La corrección en el lenguaje de Juan José Millás ( “Cuerpo y prótesis”) Un chico y una chica muy jóvenes, de instituto, discutían acaloradamente en el metro. Me acerqué disimuladamente a ellos en el momento en el que la chica decía: -¿Y por qué las mujeres tenemos que tomar somníferos en lugar de somníferas? Lo lógico es que [...]

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This podcast contains three excerpts from the excellent program “Race Bridges for Schools,” an online resource of audio and written materials designed to increase teenagers’ understanding of different races and cultures. If you are a high school or middle school teacher of language arts or social studies, I highly recommend this web site. Included in this [...]

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One of the best ways to keep your Spanish skills sharp is to read in Spanish. And what better way to do that than to pick a story that you’re already familiar with the plot and the characters. This podcast is a reading, in Spanish, of the first chapter of the novella “The Curious Case of [...]

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Listen to Part 1 Mr. Taylor, Part 2 By Augusto Monterroso Contados meses más tarde, en el país de Mr. Taylor las cabezas alcanzaron aquella popularidad que todos recordamos. Al principio eran privilegio de las familias más pudientes; pero la democracia es la democracia y, nadie lo va a negar, en cuestión de semanas pudieron adquirirlas hasta [...]

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?Mister Taylor? Escrito por Augusto Monterroso -Menos rara, aunque sin duda más ejemplar -dijo entonces el otro-, es la historia de Mr. Percy Taylor, cazador de cabezas en la selva amazónica. Se sabe que en 1937 salió de Boston, Massachusetts, en donde había pulido su espíritu hasta el extremo de no tener un centavo. En 1944 aparece por [...]

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This is the second part of an interview with Luis Rojas of Rojas Spanish. In this chat Luis shares his opinion of Pres. Barack Obama and we also talk a little about U.S. foreign policy as it relates to Cuba. My thanks to Luis for spending so much time with me on Skype recording this [...]

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This podcast is an introduction to my latest web project: ReVerb Spanish. If I do it right, it is going to help you review, relearn and remember the different meanings and conjugations of Spanish verbs. This podcast contains 3 separate ReVerb Spanish episodes in one sitting. It includes the general introduction, a segment about Conocer [...]

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(Almost) everything you ever wanted to know about Somalian pirates but were too afraid to ask. Why are young Somalian men turning to piracy? How much money does a Somalian pirate make? What exactly does a pirate spend his cut of the ransom money on? Get the answers to these questions and more in this podcast. (P.S. Based on the [...]

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Another history podcast, this time about Leonardo da Vinci’s famous painting, “The Last Supper.” Prof. John Varriano, whose research is what prompted me to do this podcast, is an art history professor at Mt. Holyoke College in South Hadley, Mass. Want to learn more about Leonardo da Vinci, the original Renaissance Man? The Museum of Science in [...]

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Una charla con Luis, (uno de los lectores de Cody’s Cuentos) sobre la historia de Darwinismo en España. If you look closely at the bottle’s label you can see the funny inscription ["Es el mejor. La ciencia lo dijo y yo no miento"] on the monkey’s parchment. The monkey man is obviously a simian version of [...]

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Uno de los mecenas de arte y cultura españoles más importante en la historia no es un español ni un europeo sino un norteamericano filántropo llamado Archer Milton Huntington. Nacido en Nueva York en 1870, Huntington fue un apasionado por la cultura y el arte españoles de todas las épocas. Hijo adoptado de un magnate [...]

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Un cuento de Julio Cortázar Nos gustaba la casa porque aparte de espaciosa y antigua (hoy que las casas antiguas sucumben a la más ventajosa liquidación de sus materiales) guardaba los recuerdos de nuestros bisabuelos, el abuelo paterno, nuestros padres y toda la infancia. Nos habituamos Irene y yo a persistir solos en ella, lo que era [...]

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Spanish author Miguel Aranguren looks for the silver lining in the current economic recession. The title “Del solomillo a la sopa de ajos” refers to the change in economic status of many middle-class Spaniards in recent months where people have gone from being able to afford many things to having to cut back and tighten [...]

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Part 2 of a conversation with Mercedes León of SpanishPodcast.org. In this episode she talks about the development of her podcast for Spanish language learners and gives us some general advice. Check out Part 1 of the interview, if you previously missed it. Click below to purchase the complete Spanish transcript of the entire conversation. Transcript for Part [...]

