Babbel

For the first time in nearly 1,000 years, the Bayeux Tapestry has left Normandy. It is now on display in England, returning, some would say, home. Sort of... Because here is the thing about 1066. The Norman Conquest did not erase English. It crashed into it, and English absorbed the impact and came out richer for it. Suddenly there were two languages in one country, occupying different floors of the same building. French upstairs: law, power, administration, the church. English downstairs: the kitchen, the fields, the everyday. And over centuries, the two floors merged into something neither language could have become alone. We still live in that building today. When you want to sound formal, you reach for the French: commence, liberty, question, residence. When you want to sound human, you reach for the Old English: begin, freedom, ask, house. You do this without thinking. Every English speaker does. As Babbel linguist Sophie Vignoles puts it: "Languages are shaped more by history than by dictionaries. Conquest, migration, trade and cultural exchange all leave lasting linguistic footprints." The Bayeux Tapestry is 70 metres of linen. It is also, quietly, the origin story of one of the most widely spoken languages on earth. Which English word pairs do you think of as distinctly French in origin? 🏰 #English #LanguageLearning #BayeuxTapestry #Linguistics

AI can translate anything. It can explain any grammar rule, any word, in seconds. So what is left for language learning to do? That was the question at the center of Diana Pulnar's fireside chat at Productlab Conference in Berlin this week. Building new Babbel products on top of 20 years of learner data and millions of people who tried and stopped before they ever got to speak, she knows the answer better than most. "Knowing about a language and learning to speak it are not the same thing. AI has made language knowledge infinite. It has not solved the gap between knowledge and ability." The question driving her work at Babbel: which of the learner problems that resisted every previous attempt can finally be solved now? #ProductManagement #AI #LanguageLearning #Babbel

Céline Dion is back on stage. And Paris is on its feet. But is she even French??? No. She is Québécoise, born in a small town outside Montreal, Canada, shaped by a variety of French that carries 400 years of history, isolation, and survival on a different continent. "Magasiner" instead of "faire du shopping." "Char" instead of "voiture." A rhythm and a warmth that is entirely its own. And unmistakable to anyone who has ever heard it. Paris is just one version of the story. And not even the biggest one. More people speak French in Africa than anywhere else in the world. In Kinshasa, Abidjan, Dakar, and Casablanca, it has been shaped by Lingala, Dioula, Wolof, and Darija into something that belongs to those cities as much as it belongs to any European capital. In Martinique and Guadeloupe, it carries the history of Creole. In Brussels and Geneva, it sits alongside other languages and borrows from all of them. The goal when encountering a new variety of a language is not to imitate the accent. It is to understand where it comes from. Curiosity over mimicry. That is where real communication starts. Céline knew this all along. Her French travelled to every corner of the world exactly as it was. That was never a limitation. It was the whole point. 🤍 How did Québécois French become what it is today? 400 years of history, survival, and a language that refused to disappear. We wrote the full story. Link in the comments. What variety of a language has surprised you the most? #French #LanguageLearning #CélineDion #Francophonie

This word you have never heard of carries an entire worldview. And some say it is the most beautiful word in the world. It is "kaitiakitanga". The Māori word describes the responsibility to care for the natural world and guardianship of the environment for present and future generations. It has no direct equivalent in most other languages. Where English needs a whole sentence, kaitiakitanga needs none. Earlier this year, an international jury of linguists, writers and cultural experts, coordinated by Babbel, named kaitiakitanga the world's most beautiful word, selected from 223 words across 75 languages. Last week, UNESCO featured the word on their platforms for Indigenous Languages, Multilingualism and Linguistic Diversity, placing it within the global conversation around the International Decade of Indigenous Languages. As Taumata Toki, Representative of Ngati Rehua Ngatiwai ki Aotea, put it: "Kaitiakitanga reminds us that we are interconnected with the world and have a responsibility to protect our environment." Babbel does not teach Māori. But this is exactly why initiatives like this matter to us. Every language holds concepts, values and ways of understanding the world that no other language can fully replicate. When a language disappears, those ways of seeing disappear with it. Recognising that and bringing it to a wider audience is part of what we believe language learning is for. Full article on UNESCO's website in the comments. Is there a word in your language that cannot be translated? #IndigenousLanguages #Kaitiakitanga #LanguageLearning

