How to practice Spanish

I've been learning Spanish for quite some time now. Here's how I practice:

get a notebook and write down all new words you learn and review them multiple times.  (or use a flashcard program on some device)

use Spanish RSS feeds - in your Google Reader or something similar (with this, for example)

use sharedtalk.com and chat with people in Latin America (so fun!)

read spanish (children's) books and take the time to look up words you don't know

be extremely hopeful and grab a novel. i started '100 years of solitude' and tried to trudge through it. i only made it to like the 10th page because of all the odd vocab in it, but it's a way to sort of 'brunt force' your way into learning new words.

that newspaper REFLEJOS in the IL 'burbs is great, it's also online. they cover interesting stories that the mainstream papers don't. their crosswords are fun and super easy.

when i was in Costa Rica i got something similar to 'reader's digest' which was an easy-ish periodical to read, with less pressure to read it than a newspaper which gets obsolete in a few days

my favorite spanish teacher showed me this website which has a lot of entertaining quizzes. her homepage also has tons of links, some of which may prove helpful (let me know if you find any)

i repeat: diligently look up words when you see them and don't know them. write them down with their translations and go over the list routinely (daily/weekly/whenever you're bored)

read BBC news headlines or headlines from the papers in a specific country - look up words in the headlines you don't know. if you find a story interesting, read/skim it.

watch a spanish news channel or tv show (online or on tv), or short videos, better yet kid's shows or cartoons...

use a flash card program like mnemosyne to practice the words you've recently looked up

to take a step further, learn the basic structure of verbs, past, present, future and conditional/indicative/

subjunctive so you have a framework into which to place these vocab words as you learn them (this is more advanced and requires more practice than the rest)

read something you're interested in -- i started reading some pablo neruda poetry which is so good in so many ways. he writes very well. i also like reading lyrics to songs i listen to. specifically, jarabe de palo (grooveshark!) is a spanish group that has pretty clear lyrics and worth translating for the poetics.

or SOME COMBINATION THEREOF...do what works and what you enjoy. depending on whatever else is happening in my life these different techniques have come in handy - a flashcard program is much more useful when i'm learning lots of vocab, or want to learn a lot fast. ...whereas mostly what i do now is read news to keep abreast of what's going on specifically in costa rica. la nacion (their newspaper) and a spanish word of the day page pop up every time i open my browser.

make things routine (like a homepage you always see, or doing 5-10 minutes of flash cards every day, or every Saturday)

Updates (7/19/2012):

• This site has a lot of videos
• This has also been very useful in writingtyping in Spanish. Using multiple keyboards and quickly being able to switch with Alt+Shift makes putting accents and other characters (á, ñ) in text super easy.
• Radio Ambulante is a non-profit org dedicated to producing high quality Spanish podcasts similar to NPR -- and has a great "about us" video.
• RTVE is a huge website that hosts Spanish-language videos from news to TV shows and documentaries.  I especially like: Españoles en el mundo about the lives of Spaniards who have relocated to other countries.
• I recently heard of Gladys Palmera's site which has a lot of streaming music and radio.
• Oh, and I recently watched the movie Tambien la Lluvia, it's great!
• Finally, I've been compiling awesome music on Youtube in my Español playlist.

Updates (8/20/2012):

• An awesome video from my friend Toño on the difficulties of learning Spanish 

Updates (10/8/2012):

• All levels of podcasts from Notes in Spanish

Are you learning a second language?  What do you do that's helpful/fun/educational?  Please share!

gum navigation?

Gum can be found everywhere, but a more attentive examination reveals that it reaches maximum density in the vicinity of the most frequented bars: the chewer who is headed there is forced to spit out to free his mouth. As a result, the stranger, not familiar with the city, could find these places following the direction of the more thickly massed gum blobs...

Reposted from here.

quote

“It can’t be any more obvious that we live in a patriarchal society if ”feminist” is a bad word.”

