Mango Languages

Feature Friday: Celebrating Veterans Day

The origin of Veterans Day dates back the end of World War I, which ended on the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month of the year. The date was November 11th, 1918. The signing of an armistice agreement between Germany and the Allies marked the end of the First World War, known as the “great war” or the first “war to end all wars.” From then on, November 11th was referred to as Armistice Day and it became a day to commemorate the veterans who served in the war. Unfortunately, war continued beyond World War I and after World War II and the Korean War, President Eisenhower signed a bill drafted by Congress in 1954 to rename the day in honor of all fallen heroes, officially changing its name from “Armistice Day” to “Veterans Day.”

While Memorial Day typically focuses on those who gave their lives in service of their country, Veterans Day is more focused on thanking the living veterans of war. Over the years, Americans have chosen to serve for many reasons — during the Revolutionary War, to create a nation; in World War II, to save humanity from destruction; at various times, to help pay for college. Still, no matter the motivation, our men and women continue to give their all for our country.

Mango Languages salutes and supports both those active and veteran members of our military. Mango Languages is proud to help those serving our country with our 5 Mango Military courses. With customized content in Dari, Pashto, Levantine Arabic, Modern Standard Arabic, and Urdu, the conversations are critical to the success and safety of military members around the world. Knowing the importance of foreign language to the armed forces, our courses were designed to meet standards and criteria set by the federal government. Mango Military is most commonly offered via a military library, often allowing personnel and their dependents access to both Mango Basic and Complete foreign language courses.

So how can we continue to support our veterans? Thank them. Talk to them. Invite them to schools so they can share their experiences and teach our children that we all must take care of each other, on the battlefield and in life. It was Colin Powell who said: “Many people refer to the World War II generation as the greatest one, but we’ve had greatness in every single generation of Americans who have served.”

This year on Veterans Day, you can put out your flags, cheer the marchers at parades, and go to veteran tributes. But when you wake up the next day, November 12, remember that it’s still Veterans Day for our veterans–and it will be every day of their lives.

Portions of this blog are shared from Gen. Colin L. Powell’s essay, published in the Sunday edition, November 6, 2011, Parade magazine.

What are you doing today (and everyday) to honor our veterans?

Feature Friday: Libraries Rock

First, I have to say I LOVE my job. And this is one of those times that really reminds me how lucky I am to get to do what I do with such cool customers – Libraries.

Mango likes to have fun…and at the New York Library Association trade show we really like to do it up. Why? Because we have a serious reputation to uphold. We have won best booth for two years running and the themes of the shows keep getting better and better. This years theme is Libraries Rock. And we couldn’t agree more!

Libraries are centers of the community. They are Google, Amazon, and Starbucks all rolled into one super human hero of searching capabilities and knowledge. I read a tweet today from the #nyla11 Hashtag that said 60% of librarians had helped someone get a job this year. Libraries are helping to keep this country working too! Wow!

We are always humbled by the words of love that our customers give to us…we honestly love you too. We wouldn’t be here without you and say thank you for all you have given us! I know that I have made some wonderful librarian friends and can’t wait for next year’s theme and show to do it all again!

Libraries…YOU rock! Thanks for letting us be your groupies!

Meet Mango Elf Gulshen Karahann

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We have had the pleasure of Gulshen’s presence at the Mango Grove since November of 2010. I recently talked to her about her background and found it super interesting.

Gulshen was born in Korla, People’s Republic of China. She moved to the U.S. in 1999 because her husband was going to graduate school here. She had learned English in college and had studied linguistics, specifically Turkic languages. Gulshen speaks Uyghur (her native tongue, a member of Turkic Language family), Mandarin Chinese, and English. She understands most of the Central Asian languages as well.

She loved the linguistic graduate program back in China as she learned about the history of her native language, why certain words are used and where many words are borrowed from. But when she moved to the U.S. she had to stop her linguistic studies, not many schools here specialize in Turkic languages. Hmmm…I wonder why. She started a family but made a promise to her dad to finish her Master’s degree.

