Tap, tap, tap…. is this thing on?
Funny to be writing a blog to the virtual equivalent of an empty auditorium, but if you’ve found your way here and worked your way to the beginning, welcome to the Language Omnivore.
What’s a “language omnivore”? I’ve just coined the term for that one person in every 5,000 (by my rough estimate) with a passion, verging on compulsion, for language learning. And not just one. Lots. My alternate blog title was “The Promiscuous Linguist”, which captured the idea even better, but was sure to cause problems on down the road. In my work, I meet many Language Omnivores, get to sample new books and products in a variety of languages, and talk to language teachers and students. This blog is a place to share news from that world.
My name’s JD Wilson, and I’m the Academic Sales Manager and all-around “language guy” at Tuttle Publishing. We’re a 65-year-old publishing company in Rutland, Vermont that specializes in books about Asia, especially, but by no means only, language books. To some extent, I’d like to shine a spotlight on less-commonly taught languages if only because Spanish and French are much taught and celebrated in the US. In addition to my Japanese/Journalism major, however, I minored in Spanish and French, and stories and strategies from a European-language perspective are 100% welcome here. Not being a trained linguist or language teacher, however, I invite experts to be generous with their comments.
As we start, if I seem to talk about Tuttle books more than those of other publishers, that’s not meant to be exclusionary. Like a food critic who works in a restaurant, I eat for free at my own job, so you’ll hear a lot about books coming out of our language kitchen. If you’re a fan of or associated with another publisher, please also feel free to jump into the conversation.
Bon appétit!
Language Omnivore 