Ellen Page (aka Juno)

privilege: a poem

privilege
a poem for men who don't understand what we mean when we say they have it

D.A. Clarke

reprinted from Banshee, Peregrine Press

Copyright (c) 1981

privilege is simple:
going for a pleasant stroll after dark,
not checking the back of your car as you get in, sleeping soundly,
speaking without interruption, and not remembering
dreams of rape, that follow you all day, that woke you crying, and
privilege
is not seeing your stripped, humiliated body
plastered in celebration across every magazine rack, privilege
is going to the movies and not seeing yourself
terrorized, defamed, battered, butchered
seeing something else

privilege is
riding your bicycle across town without being screamed at or
run off the road, not needing an abortion, taking off your shirt
on a hot day, in a crowd, not wishing you could type better
just in case, not shaving your legs, having a decent job and
expecting to keep it, not feeling the boss's hand up your crotch,
dozing off on late-night busses, privilege
is being the hero in the TV show not the dumb broad,
living where your genitals are totemized not denied,
knowing your doctor won't rape you

privilege is being
smiled at all day by nice helpful women, it is
the way you pass judgment on their appearance with magisterial authority,
the way you face a judge of your own sex in court and
are over-represented in Congress and are not strip searched for a traffic ticket
or used as a dart board by your friendly mechanic, privilege
is seeing your bearded face reflected through the history texts
not only of your high school days but all your life, not being
relegated to a paragraph
every other chapter, the way you occupy
entire volumes of poetry and more than your share of the couch unchallenged,
it is your mouthing smug, atrocious insults at women
who blink and change the subject -- politely -- privilege
is how seldom the rapist's name appears in the papers
and the way you smirk over your PLAYBOY

it's simple really, privilege
means someone else's pain, your wealth
is my terror, your uniform
is a woman raped to death here, or in Cambodia or wherever
wherever your obscene privilege
writes your name in my blood, it's that simple,
you've always had it, that's why it doesn't
seem to make you sick to your stomach,
you have it, we pay for it, now
do you understand

PS more like BS

Was just toying around with this as a t-shirt idea...but not sure it'll come to fruition:

Polystyrene (PS) more like BS!

Letter to Subway Franchise World HQ

Subway Franchise World Headquarters

325 Bic Drive

Milford, CT 06461-3059

May 24, 2011

To whom it may concern:

I recently purchased a sandwich in Champaign, Illinois and was happy to see a note on your Subway® napkins telling me to compost them after use. Had I been going home after my meal, I would have. However, I was in transit, as I assume many fast food customers are when they purchase such food.

I’m writing this letter with the hope to encourage franchises to provide compost bins in their stores as well as compost food waste generated on-site. I imagine franchises generate far more waste than consumers generate using napkins, and taking the steps necessary to process this on-site would mean a huge reduction in waste. Furthermore, providing napkins when people ask for them rather than handing 5 out each time would also cut down on waste, as would sourcing part of the napkins from post-consumer recycled paper.

It’s encouraging to me as an individual that Subway® acknowledges my part in addressing waste problems, but I’d also like to see this mirrored by the corporation/franchise itself. Composting food waste and allowing consumers to do so in-store would do this.

Thank you for your consideration and the steps that the franchise has already taken. I hope you and the franchise continue along this path.

Sincerely,

Ariann Sahagun

Letter to the Editor

Land Grant Institution should use Renewable Energy

I graduated with a Bachelor’s in Psychology in 2008 and recently came back to the University for a Master’s program. When I was an undergrad, I worked with other students to urge the University to become more sustainable. We urged: build a wind turbine, create a strong Office of Sustainability, and include sustainability topics in classes. Unfortunately, since I’ve come back I’m not sure that the University has gained much ground on these fronts. U of I - as a land grant institution - should be striving to become a leader, to demonstrate to our state and local communities what sustainability means: using renewable energy, enacting policy changes, engaging students for educational advancement, among many other potential activities.

I am disappointed that our university has continually dragged its collective feet on building a wind turbine on campus. I started working on this project in 2005 and have spent countless hours with many other students. Students in the form of the Student Sustainability Committee as well as the Illinois Clean Energy Community Foundation have committed millions of dollars to the project and the University has shown little follow-through.

It is time now to move past coal-powered electricity plants and toward renewable energy. We know about climate change enough to commit to this. Given this knowledge and such inaction, what will we say to our children and grandchildren? Will we say we did all we could?

Ari Sahagun
Graduate student in Communication