After her son was born she applied to college here in the U.S. and decided to go into accounting. Crazy right!?! A friend of hers said she could get a good job in this field, so she thought she would give it a try. She ended up loving it and finished Schoolcraft College in August 2007 and transferred her credits to Walsh College in September 2007. She received her bachelor’s degree in accounting from Walsh College in December 2009.

She found Mango through an online job search and fell in love with the idea of working at a language company where both her passion for linguistics and her knowledge of accounting could be put into practice. Gulshen is The Numberist (number+linguist) who makes sense of our numbers and accounting here at Mango Languages. We are so glad to have her and her very rich background here at the Grove.

Do you use what you went to school for?

Meet New Mango Elf Nicolas Pommereau

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We are so excited to have Nicolas on the Mango Product Development Team! I was lucky enough to get to spend some time with him this week, and I learned a ton about him.

Nicolas was born in Paris, France but grew up an army brat so he has lived all over France and even in Tahiti. He moved to the U.S. in 2002 as an exchange student. He attended Michigan State University and obtained two degrees, one in telecommunications and the other in French. He speaks several languages (I am so jealous), French, English, Spanish and a bit of Italian, German, and Russian. He enjoys any opportunity to learn a language. I think he found a great place to work that feeds his addiction.

He said that when he moved here from Paris…getting used to a more suburban lifestyle was interesting. He said everything was bigger here, especially the cars. He shared a story with m about his first night at the university. He said he kept hearing honking all night and thought someone had double parked and trapped a driver. But he quickly realized that our trains honk. Who knew?

His wife calls him “Nicopedia” because he is full of random trivia. Next Trivial Pursuit game at the Grove, I am calling dibs on Nicolas to be on my team. He loves rugby and even took fencing and orienteering at boarding school. Give him a compass and a map and he is your best bet out of the forest. He is also an avid barefoot runner.

Please help me give Nicolas a warm welcome to the Mango Grove.

French Canadian is Here!

Today is July 1st, which means it’s Canada Day. In celebration of this holiday Mango has launched French Canadian!

The differences between Canadian and standard European French are analogous to the differences between American and British English or the Swedish of Sweden and the Swedish of Finland. They are mutually intelligible, but there are some interesting differences, especially in vocabulary. Mango makes it easier for you: we now offer both.

Here is a brief timeline of the French influence in present day Canada: New France in Canada, the St. Lawrence valley, was the historic homeland of the French Canadian people in the time of New France. It corresponds to the southern part of modern Quebec excluding the Eastern Township. Later it had various names: the Province of Quebec (1763), Lower Canada (1791), Canada East  (1840), and finally the Province of Quebec (1867) again.

There are nearly 6 million French Canadian speakers living throughout Canada and North America, with the majority of that population residing in the province of Quebec. With a little help from Mango’s new French Canadian language course,  patrons will be soaking up the general joie de vivre in Montreal, touring the many historic points of interest scattered throughout Quebec City, or reconnecting with their Québécois heritage.

Ready to check it out? On your library’s website, log into Mango Languages to access the French Canadian course and start learning!

Enjoy!

Mango’s Phonetic Pop Up

Every Mango course, chapter, and lesson incorporates our Intuitive Language Construction methodology designed to simulate the way people learn when actually surrounded by a foreign culture through practical conversation. The Intuitive Language Construction methodology consists of teaching grammar, vocabulary, culture, and pronunciation.

We have integrated a variety of interactive tools designed to help improve pronunciation. One of the unique and very helpful features that Mango Languages offers in all its courses is Phonetic Pop Ups. Users can interact with any word, at any time, to view its phonetic spelling.

Our phonetic pop-ups use approximated phonetics, not IPA– the International Phonetic Alphabet. Why don’t we use IPA? Because with IPA you have to memorize a lot of different symbols that you may not be familiar with. We want the pronunciation to be easy with no extra “studying.” Approximated phonetics allows students to actually sound-out the language and helps produce correct pronunciation along with the audio.

We figure that you shouldn’t have to study a course to take another course!

What feature do you use the most to help you with pronunciation?