July Roundup

The French Revolution, Sayonara Baby and Conversation

This month has passed by in the blink of an eye.

Between the World Cup, village festivals, family visits and building work on our house, my language practice (and “Substacking”) has been sporadic and limited.

Taking it easy, being outside and spending time with others has been the priority.

What I’ve been reading this month:

I’m still reading La Casa de los Espíritus for our Lit Club. Still loving it.

Thanks to everyone who has already registered for our second discussion session that takes place this Friday, 30 July at 19:00 CET. If you’re planning on coming, please register as soon as possible so Bianca González and I know how many people to expect.

5 courageous French learners have agreed to participate in a pilot event I’m calling Self-Study School. The idea is that we each research a topic of our own choosing (in French) and give a short presentation on it to each other (in French) at the end of August. Everyone else has really interesting topic ideas, but I was drawing a blank.

In February, I listened to the audio version of Hilary Mantel’s A Place of Greater Safety. This historical fiction novel follows the personal and political lives of Danton, Desmoulins and Robespierre and the women in their lives. This book made me want to learn more about how the Revolution affected women, especially because they were so instrumental to bringing it about.

So in the end, I’ll give a presentation about the role of women in society before and after the French Revolution. It’s probably too broad a subject for a 10 minute talk, but as I don’t know anything at all, I’m not ready to narrow it down yet. My main resource is Les Femmes dans la France Moderne by Dominique Godineau. So far, so good.

What I’ve been watching/listening to:

My husband recently learned that I had never seen Alien, Conan the Barbarian nor Rambo, so you can guess what we’ve been watching recently. It sort of counts as language practice because we’re watching them dubbed in Spanish, because that’s how he remembers the films from his childhood. Sigh.

Fun fact, did you know that in the Spanish-dubbed version of Terminator 2, Arnold Schwarzenegger doesn’t say “hasta la vista, baby”? It wouldn’t have the same effect because the whole thing is in Spanish. Instead, he says “sayonara, baby”.

What I’ve been doing:

In addition to my weekly Italian classes, which have just ended for the “school year,” I’ve been doing plenty of conversation practice with Daily Italian

My classmates and teacher have been an absolute pleasure to work with. Everyone is super patient, helpful and kind.

I’ll be needing a new Language Learning Notebook in September! I’ve filled out most of this one. I still have space for the language logs, which motivates me to keep reading my favorite Substacks in Italian and watch/listen to the language more.

Of course I’ve been continuing with my journal, and added a simple weekly diary entry to practice the past tense. Simple but effective.

For French, in addition to the reading I’m doing for Self-Study School, I’ve been keeping up with my weekly French exchange. If practicing speaking is one of your goals, I highly recommend finding an exchange partner. I’ve written a guide about getting the most out of this kind of practice here if you’re interested.

What’s coming up:

August is looking to be somewhat similar to July on my end, but I’ll be working on some things behind the scenes:

• Revamping the Routine Refresh Challenge for the first week of September

• Thinking through logistics of Self-Study School Groups

• Finalizing coming guest lectures and cinema club sessions in French and Spanish

Hope you’ve had a lovely July and wishing you, as always, happy language learning! ♡

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Thank you, as always, for reading Love to Lingo. ♡

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