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In this interview with Spanish podcaster, Mercedes León, we talk about economic hard times in Spain, brought on by rampant real estate speculation. Later on in the conversation we switch gears and Mercedes takes us on a wonderful audio tour of her favorite sections of Barcelona. It’s a great interview, if I must say myself.  [...]

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A short story by Elena Poniatowska Señorita: A partir de hoy, debe usted borrar mi nombre de la lista de sus admiradores. Tal vez convendría ocultarte esta deserción, pero callándome, iría en contra de una integridad personal que jamás ha eludido las exigencias de la verdad. Al apartarme de usted, sigo un [...]

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By Julio Cortázar Había empezado a leer la novela unos días antes. La abandonó por negocios urgentes, volvió a abrirla cuando regresaba en tren a la finca; se dejaba interesar lentamente por la trama, por el dibujo de los personajes. Esa tarde, después de escribir una carta a su apoderado y discutir con el mayordomo una [...]

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Cuban-American entreprenuer Carrie Ferguson Weir talks about growing up in two cultures: Anglo and Latino and also about her business, Los Pollitos Dicen, a T-shirt line for babies. This is the longest podcast I’ve published to date. Carrie and I spoke in a little bit of Spanglish so I did an exact word-for-word transcript of [...]

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Yeah, this epi is long, long overdue. Sorry about that folks. This is (was?) part three of the trip to the U.S. with mi amiguete, David. In this episode we talk about seeing the Grand Canyon for the first time and gliding along the SkyWalk and then taking in a flashy, splashy Vegas show and [...]

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El Ingenioso Hidalgo Don Quijote de la Mancha de Miguel de Cervantes PRIMERA PARTE CAPI?TULO 1: Que trata de la condicio?n y ejercicio del famoso hidalgo D. Quijote de la Mancha En un lugar de la Mancha, de cuyo nombre no quiero acordarme, no ha mucho tiempo que vivi?a un hidalgo de los de lanza en astillero, adarga antigua, roci?n [...]

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Mexican writer Juan Manuel Villalobos tells us about his experience being an immigrant in Spain. In an earlier podcast, episode 19, Juan Manuel talked about his novel “La vida frágil de Annette Blanche.”

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Martín Ventola’s 3 rules to remember about Spanish vowels: They are short sounds They are “pure” sounds They start and end differently from English vowels. Visit Martin’s blog, Spanish Pronunciation 101, for a detailed description of the correct pronunciation of Spanish vowels. Vowel A : In Spanish, the “a” is similar in sound to the “a” in the English word [...]

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La yerba mate (An Argentine legend) De noche Yací, la luna, alumbra desde el cielo misionero las copas de los árboles y platea el agua de las cataratas. Eso es todo lo que conocía de la selva: los enormes torrentes y el colchón verde e ininterrumpido del follaje, que casi no deja pasar la luz. Muy [...]

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[See post to watch QuickTime movie] Part 2 of Going 2 America Above, video of Grand Central Station in Manhattan. Below, view of Central Park from Top of the Rockefeller Center. David calls a scavenger hunt a ginkana. He also uses the expression dejar a la altura del betún when comparing Whole Foods, a U.S. grocery store, to El [...]

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La ciudad de Esteco era, según la leyenda, la más rica y poderosa de las ciudades del norte argentino. Se levantaba en medio de un fértil y hermoso paisaje de la provincia de Salta. Sus magníficos edificios resplandecían revestidos de oro y plata. Los habitantes de Esteco estaban orgullosos de su ciudad y de la riqueza [...]

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La noche de los feos por Mario Benedetti 1. Ambos somos feos. Ni siquiera vulgarmente feos. Ella tiene un pómulo hundido. Desde los ocho años, cuando le hicieron la operación. Mi asquerosa marca junto a la boca viene de una quemadura feroz, ocurrida a comienzos de mi adolescencia. Tampoco puede decirse que tengamos ojos tiernos, esa suerte de faros [...]

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[See post to watch QuickTime movie] David, el Cántabro, is back. This time he’s going to talk about stereotypes that exist among the Spanish regarding mi “pueblo,” the United States, and explains what he’s looking forward to seeing during our vacation there. Music featured in this podcast: Big George Jackson “If I Could Change” (mp3) from “Big Shot” (Black and [...]

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In this podcast I chat with Maya Escobar, a performance artist from the U.S. Her culturally-diverse family background (Dad is Guatemalan and Mom is Jewish) has inspired her to create a series of photos and satirical videos about stereotypes related to Latina and Jewish women. Maya says her work “Acciones Plásticas” is a “commentary [...]

