What's another word for thesaurus?
Steven Wright
Whether you are multilingual or speak only one language, you will enjoy the sites listed in this category. We didn't stop at the better known and more widely used languages—also included are sites that offer information on Klingon and Tengwar!
http://www.quetzal.com/conlang.html
A site containing listings and links to further information on constructed human languages. Constructed human languages are planned languages created by humans. The site is a good starting point for any one interested in non-natural languages.
http://www.webcom.com/~donh/esperanto.html
Esperanto is the most successful created language and is spoken by some two million people world wide. Check out this site for a good introduction to Esperanto. The introductions are made available in English, Swedish, Dutch, Spanish, and many other languages.
http://infoweb.magi.com/~mfettes/
This site is an index to English language sites on "planned" or "international" languages. It focuses on Esperanto because of more than 900 attempts to create international languages, only Esperanto has been successful. Esperanto is thus used as a tool in the branch of linguistics known as interlinguistics, or the study of how languages are used to communicate between two different groups.
This site is for "scholars" wishing to study the Klingon language from the Star Trek TV series. Lots of information is available on the language and you can even learn to speak Klingon using the site.
http://home.earthlink.net/~cpinette/treklang.html
This site serves as an index to Internet resources available on some of the languages used on the Star Trek TV Series. Information is available on Bajoran, Cardassian, Ferengi, Klingon, Tarmarian (Darmok), Romulan, and Vulcan. A wealth of downloadable software is also available through this site. Goodies like phrase books and dictionaries, fonts, and translators can be found here.
http://www.dcscomp.com.au/jewell/tolkien/tengwar/
Tengwar is the written language of the elven people described in the books of J.R.R. Tolkien. Here you can find information regarding this interesting constructed language. It includes explanations of Tengwar writing and links to Tengwar fonts for windows and Macintosh computers.
http://www.msstate.edu/Archives/ADS/
Founded more than a century ago, the American Dialect Society still is the only scholarly association dedicated to the study of the English language in North America, and of other languages, or dialects of other languages, influencing it or influenced by it. The site contains information on ADS activities, including meetings and job offers. An online version of the society newsletter is available.
http://mainstreet.t5.com/cyberback.htm
A collection of six lists of words and phrases in South African English, with explanations of their meanings. A very humorous and entertaining site.
http://ebbs.english.vt.edu/hel/hel.html
Home page for the History of the English Language mailing list (HEL-L). The page includes many resources for English language history studies. Anything from Anglo-Saxon texts to modern American English can be found here.
http://www.uq.edu.au/~zzlreid/slang.html
A site containing an Australian English Slang and Phrase dictionary. There are hundreds of colorful Australian phrases to be found here. If you enjoy language, check this site out!
http://www.georgetown.edu/cball/oe/old_english.html
The Old English Pages is a vast collection of resources for those interested in the study of Old English and Anglo-Saxon England. This site contains texts, language information, fonts, and sound clips.
http://www.interlog.com/~richs/phrases.html
A collection of unique British English words and phrases. The phrase lists are broken down by region and contain descriptions of their meanings. This site can help you understand what people are saying when you see those British TV shows.
http://www.users.interport.net/~words1/
An online version of The Word Detective, a newspaper column that answers readers' questions about words and language. Back issues of the Word Detective are available. Links to similar, or English language-related World Wide Web sites are included.
http://www.peg.apc.org/~toconnor/welcome.html
Created by Terry O'Connor, literary editor of the Courier-Mail in Brisbane, Australia, this site discusses the origins of words and expressions in the English language. Previously discussed words and expressions are available for browsing. The author also welcomes word and expression suggestions for future discussion.
http://www-ucsee.eecs.berkeley.edu/~lorentz/scripts/scripts.html
A site devoted to ancient written representations of languages. The scripts are divided in to six geographical categories. Images of these ancient writings are included in each article.
