Filed under: Language
One of the aspects of a learning a language that one must come to terms with is the sheer enormity of the task. I often find it incredible to think that I can speak, listen, write and read so well in English (my mother tongue). Even more so, I find it more incredible how similarly so many others speak the same mother tongue. For me, this sensitisation to my own language only came about after making the effort to learn French.
If there were an auditory equivalent to La Bibliotheque Nationale it just might be europe1.fr – 24 hours a day people talk in French. Even better, there is the distilled version of all their shows without their commercials at http://www.europe1.fr/podcast/index.jsp.
Without exaggerating, there are times I can listen to these selections of French and simply marvel at it all. Now, if I could only find the equivalent of this webpage for arabic, persian, italian, russian, polish and others!
Jonathan Smith
All The More Reason 