pberk wrote:Alfred wrote:Thanks for the link, Paul. As you say, an interesting piece.
pberk wrote:I don't understand the French
YouTube’s auto-translated closed captions (CC) aren’t too bad. By default they’re at the bottom of the video, so they obscure the French subtitles that are included in this one, but you can simply drag them to another part of the screen if you want to be able to see both.
To enable CC, click on the icon to the left of the Settings cog in the control console. When you click on the Settings cog itself you should find that Subtitles/CC is set to ‘French (auto-generated)’. Click on that option to display a menu where you can change it to ‘Auto-translate’, and then scroll down the list that pops up until you find English.
Thanks Alfred. That works. An amazing age we live in ..
Yes, I have found it very useful to follow the Ukrainian You Tube videos I am subscribed to.
I did complete the Duolingo Ukrainian course in just under 300 days last year so I can recognise a few phrases, but, for me, it's not an ideal way to learn the general language. There is no real explanation of grammar and quite a few of the sentences it comes up with are weird, to say the least. I'm not sure how often I am going to want to say "This is a strange flower that grows on a tree", for instance. There seems to be a paucity of standard meaningful phrases you might need to use in conversation.
I am now starting to continue my learning process in a more structured way via text books. It is very similar to Latin grammatically, and I am also going back to refresh my schoolgirl 'O' Level Latin, partly to help with the Ukrainian, but also to be able to understand some of the older sources as I scramble through my family tree.
So there is a mix of the modern way of doing things, which can also include translation apps, and the old-fashioned way. Keeps the old grey cells ticking over, at least. I actually impress myself with how much of the schoolgirl French I learned has stuck in the brain. Typically for me, I only got a B grade in the living useful language, and an A grade in the 'dead' one. But listening to spoken French, and /or reading written French I can still get the gist, even if I can't do a full translation.