http://www.sil.org/ethnologue/ethnologue.html
One of the most complete sources of information on languages on the WWW, the Ethnologue database contains information on over 360 languages spoken world wide. Information on languages includes, name, number of speakers, and geographical location. The site even contains information on lesser known languages and dialects, such as Gypsy.
http://www.smo.uhi.ac.uk/saoghal/mion-chanain/Failte_en.html
A site dedicated to lesser known European languages. Includes information on languages such as Breton, Basque, and various Celtic languages, that are spoken by small groups of people throughout Europe. Contains links to other sites that specialize in one of the minority languages.
http://www.cd.sc.ehu.es/DOCS/book.SS-G/v2/Euskara.html
Euskara is the language of the Basque people who inhabit northwest Spain and southwest France. This site is an introduction to the euskara language and the Basque people. Euskara is unique in that it is not related to any known language.
http://sunsite.unc.edu/gaelic/
This site contains a good introduction to the Gaelic languages spoken in Ireland, Scotland, and Wales. Information on Gaelic cultures and history can also be found here. Many of the resources listed here are actually in Gaelic, so non-Gaelic speakers/readers beware.
http://www.cs.colostate.edu/~malaiya/hindiint.html
Spoken by millions around the world Hindi is one of the major languages of India. As the site's title implies there is a large archive of Hindi songs available through this site. There are also links to Hindi language and literary resources.
http://www.willamette.edu/~tjones/Language-Page.html
The Human-Languages Page is an index to sources of language information located throughout the Internet. Examples of resources contained in this guide include, online Dictionaries, vocabulary lists, language tutorials, and foreign language software. The page is available in many languages.
http://webbo.enst-bretagne.fr/Kervarker/index.html
Breton is a Celtic language spoken by many of the people in West-Brittany, France. This site provides information about the breton language and culture. A series of lessons in Breton are provided for anyone interested in learning this language. Sound files are included to demonstrate pronunciation.
http://www.olelo.hawaii.edu/OP/help/
A wealth of Hawaiian language information can be found on 'Olelo Hawaii. This site is dedicated to promote and preserve the native Hawaiian language. Available resources include, an online dictionary, and Hawaiian fonts for IBM PCs and Macintosh computers.
LingNet is a site dedicated to linguistics, the study of language. LingNet is located at the Defense Language Institute Foreign Language Center (DLIFLC) in Monterey, California. An index of links to other WWW language resources, grouped by language, is available. File libraries, and discussion forums are accessible through the LingNet BBS (Bulletin Board System) which has a WWW based interface.
http://engserve.tamu.edu/files/linguistics/linguist/
LINGUIST is an electronic network hosted at Texas A&M and Eastern Michigan Universities. LINGUIST is used for research and discussion by linguists world wide, through the use of its electronic mailing list and World Wide Web site. Archives of past discussions are maintained on the site.
http://www.phoenix.net/~melanie/thelogic.htm
If you've ever wondered about the origins of a certain word, this site is for you. There is a featured word of the week whose etymology is discussed. The site also shows one some basic ideas behind etymology and how to apply these ideas logically for the purpose of discovering a word's history.
The MERCATOR Project is an initiative set up by the European to promote the interests of the minority/regional languages and cultures within the European Union. The site contains information on minority languages found in the EU. There are also links to three MERCATOR departments, and links to a bibliographic database.
http://www.rahul.net/lai/companion.html
Sponsored by the Northern California Translators Association, the Translator's Home Companion provides a guide to resources for professional translators. Links to online translation resources, such as dictionaries are listed on this site. Translation news and product information and reviews can also be found here.
http://www.netaxs.com/~salvucci/VTLhome.html
Dedicated to the languages of ancient Italy, this site begins with an interesting history of the country's name. Resources include maps showing where these ancient languages were spoken, alphabets of the ancient languages, and fonts for Macintosh personal computers. There is also a section on etruscan vocabulary.
http://babel.uoregon.edu/yamada/fonts.html
If you've ever needed foreign language fonts, this is the site to visit. This archive contains a large number of fonts for foreign languages. Graphic designers and linguists can both benefit from this archive.
