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aiaTranslations
- Dec 22, 2014
Is a Merry or Happy Christmas the same thing?
The holidays are almost here, and the phrase “Merry Christmas!” – or “Happy Christmas!” if you live in the UK – is in the air. I’ve always taken it for granted that these were how the greeting went in each place. But this year, I started to wonder exactly why. What’s the difference between “Merry Christmas” and “Happy Christmas”? I thought my research into this would be brief, but it turns out that the word “merry” has a side you may not know about…. It’s a phenomenon that
aiaTranslations
- Feb 24, 2014
Buzzfeed: Lists…and Linguistics
My name is Alysa, and I’m addicted to the website Buzzfeed. If you are, too, I’m not judging you. But sometimes other people are. Little do they know, though, that as we’re doing silly quizzes and perusing lists of weird news stories from Florida, we may also be witnessing linguistic history. While Buzzfeed’s success has increased exponentially in the past few years, its founders haven’t decided to rest on their laurels. A few months ago, they introduced Spanish, French,
aiaTranslations
- Feb 25, 2013
Martini Learning
What’s the best way to learn a new language? With a martini of course. Learning a lovely little bit of Italian, you may struggle in class until a night out with a bottle of Chianti and suddenly you’ve gone native. Should you reach for a bottle before each language lesson? Alcohol lowers our affective filter, dropping worries and lowering inhibitions. As confidence soars, we are unconcerned about grammatical rules or mistakes, relaxing our spoken communication (sometimes a l
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