Words That Have Circumnavigated the World

The Indonesian word for ‘dictionary’ (kamus) is almost the same as the Swahili word (kamusi) and is in fact an old borrowing from Arabic that somehow came from the Greek word for ‘ocean’. Confused? Here’s how multilingualism and trade spread three rather unusual words around the world. An ocean of words The Indonesian word for … Read more

Valentine’s Day: Love Around the World

uTalk’s regular guest blogger and all-round language guru, Brian Loo Soon Hua, is back with our 500th published post, all about Valentine’s Day! Learn what to call your loved one in different languages—and maybe try some out on the 14th! It’s that time of year again; Valentine’s Day is just around the corner. If you’re … Read more

The Plains of Essos: The Final Frontier

Find out what Game of Thrones and Star Trek have in common and why fans of both will be living it up in Montreal this weekend! You’d be forgiven for not having heard of Marc Okrand or David Peterson, though it’s likely that you’ve seen some of their work. Both of these gentlemen are going … Read more

Beginner’s Guide to Romanian

The Junior Language Challenge is a national competition for children aged 10 and under across the UK. One of the goals of the competition is to give young learners the chance to discover exciting new languages, and this year we’ve chosen Romanian as the first language. But how much do you know about this European … Read more

Languages for the future: the top ten

A recent report by the British Council has laid out the ten most important languages for the UK’s future, in political, economic, educational and cultural terms. According to the report, the ten most important languages, in order, are: Spanish, Arabic, French, Mandarin, German, Portuguese, Italian, Russian, Turkish and Japanese. I read this list with a … Read more