I don't mind what language an opera is sung in so long as it is a language I don't understand.
Sir Edward Appleton
http://www.hoh.org/~masterstech/ASLDict.spml
This site contains a few American Sign Language terms that can be used to communicate with a person who cannot hear. The American Sign Language alphabet and the numbers are also included on this site. This site contains many graphics, illustrating the hand signals.
http://www.threeweb.ad.jp/threeweb/jpncntrl/bgnr_hp.html
This page teaches the basics of the Japanese language. Lessons are available in two formats, the first is used if your computer is equipped with special software to view Japanese characters, the second uses GIF images to display Japanese characters. Each lesson is made up of three parts, the target material, the explanation, and exercises.
http://www.webcom.com/bamboo/chinese/
An index of online resources on the Chinese language. There is a featured Chinese site each month. Link categories include literature, software, and Chinese language radio broadcasts.
http://www.sinologic.com/clap.html
CLAP offers the Chinese learner great resources that aid in the learning of Chinese. In addition to the standard fare of vocabulary words and dictionaries, CLAP offers information on the latest happenings in chinese language and culture. For example, there is a section detailing English words in common Chinese usage.
http://www.hut.fi/~tlindber/conjugue/
Need a little help conjugating those foreign language verbs? Conjugue is a program that conjugates those tricky verbs for you. It includes support for languages and is for MS windows computers.
http://www.travlang.com/Ergane/
Ergane is a translation program for Microsoft Windows. It includes support for 42 languages. The program uses Esperanto as an intermediate language to translate between the two desired languages. It is available for download on this site and is freeware.
http://wwwtios.cs.utwente.nl/esperanto/hypercourse/index.html
If you've ever had a desire to learn the Esperanto language, this site is for you. The site features a WWW version of a HyperCard stack that will guide you through an introductory course on Esperanto. The lessons are available in English only.
http://www.accent.net/falcarte/
Français à la Carte Formation is a company that specializes in French instruction. They provide a writing page to assist those learning French in improving their writing skills. The site also includes many pointers to French language resources available on the Internet.
http://www.kd.qd.se/iii/languages/french/course/index.html
An online course in the French language. The course consists of nine lessons and some additional vocabulary. In addition to the lessons, there is a section describing French expressions and idioms. Also included, are pointers to other French language and culture sites.
http://www.lincolnu.edu/~focal/
Focal an Lae, literally meaning the word of the day in Gaelic, is a site devoted to the Gaelic Language spoken in Ireland. It includes back issues of Focal an Lae in case you have missed them, or just want to build your vocabulary. The site also features other valuable Gaelic language resources such as a list of useful phrases and links to other Gaelic information sites.
http://www.travlang.com/languages/
A useful site featuring phrases in several languages that can be used by people who are planning trips abroad. Languages covered include Spanish, Portuguese, German, French, and Dutch. Sound clips demonstrating pronunciation can also be found on the site.
http://futon.sfsu.edu/~jtm/Gaelic/
Collection of resources and pointers for learners and speakers of Irish Gaelic. Resources include, Irish Gaelic web sites, software and online dictionaries. Although this site mainly lists information relevant to Irish Gaelic, there is some information on other Gaelic languages such as Scottish and Manx.
http://www.isr.umd.edu/~kanlis/Greek/
Greek through the Internet provides on line lessons in modern Greek. There are five lessons currently available with more to come. Practice exercises are available at the end of each lesson. There are also other sections on grammar, syntax, and vocabulary.
http://www.macom.co.il/hebrew/index.html
Hebrew is one of the world's oldest living languages, and this site is dedicated to the Hebrew language. Basic Hebrew lessons are available on the site, covering topics such as counting in Hebrew. Hebrew stories, and poetry are provided to assist those learning the language. The site even includes Hebrew fonts for those wanting to write in Hebrew on their computers.