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Here’s Part 2 of my chat with Teresa Córdova from Middlebury College. In this podcast Teresa talks about the ways some American university students have found to work legally in Spain. You can find more info about the Language Assistants program she mentions here. Also, Julie Espinosa, a current language assistant in Madrid, gives advice [...]

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Today’s episode of Spanish Pronunciation 101 is about Spanish consonant sounds that don’t come naturally to English speakers. Martín Ventola, our Spanish instructor from Buenos Aires, has written a detailed post on his blog about the subject but here is a summary of today’s topic: There are five Spanish consonant sounds that sometimes throw a wrench [...]

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Teresa Cordova, a coordinator for Middlebury College’s program in Spain, talks about the benefits and challenges of studying abroad. Teresa is from Puerto Rico and a graduate of Tufts University.

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Cody’s Cuentos is my new podcast featuring children’s stories in Spanish. Cody, a mischievous, lovable puppy, serves as the mascot to this new program. Every month Cody and one of his human pals from Spain, Mexico or Argentina will present to you a well-told tale in Spanish. Spanish-speaking and bilingual families everywhere can now [...]

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The first step to improving your Spanish pronunciation is to isolate and eliminate the sounds from your native language (in my case, English) that don’t exist in Spanish. In this podcast Martín Ventola talks at length about some of these sounds from English that interfere in pronouncing Spanish correctly. You can get more details here.

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Era un tipo guapo Santonni. Siempre con jeans y zapatillas blancas percudidas. Y siempre con esa mirada ausente, introspectivas, que tienes los ojos que no son verdes, ni azules, ni grises, sino una mezcla de los tres, esos ojos que miran hacia adentro como escudriñando el alma para reporcharle al mundo y a su madre [...]

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Juan Manuel Villalobos, a writer and journalist from Mexico City, talks about his novel, “La vida frágil de Annette Blanche.” Click here for more details.

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Today’s podcast is an introduction to a series of podcasts I plan to do with Martin Ventola, a Spanish teacher from Buenos Aires, Argentina. Martin has studied English phonetics, so that background, combined with his experience teaching Spanish to extranjeros in Buenos Aires, makes him the ideal guide for those of us who want to [...]

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“Remember that we’re in the U.S.,” Dante Celestino is told by his friends and neighbors when his daughter Emmita runs away. Dante had told Emmita to date only respectable, Spanish-speaking boys but she doesn’t listen to him and runs away from home in the middle of her quinceañera. To make matters worse, Dante is living in [...]

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Interview with Eduardo González Viaña, author of El corrido de Dante. Eduardo is from Peru and in this podcast he talks about the inspiration of this book and the current situation of some Hispanic immigrants in the United States.

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Porque el mate no es solamente una bebida by Javier Luis Guastavino (Read by Dolly from Uruguay) El mate no es una bebida. Bueno, sí. Es un líquido y entra por la boca. Pero no es una bebida. En este país nadie toma mate porque tenga sed. [...]

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In this Spanish podcast, Gabriel Guillén tells us all about Blogs Exchange, a new web site that helps native Spanish and English speakers improve their respective second languages through blogging. It’s easy. First you create a blog on the Blogs Exchange platform, then you start posting in the language you need help with. The site will [...]

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In today’s podcast I introduce you to The Mixxer, a language exchange web site. If you’ve never done an intercambio (a language exchange) I highly recommend it. It’s an easy way to meet native Spanish speakers eager to help you with your Spanish. In exchange you agree to help them with their English (or German, [...]

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In today?s podcast, we hear from Kim Griffin, director of Middlebury College?s Spanish school in Spain. Middlebury is a U.S. college located in the state of Vermont. It offers both undergraduate and graduate programs in Spanish in Spain and in this interview Kim talks about the unique challenges of maintaining a language immersion environment away [...]

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In the second part of this Voices en Español interview, Javier Barros del Villar talks about the different styles of street art he found in Europe, specifically Austria, Hungary and the Czech Republic. There’s a word that Javier uses frequently in this podcast. It’s cuate. And it means buddy, friend or dude. Also, the names of the [...]

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Javier Barros del Villar from Mexico City talks about Arte Callejero, his Spanish-language blog. What started out as a hobby photographing images he saw on the streets of Mexico City, has now become the largest photographic archive of street art in Mexico. In this podcast, Javier talks about the differences between street art and graffiti [...]

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