Curate, connect, and discover
Learning - Blog Posts
I think this is important for me to say, especially as someone who is far below the poverty line and disabled myself.
Now is the time to get fat, especially for people who are going to be put at risk by tariffs and restrictions on food stamps.
Now is the time to learn how to forage and how to use herbs to prevent and treat simple ailments.
Now is the time to learn first aid, how to stitch wounds, how to prevent a bullet wound from killing someone.
Now is the time to make plans to help disabled folks who can't run or defend themselves.
Now is the time to build muscle if you are physically able.
Now is the time to learn how to mend or create clothing.
Now is the time to try and transfer to physical media, and to transfer important information into something physical.
Now is the time to learn media literacy and how to decipher fake news.
Now is the time to understand that being a doomer will help no one, especially not yourself.
Things are going to shit. Prepare yourself as well as you are able. Don't spend your time worrying about impending doom, that won't help you. But what will help you is being prepared for things to go wrong. Start being more loving to the people who deserve it. Start taking care of yourself so that if at some point you can't, you'll have more time to change that fact. Start being hopeful. Start being angry if you aren't already. Start forgiving yourself, because you are your biggest ally. Start learning. About yourself. About how to support yourself. About the world. I love you, and we will all get through this via the aid of ourselves and others.
how do you go about learning new languages?
i've tried duolingo in the past but asides learning a few phrase i don't think i learned that much
You must read this book
Can you recommend me resources for racial literacy, please?
so this is a hard question to answer when I don't know where you're from or what your background is.
The first book you should be reading if you're USAmerican is
preferably the 10th edition.
here's some articles and resources that are free though.
This is a really good starting point if the above are too confusing though
let me know if you need more resources!!
mod ali
Free Online Language Courses
Here is a masterpost of MOOCs (massive open online courses) that are available, archived, or starting soon. I think they will help those that like to learn with a teacher or with videos. You can always check the audit course or no certificate option so that you can learn for free.
American Sign Language
ASL University
Sign Language Structure, Learning, and Change
Arabic
Arabic for Global Exchange (in the drop-down menu)
Intro to Arabic
Madinah Arabic
Moroccan Arabic
Arabe (taught in French)
Catalan
Intro to Catalan Language & Society
Intro to Catalan Sign Language
Chinese
Beginner
Basic Chinese I. II, III, IV , V
Basic Mandarin Chinese I & II
Beginner’s Chinese
Chinese for Beginners
Chinese Characters
Chinese for HSK 1
Chinese for HSK 2
Chinese for HSK 3 I & II
HSK Level 1
Mandarin Chinese
Mandarin Chinese for Business
More Chinese for Beginners
Start Talking Mandarin Chinese
UT Gateway to Chinese
Chino Básico (Taught in Spanish)
Intermediate
Chinese Stories
Intermediate Business Chinese
Intermediate Chinese Grammar
Dutch
Introduction to Dutch
English
Online Courses here
Resources Here
Faroese
Faroese Course
Finnish
A Taste of Finnish
Basic Finnish
Finnish for Immigrants
Finnish for Medical Professionals
French
Beginner
AP French Language and Culture
Basic French Skills
Beginner’s French: Food & Drink
Diploma in French
Elementary French I & II
Français Interactif
French in Action
French Language Studies I, II, III
French: Ouverture
Intermediate & Advanced
French: Le Quatorze Juillet
Passe Partout
La Cité des Sciences et de Industrie
Vivre en France - A2
Vivre en France - B1
Frisian
Introduction to Frisian (Taught in English)
Introduction to Frisian (Taught in Dutch)
German
Beginner
Beginner’s German: Food & Drink
Conversational German I, II, III, IV
Deutsch im Blick
Diploma in German
German at Work
Rundblick-Beginner’s German
Intermediate
German: Regionen Traditionen und Geschichte
Landschaftliche Vielfalt
Gwich’in
Introduction to Gwich’in Language
Hebrew
Biblical Hebrew
Know the Hebrew Alphabet
Teach Me Hebrew
Hindi
A Door into Hindi
Business Hindi
Virtual Hindi
Icelandic
Icelandic 1-5
Indonesian
Learn Indonesian
Irish
Introduction to Irish
Irish 101
Irish 102
Italian
Beginner
Beginner’s Italian: Food & Drink
Beginner’s Italian I
Introduction to Italian
Italian for Beginners 1 , 2, 3 , 4 , 5, 6
Intermediate & Advanced
AP Italian Language and Culture
Intermediate Italian I
Advanced Italian I
Letteratura italiana
Japanese
Genki
Japanese JOSHU
Japanese Pronunciation
Sing and Learn Japanese
Tufs JpLang
Kazakh
A1-B2 Kazakh (Taught in Russian)
Korean
Beginner
First Step Korean
How to Study Korean