http://ohm.kaist.ac.kr/hangul/
A series of ten lessons written in the English language that teach the basics of the Korean language. The lessons are well organized and include practice exercises at the end of each lesson. A Korean-English dictionary is also available on this site.
http://www.crocker.com/~lcastro/learncatalan.html
Catalan is a romance language spoken by millions of people along the eastern coast of Spain in the provinces of Catalunya and Valencia. Here you will find an introduction to the language and five lessons teaching the fundamentals of Catalan.
http://www.fred.net/malta/malti.html
Planning to travel to Malta? If so, Survival Maltese is for you! Survival Maltese focuses on frequently used words and phrases for use by travelers. Phonetic transcriptions of every word and phrase are available so users can see how the language is pronounced. Using Survival Maltese will not only give you a minimum Maltese vocabulary but also helps you get used to pronouncing the language.
http://www.hardlink.com/~chambers/Italian/
Inspired by the Spanish lessons made available over the Web Lucio Chiappetti created this site to teach the basics of the Italian language. There are three lessons, available in HTML format for on-line browsing, and in postscript format suitable for printing.
http://www.hardlink.com/~chambers/Spanish/
Online lessons in the basics of the Spanish language. Three lessons are currently available in two formats, HTML for online viewing, and PostScript for printing. A list of helpful resources for people interested in learning Spanish is included.
http://www.cs.brown.edu/fun/welsh/Welsh.html
A course in the Welsh language. Welsh is a language related to the Gaelic languages of Ireland and Scotland, primarily spoken in Wales. The course is geared toward beginners. The site also provides links to other Welsh resources on the WWW.
http://www.msstate.edu/Archives/ADS/
This is the home page of the ADS, the only scholarly association dedicated to the study of the English language in North America—and of other languages, or dialects of other languages, influencing it or influenced by it. Includes membership information, conference schedules, and calls for papers.
This is a collaborative research project, involving researchers at Boston University, Dartmouth College, Rutgers University, and Gallaudet University. Information is provided at this site on the two main parts of this project: investigation of the syntactic structure of American Sign Language (ASL) and development of multimedia tools for sign language research.
http://www.cs.columbia.edu/~acl/home.html
Includes background information on the Association, conference schedules, abstracts from the Computational Linguistics journal, plus links to related sites.
http://online.anu.edu.au/ANDC/
This center provides information on research into the usage of Australian English. Includes details on various Australian dictionaries published by Oxford University Press, with plans for an online dictionary.
http://www.kun.nl/celex/index.html
CELEX has compiled three large electronic databases which can provide online and offline users with detailed English, German, and Dutch lexical data. Aimed at the professional linguist, this database contains representations of the phonological, morphological, syntactic, and frequency properties of lemmata for each of the three languages included.
http://www.cal.org/cal/calhome.html-ssi
CAL is a private non-profit organization, that has been applying research and information about language and culture to educational, cultural, and social concerns for 37 years. This site provides information about CAL's history, current projects, and future mission.
http://www.mt.cs.cmu.edu/cmt/CMT-home.html
The Center for Machine Translation (CMT) at the School of Computer Science at Carnegie Mellon University conducts advanced research and development in a suite of technologies for natural language processing. At this site you will find project details, personnel profiles, technical reports, and more.
This group from the Oregon Graduate Institute of Science and Technology has a mission to perform basic research leading to advances in the state of the art of spoken language systems. Their Web site follows that mission by providing research summaries, publications, including the full text and illustrations of the Human Language Technology Survey, and more.
http://www.ling.lsa.umich.edu/cgi-bin/chomsky.pl
The focal point of this site is a Web robot that assembles random phrases from the works of Noam Chomsky into nearly coherent paragraphs. Also provided is a detailed discussion of the programming behind this robot and the linguistic principles it uses.
