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Multilingual Books Magazine Issue #2
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Thanks for reading the Multilingual Books Magazine, your source for foreign language news, information, and product information and specials from Multilingual Books. 
In this issue:
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Unsubscribe/Subscribe Information Multilingual Books gives Teachers $10,000 in Free Downloads!Multilingual Books announced today that it will give away at least 200 free language course downloads to teachers across the country. These downloads can be used for professional development or classroom use. Here is how to qualify: Teachers need only to write a short essay with up to 200 words explaining why they think foreign language learning is useful. Email the essay by October 30, 2010 to contest@multilingualbooks.com. The downloads offered include the comprehensive Foreign Service Institute language courses, Linguaphone language course and the renowned Platiquemos Spanish course. President of Multilingual Books, Kenneth Tomkins said today, "We are happy to announce this giveaway since we know how hard teachers work and how strapped their school budgets can be at the present moment." Multilingual Books has offered language courses, foreign language books and dvd's on the internet since 1995. Multilingual Books maintains the web's most popular foreign language radio and tv directory. To see the downloads offer go to: https://www.multilingualbooks.com/downloads.html. To contact Multilingual Books email multilingualbooks@gmail.com or call 206-384-3728. |
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French Lesson: Le Dico de l'Argot
By Polly Glott (AKA Kerrie Maynes, from The Wandering Muse)In the 59th issue of Granta (Autumn 1997), Parisian journalist Pierre Merle offers a selection of French slang taken from his Dico de l'Argot fin-de-siècle. Merle includes quite a bit of verlan, or “backslang,” in which the syllables of a word are rearranged--as in verlan, the inverse of l'inverse (“the inverse”). That the Académie française and the French Ministry of Culture frown on such language makes it all the more alluring.
Here's a posse of my favorite renegades:
accro: hooked on something. Abbreviation of accrocher, “to hook.” You can be accro on anything you want to.
afnaf: from the English "half-and-half".
arglais: neologism denoting the mixture of slang and English; e.g., C'est un mec au look cool ("He's a guy with a cool look").
breaker: (pronounced bréquer) to take a break.
Camembert: big shot; translation of "big cheese," the Anglo-American equivalent to the French une grosse legume.
C'est glitter!: It's great, superb, and, above all, showy, as in Glitter, tes chouzes! (see chouzes below); from the English "to glitter".
C'est l'hallu!: I can't believe my eyes! Also common: J'hallucine!
chéwam: (pronounced chéouame) at my house, chez moi, in backslang; Chéwam ou chéwat? ("My place or yours?").
chouzes: from the English "shoes".
from: name given to those born and bred in France by those born and bred elsewhere; abbreviation of fromage blanc.
pagetourner: to decide to break up with somebody, as in Je vais la pagetourner.
scotché: fixed, unable to "peel oneself away"; from Scotch tape, scotcher means "to stick." By extension, être scotché is to be amazed, to be rooted to the spot: J'suis scotché!
zouleur: loser; backslang of the English word "loser".
See the full Dico de l'Argot fin-de-siècle (in French, of course).
Kerrie Maynes can be followed on her blog, The Wandering Muse.
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Product News
New on Multilingual Books
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Little Pim DVDs for Kids
Meet Little Pim, a charming animated panda who guides babies, toddlers and preschoolers on a fun-filled journey to learning a foreign language. Little Pim only speaks in the foreign language, while interacting with babies and young children enjoying everyday activities. Because Little Pim focuses on the first words typically acquired in a kid’s vocabulary, your family can reinforce the lessons by simply repeating the new language during your everyday routines. Created by Julia Pimsleur Levine, an award-winning filmmaker and mom, Little Pim is a groundbreaking kids’ language DVD series that offers hours of fun while providing the basic building blocks for learning a foreign language. This multi-disc series of 35-minute DVDs can be viewed in any order, with each DVD teaching 60 words of vocabulary. Each program is available individually or in a discounted 3 or 6-DVD set, for Spanish, French, Chinese, Italian, Japanese, Hebrew, English (ESL), German, Arabic, and Russian. |
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Trivia Contest
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This month's quiz In honor and memory of Ken Tomkin's mother our trivia quiz is about words having to do with peace: we wish all of our readers a peaceful and blissful month. Name the original language and English meaning for the following words. The first 5 with the correct answer will receive a free download of any FSI course, up to a $50 value.
1. Liefde
2. beatitudine
3. sásta
4. barátság
5. utulivu
Have a favorite item of language trivia? Send it to multilingualbooks@gmail.com. You will receive credit for your contribution if your item is used. |  |
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Featured Website
Language Log (from the University of Pennsylvania)
A communal language blog devoted to short essays and observations from many of the most distinguished luminaries of linguistics:
"Language Log was started in the summer of 2003 by Mark Liberman and Geoffrey Pullum. For nearly five years, it ran on the same elderly linux box, with the same 2003-era blogging software, sitting in a dusty corner of a group office at the Institute for Research in Cognitive Science at the University of Pennsylvania."
"Other more or less regular contributors include Arnold Zwicky, Ben Zimmer, Victor Mair, Bill Poser, Heidi Harley, Roger Shuy, Geoff Nunberg, Eric Bakovic, Sally Thomason, Barbara Partee, and John McWhorter. And an additional cast of dozens have blogged here from time to time."
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Magazine Specials
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Get a free Digital Download with any order over $100! (Offer limited to downloads of $50 and under). Just let us know which download you want to pick, and we'll send you a link to download it! |
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Platiquemos Complete CD/Book Set (8 levels), with Talk Now Spanish for $475
with a savings of $200!
The world's best Spanish course just got better! "The course that works" has been completely revised and improved by Don Casteel, the author of Platiquemos and a former Foreign Service officer who is well trained in the FSI method and fluent in several languages. This edition has improved audio, with both male and female voices, more than 200 illustrations, and trivia.
From former Secretary of State of the United States Lawrence Eagleburger:
"I am a firm believer in the Foreign Service Institute's Spanish language program. I took the course early in my Foreign Service career, and thanks to the quality of the teaching methods used, was able to go from no competence in the language to an almost bilingual facility in only a few months. I know of no method of teaching a foreign language that even approaches the quality of the FSI program."
Lawrence S. Eagleburger, April 1998 |
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EuroTalk Gift Set for $99 EuroTalk's Gift Set Originally Contains Vocabulary Builder, Talk Now, Talk More, World Talk, and Movie Talk (available for English, French, German, Spanish, and Italian - all other complete sets include a Talk More extras disc including the 'Where on Earth' geography game |
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Buy three movies, get one free! Every time you buy three videos, get one free! Just include the promo code MBVideo3plus1 while ordering four videos, and we'll give you the lowest-priced video free. |
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