book for their next reading group on 21 March, so Mr Lezard and I cannot be wrong!

Has anybody else come across this book?

Friday 10 February 2012

Welcome students to our blog!

The idea of this blog came to me during the Christmas holidays.
I asked Santa Claus to bring me a Language Centre where I could meet all my students. Instead, he brought me a lovely top and a great pair of boots! I was in Italy, what else could I have expected?
As nice as my presents were, I thought that, if I cannot meet all my students in person, maybe I could meet them virtually! And the idea of a Foreign Languages Centre blog came to me.

What can we ‘blog’ about?
Well, here are a few suggestions:
1. We might tell other students at the language centre that we are going to watch a foreign film and see if others want to join us.
2. We might tell other students that we went to see a foreign film and that we liked it and see if others agree with us.
3. We might want to try a new
French/Greek/German/Italian/Japanese/Chinese/Portuguese/Russian/Spanish/
Middle Eastern restaurant and see if some fellow linguists want to join us.
4. We might want to tell other students about a great book we have read in a foreign language and how wonderful we feel about it!
5. We might want to share some tips about finding our course books (some are very difficult to find!) to other students.
6. We might want to share some articles we have just read that might be of interest to other linguists.
What other topics for a blog can you think of?

Please, do join in…I would hate to be the only blogger and it will be WONDERFUL if friendships can be created thanks to a foreign language course!
Ciao a tutti,
Isabella Stefanutti
(Course Director, Foreign Languages Centre)