Colibri is an electronic newsletter and WWW service for people interested in the fields of language, speech, logic, or information. A searchable index of current and past issues is available, along with subscription directions and many links to related topics.
http://www.lang.uiuc.edu/r-li5/esl/
This home page is a starting point for ESL learners who want to learn English through the World Wide Web. Many people have created ESL learning materials for the Web. This home page links you to those ESL sites and other interesting places. The variety of materials will allow you to choose something appropriate for yourself.
http://www.sil.org/ethnologue/ethnologue.html
If you've ever wanted to know what people are saying all over the world, this is the place to come. This site includes a detailed study of the names, number of speakers, location, dialects, linguistic affiliation, multilingualism of speakers, and much more information on over 360 languages currently spoken on this planet. A searchable database and clickable maps are provided to help you find just the language you are looking for.
Provides information on the EUROLANG Optimizer software package. This program is designed to work with the most popular word processors and RDBMS to provide language translation. Download the demo version from this site. Pages available in French or English.
http://www.fwi.uva.nl/research/folli/
This site contains information FoLLI's background, current and future projects, and publications. Also find out how to join FoLLI and receive their journal.
http://www.haskins.yale.edu/haskins/inside.html
Haskins Laboratories, New Haven, Connecticut, is a private, non-profit research laboratory. Currently, most of the Laboratories' research projects are focused on problems in human communication and related topics, including speech perception, speech production, reading, linguistics, motor behavior, cognitive science, nonlinear dynamics, medical imaging, functional MRI, and so on.
This page is devoted to bringing together information about the languages of the world. The language resources listed here come from all around the world, and range from dictionaries to language tutorials to spoken samples of languages. Offers the page in several languages. Provides Quick-Jump links for easy navigation, and should soon be searchable.
http://www.cup.cam.ac.uk/Journals/JNLSCAT95/jcl/jcl.html
Journal of Child Language publishes articles on all aspects of the scientific study of language behavior in children, the principles which underlie it, and the theories which may account for it. At this site you will find submission requirements, tables of contents for past issues, and subscription information.
http://www.siu.edu/departments/cola/ling/
JPCL presents the results of current research in theory and description of pidgin and creole languages in the wider sense. Includes glossary of linguistic terminology.
Just for fun or for the serious linguist, this site details the development of the "artificial" Klingon language from the Star Trek series and movies. At this site, you can also teach yourself Klingon to speak with your friends.
http://www.olelo.hawaii.edu/OP/help/
This Web site is dedicated to providing information on the native Hawaiian language, both for preservation and teaching. Among its many resources are Hawaiian fonts (Mac and IBM), an online dictionary, and instructional materials for purchase.
http://www.bucknell.edu/~rbeard/
The LMBM lexicon is exclusively the domain of lexemes which are defined specifically as noun, verb, and adjective stems and the lexical categories which define them (Number, Gender, Transitivity, and so on). LMBM distinguishes itself from other lexeme-based theories in that it maintains a pristine distinction between lexemes and grammatical morphemes and consequently predicts this distinction at every level of language and speech.
http://www.loria.fr/exterieur/equipe/dialogue/lingua/
This page is devoted to the Lingua Parallel Concordancing Project, which aims at managing a multilingual corpus to ease students' and teachers' work in second language learning. More specifically, some implementation issues of the Text Encoding Initiative guidelines are shown, along with the corresponding tools which have been developed. Currently, this project has translated various texts into English, French, German, Dutch, Greek, or Italian, and cross-referenced each work in a searchable index of the languages.
http://engserve.tamu.edu/files/linguistics/linguist/
LINGUIST is an electronic network maintained at Texas A & M and Eastern Michigan Universities. LINGUIST serves as a research and discussion facility for the linguistic academic community through an electronic mailing list and its World Wide Web sites. Join a discussion or read archived discussion threads from this site.
