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Proof the internet is the greatest thing ever happened to languages
 
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Thread poster: Michael Jones
Proof the internet is the greatest thing ever happened to languages

Michael Jones  Identity Verified
Australia
Local time: 10:11
Member (2006)
Italian to English
+ ...
May 9, 2008

I posted a comment a few weeks ago about how great the internet is for language diversity.
Well today I just blew myself away.

I was looking for some information about a word in the Tetum language, which is one of the two official languages of East Timor, the other being Portuguese. The word was "tratamentu".

Ok, forget that, I actually discovered a language I had never heard of before, a fantastic amalagam of European, African and American sources called Papiamento (or Papiamentu), spoken in the Carribean islands of Aruba, Bonaire and Curaçao (ABC, get it?).

Wow, I went through over 50 years of life without ever knowing about this.

Google it yourself, and enjoy.

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Margreet Logmans  Identity Verified
Netherlands
Local time: 01:11
Member (2006)
English to Dutch
+ ...
Thanks Michael May 9, 2008

Funny, I've known about Papiamentu since I don't know when. Aruba et al being part of the Dutch colonies. At school, I was told to remember their names as the ABC-islands indeed.

But I never knew about Tetum! Thanks!

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Faruk Atabeyli  Identity Verified
Turkey
Local time: 02:11
Member (Jun 2009)
English to Turkish
+ ...
More languages May 9, 2008

Take a look at this interesting site.

http://www.omniglot.com/

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Fabio Descalzi  Identity Verified
Uruguay
Local time: 22:11
Member (2004)
German to Spanish
+ ...
Ethnologue May 9, 2008

http://www.ethnologue.org/web.asp
This is another very good site, if you wanna know "all the languages ever around" (or almost...)
Here you are, for Tetun:
http://www.ethnologue.org/show_language.asp?code=tet - a language from Indonesia, Austronesian family;
http://www.ethnologue.org/show_language.asp?code=tdt - Tetun Dili, language of East Timor, actually a Tetun-based Creole.

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Richenel Ansano  Identity Verified
United States
Local time: 19:11
Member (2008)
Spanish to English
+ ...
Happy to see your post. Oct 13

Michael,

I am a native speaker of Papiamentu and always enjoy it when people discover our language like this. There are a lot of similarities, especially in vocabulary, with all these other languages that were influenced by Portuguese and other Iberian languages. First time I heard of Tetum. Truly a wonderful way to know bits and pieces of the world!

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Ulrike H
Germany
Local time: 01:11
English to German
+ ...
the internet has a lot of advantages for people interested in languages... Oct 13

Oh, Papiamentu is a language I always wanted to learn (well since about ten years ago when I first learned about it), unfortunately so far I haven't had time or opportunity for that... About Tetum on the other hand I never had heard either.

But the internet is not only great for learning about the existence of languages, but also for learning and practicing languages...

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