Introduction to Korean
Learn to Speak Korean
Pathway to Spoken Korean
Intermediate
Intermediate Korean
Nepali
Beginner’s Conversation and Grammar
Norwegian
Introduction to Norwegian
Norwegian on the Web
Portuguese
Curso de Português para Estrangeiros
Pluralidades em Português Brasileiro
Russian
Beginner
Easy Accelerated Learning for Russian
Advanced
Reading Master and Margarita
Russian as an Instrument of Communication
Siberia: Russian for Foreigners
Spanish
Beginner
AP Spanish Language & Culture
Basic Spanish for English Speakers
Beginner’s Spanish: Food & Drink
Introduction to Spanish
Restaurants and Dining Out
Spanish for Beginners 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6
Spanish Vocabulary
Intermediate
Spanish: Ciudades con Historia
Spanish: Espacios Públicos
Advanced
Corrección, Estilo y Variaciones
Leer a Macondo
Spanish:Con Mis Propias Manos
Spanish: Perspectivas Porteñas
Swedish
Intro to Swedish
Swedish Made Easy 1, 2, & 3
Ukrainian
Read Ukrainian
Ukrainian Language for Beginners
Welsh
Beginner’s Welsh
Discovering Wales
Multiple Languages
Ancient Languages
More Language Learning Resources & Websites!
Last updated: April 1, 2018
The Digital Transgender Archive (DTA)
Welcome to the Digital Transgender Archive! This site was created to make transgender history accessible for anyone wishing to learn more. Whether you’re a researcher, student, or just someone curious about trans history, the DTA is for you!
…Based in Worcester, Massachusetts at the College of the Holy Cross, the DTA is an international collaboration among more than fifty colleges, universities, nonprofit organizations, public libraries, and private collections. By digitally localizing a wide range of trans-related materials, the DTA expands access to trans history for academics and independent researchers alike in order to foster education and dialog concerning trans history.
The DTA uses the term transgender to refer to a broad and inclusive range of non-normative gender practices. We treat transgender as a practice rather than an identity category in order to bring together a trans-historical and trans-cultural collection of materials related to trans-ing gender. We collect materials from anywhere in the world with a focus on materials created before the year 2000.
You can dive right into the DTA or check out these links to start exploring:
DTA Starter’s Guide
Race & Ethnicity Research Guide
Search by Map
Global Terms
Art by Cricket Press.
The online Japanese course that no one talks about
Okay so I’m not a langblr and I never plan to be. However. What I do know from following a ton of them is that no one talks about Minato.
Now you may be thinking, ‘What’s Minato?’. It’s a website that was recommended to me by a Japanese Studies university professor for learning Japanse at home.
It’s literally the best resource out there and it’s free (funded by the Japanese government). You can choose between self-study and tutor support-led courses.
There are courses in Hiragana, Katakana, and the general language (from levels A1 to A2), and you can download a certificate and study record after completion of a course.
Here’s the link. Or if you want to type it: https://minato-jf.jp
Go. Learn some actual Japanese.
blog dedicated to categorizing and saving various posts i find helpful. main blog @venomgender ;
newly rbed posts almost definitely won't be tagged, but (in theory) they'll all be tagged within the month
tag explanations below cut:
#piracy - self explanatory. has both piracy tutorials and masterposts of pirated media
#digital privacy - posts dedicated to resources on digital privacy; has things ranging from browser extensions to google product alternatives
#cooking - cooking resources. both general how-tos and actual recipes
#trans - trans resources. more dedicated to transmasc than transfem posts just because im transmasc, but has several generalized posts as well
#art resources - self explanatory. has both tutorials and things like resource packs and stuff
#writing resources - self explanatory
#learning - learning resources, typically dedicated to masterposts about learning a specific "thing" (language, sewing basics, etc)
#media rec - media recommendations
#sewing - sewing resources. has both tutorials and sewing patterns
#tech - technology resources. stuff like removing windows 10 bloatware, switching to linux, improving pc performance
#video game resources - resources centered around making video games
#coding - coding resources. from basic language how-tos to how to make your own websites
#save - any other helpful post i see that doesnt easily fit into the above categories. typically has things that help with "adulting" but i dont like that word so im not making a tag for it.
#megathread - any post containing large amounts of links for different things. contains a variety of categories. mildly depreciated in terms of how often i actually tag things this...