http://www.bucknell.edu/departments/linguistics/fun.html
A Bucknell professor has put together this fun and interesting introduction to the study of linguistics. It all begins with the question, "What do a hippo and a feather have in common?"
http://www.halcyon.com/loglan/welcome.html
Loglan is an artificial human language originally designed/invented by James Cooke Brown in the late 1950s. This site details the construction and usage of this language. An HTML primer to learn Loglan is scheduled to be available soon, but some translations are already online.
http://jefferson.village.virginia.edu/med/home.html
The Mayan Epigraphic Database Project (MED) is an experiment in networked scholarship with the purpose of enhancing Classic Mayan epigraphic research. MED is an Internet-accessible database of primary and secondary sources of epigraphic, iconographic, and linguistic data in a multimedia format.
Intended for primarily for researchers already familiar with Mayan language and history, this site contains GIFs of Mayan hieroglyphics, associated sound files, and much more information on the Mayan culture. However, this site is also fun to browse, not only to see the hieroglyphics, but also because of the VRML walk through of the 900 AD Palace of the Governor in Uxmal, Yucatan, Mexico.
http://members.aol.com/JAHenning/index.htm
The electronic newsletter discussions and articles on made-up languages. Includes subscription information and a software package (Windows) for making your own language.
http://www.knowledge.co.uk/xxx/mpcdir/book.htm
The Multilingual PC Directory is designed to help you find products which support non-English languages on PCs and compatibles. A search option by language is available. Includes software reviews, company profiles, and links to Web resources.
http://www.nyu.edu/pages/linguistics/ling.html
This page is part of a larger Web site that discusses the design and implementation of a computer programming language that works using real English syntax, not the cryptic commands of languages such as C++. This page relates the linguistic theories of Noam Chomsky to the larger project.
http://www.georgetown.edu/cball/oe/old_english.html
This site contains nearly everything you could want to know about Old English. Includes links to online texts and translations, discussion groups, fonts, audio recordings, course materials, instructional software, and much more.
http://weber.u.washington.edu/~jkautz/russian.sign.html
This small page provides graphics that demonstrate the use of sign language to speak Russian.
http://www.aber.ac.uk/~dgc/semiotic.html
As the title suggests, this site provides an online course in the study of signs/communication in society (semiotics). Here you get the history of this discipline, current applications and research, and lists of suggested reading material.
http://www.comp.lancs.ac.uk/computing/research/ucrel/
The University Centre for Computer Corpus Research on Language is a Lancaster University research center shared between the Department of Linguistics and Modern English Language and the Department of Computing. Its objective is to carry out computer-based research on the analysis and processing of natural language data. This site provides details on the Centre's research, including data summaries, online papers, and conference schedules.
http://www.press.uchicago.edu/Subjects/Linguistics/
This page is the entry-point into U of Chicago's Gopher-based online catalog and ordering system for linguistics texts. Search by author and subject or read the whole catalog, including book summaries.
This recently created online journal includes articles, book reviews, and subscription and submission information. (A print version will also be available.) Submissions are encouraged from any branch of Modern Lanquages.
http://www.idsia.ch/wordmanager.html
Word Manager is a system for the acquisition and management of reusable morphological and phrasal dictionaries. Learn about this system developed in Europe; a demo version is downloadable for Macintosh.
http://www1.oup.co.uk/cite/oup/elt/software/wsmith/
Wordsmith Tools is an integrated suite of programs for looking at how words behave in texts. It is intended for linguists, language teachers, and anyone who needs to examine language as part of their work. Download a full demo version from this site at the Oxford University Press.
http://weber.u.washington.edu/~yuenren/index.html
Founded for the Promotion of Chinese Dialect Fieldwork, the Yuen Ren Society is a loose group of descriptive linguists working in Hann Chinese. The central focus of this Web site is a guide to Gwoyeu Romatzyh Tonal Spelling of Chinese for the romanization of the Chinese language.