#tutorial - posts that teach you things. normally will also be tagged with a more specific category. also mildly depreciated...
additionally anything tagged 'kinda' means it only sort of falls into the tagged category. i tag these things to in theory go through later and see if theres enough similar items to have them been grouped into a new one
Studying Art
I’ll have some free time nowadays (supposedly) so I’ll try to “study” one old drawing per day. At first, it’ll be more of a tracing by eye (I dunno the right term), but I want to learn realism to make more drawings of Kenyan/Maivtre 😗❤️
Ive learned something today.
If you sit and do nothing, nothing will happen.
Read books guys
I'm telling you. Read books. There's an entire world of dead useful knowledge contained. There are so many books that have a TON of useful information while also being easier to read than textbooks.
Listen, I know the internet's gone to pieces. Misinformation is practically the only thing you can be certain of with any search engine.
But books.
I mean yeah, there are books that are inaccurate. Or outdated. But for the most part, if someone cares enough to compile so much information on a subject together into a book, they care enough to make sure it's right. After all, it's not so easy to edit it like a blog once it's published. They're not spending so much time and labor putting together random units of information they stumbled across on the internet. They're doing this with genuine research and careful time and knowledge.
Let me emphasize one more time that there are so many books with real information that are NOT COLLEGE TEXTBOOKS (though those can be incredible sources of information too!). There is real information out there in very easy to process formats if you're willing to open a book and thumb through the index, table of contents, or even just all the pages.
...I mean, it does require us to care a little bit. It's certainly not as fast and convenient as a quick internet search. But it is so much more reliable, and if you care to know more about a subject I think it's important to care enough to get some solid information about it and not just a once-and-done.
Side note, did you know the Dewey Decimal System has a number for everything? Actually everything? Want to pick up a book on crochet or leatherworking? Dewey's got you. Learn about moths? Yup. Politics? Public speaking? Languages? Writing? Architecture? Librarians have master's degrees specifically so they can help you find things in the DDS (and also for other reasons but ya know).
we were never meant to be permanent
not in
mortality
so the story behind this, today, is that I got emotionally attached to a class I only have for three months ish. that's college for you.
and we came to the end of our time together today sitting around a table, slamming markers and gatorade down in a game in Portuguese I felt so content even knowing it was coming to an end even with the primal fear of someone aboard a speed train about to reach the end of the track one day, it will be permanent but not in this life I will see you all again on the other side Even if I never see you again in this mortal life
It comes down to the principle of Gatorade. That's what I call it because I remember a time when I was a kid that Gatorades were a prize. You could only obtain them by playing soccer because the other kids' soccer moms would bring Gatorade and CapriSun and all those glorious things your parents didn't get for you. Basically, you can't have one Gatorade forever. Makes sense, right?
But what if you could make a Gatorade last forever? What if you were in that one glorious moment forever? The sun shining off the thick clouds in the late golden hour, illuminating the greens and blues in the mountains around, the wind your best friend so exhilarating, the satisfaction of completing a soccer game you loved not for anything in particular other than the fact that you were outside and alive and proving yourself alive and you have a Gatorade.
Make that moment last forever. Now, what do you lose?
Years from now, you'll be at a movie night with friends. You will be scrunched between two people you love on a couch, or maybe curled cozily into a corner, or marinating in a beanbag with a super soft blanket. The movie is the greatest movie you've ever seen and it's only augmented by being cozy with true friends. One day you will finally achieve that skill you spend years trying to perfect. One day you might even learn to cook. You'll meet someone new a thousand times, then a million times. You'll even get to meet the same person again and again if you try. There will be so many people that come and go in your life. So many hobbies and loves and passions and YouTube recommendations.
You will change as a person and maybe you will be scared to. Maybe you'll long for the comfort and safety and glory of the Gatorade in the fresh air.
But if you remain there forever, you will never meet your best friend. You will never have that cozy movie night and never accomplish that tricky thing. You will never encounter so many things to love. TV show or drawing styles or color palettes or characters or songs. You're going to make an awesome PowerPoint one day. Would you give that up for the Gatorade you've already had?
As mortal beings we are confined to a timeline. Time-bound. Afterwards, though, we'll get to be whole, and let me tell you time isn't a problem for God. We'll get to remember each moment of joy we got to have down here on earth. We'll get to live each of them all at once if we want, and be with everyone we love all at once, forever, and I know I'm a mortal and probably butchering this description of what comes next because heck it I've not been there yet but that's sort of what it'll be like.
It's possible for everything we want to be permanent to be permanent in eternity. That's the point of eternity. That is not the point of mortality. The point of mortality is to do many things, experience many things, keep moving.
(As for the loved ones who stay in your life? They change, too, and that's beautiful.)