What does a product manager’s role look like after AI does the rest? 🤔 Join Product People x Babbel in Berlin for a morning meetup exploring the realities of product strategy, roadmapping, stakeholder management, and making the right calls in an AI-powered world. The event will include a panel discussion and Q&A with product leaders from Babbel, Doctolib, and YourHero, followed by time to connect with fellow product professionals over breakfast and coffee. Whether you’re a product leader, an experienced product manager, or just beginning to shape your career in product, we’d love to see you there! Register here: https://lnkd.in/g2aZnaQJ

We are heartbroken to hear of Dolly Parton's passing, and endlessly grateful for everything she taught us. "You don't need perfect English to understand what Dolly is saying. And that's exactly why her words travel so well." That's Babbel linguist Esteban Touma, who grew up speaking English as a second language. And he's right. Dolly's language was never polished or neutral. It was rooted in Appalachian dialect and idiom, a voice that is rarely heard in American pop culture, let alone celebrated globally. She brought "flaming locks of auburn hair" and folk ballad cadences into the mainstream, and the world didn't just accept it. The world sang along. Jolene taught millions of learners what longing sounds like in English. I Will Always Love You gave them the words for a feeling they already had. Coat of Many Colors showed that a story about one person can belong to everyone, if the language is honest enough. Dolly understood something profound: that clarity is a form of generosity. That the right words, plainly spoken, can cross any border. That language doesn't need to be complicated to be deeply human. We'll miss her. And we'll keep learning from her.

One of the easiest ways to make work harder than it needs to be? Starting from scratch. We call it reinventing the wheel. But sometimes, we do it simply because we don’t know what’s already there. The same thing can happen when we learn a language. But as an English speaker, you already have a big head start. Do you recognize any of these Spanish words? 📣 Comunicación 🔗 Colaboración 🧠 Innovación These are called cognates: words that share a linguistic root and look or sound similar across languages. They won’t make you fluent overnight—but they can give you an advantage, especially when you’re learning Spanish for work, travel or connecting with people across cultures. Remember: a new challenge doesn’t always mean starting from scratch. 👉 Explore Babbel’s English–Spanish Cognate Finder: https://lnkd.in/ghu2Quxb

If AI can translate everything, why learn a language? Babbel is bringing this question to SXSW 2027. Your vote gets it on stage. Our proposed panel, "Translation World: Why We Still Learn Language in AI's Wake," features Meredith Broussard, NYU professor and author of "Artificial Unintelligence," Sophia Smith Galer, journalist and author of "How To Kill A Language" and Tim Allen, CEO at Babbel - three voices in genuine tension on what's actually at stake when AI becomes the default mediator of human communication. The conversation: what is actually lost when AI mediates how we communicate and why language learning still shapes human connection, identity, and belonging. Voting takes 60 seconds: 1️⃣ Open the panel page (link below) 2️⃣ Sign in or create a free SXSW account 3️⃣ Click Vote Community voting closes this Sunday, August 23. Vote here: https://lnkd.in/dr4JauY8

Our expert tip for your beach holiday: you are already in a language class. You just have not noticed yet. New research from Skyscanner and Babbel, covered by TF1 Info, shows that French coastal towns are seeing record growth in international visitors this summer. The result is something we have long observed: when two people want to communicate and neither is on home turf, language learning happens naturally, on both sides. Skyscanner analyzed international hotel search data between January 1 and July 15, 2026. These destinations have seen exceptional growth: Figari: +1,151%. Bastia: +862%. Brest: +642%. Biarritz: +402%. Corsica accounts for four of the top ten destinations on the list. The languages in circulation go well beyond English: Finnish, Dutch, Romanian, Lithuanian, Greek. Which means the learning opportunity is not just for the tourists. Three things we took away from the data: 1. A beach vacation qualifies as language learning. Short, spontaneous exchanges like a question on the beach, a café order, a moment in a queue, produce stronger spoken language retention than isolated study sessions of equivalent time. Low stakes, real context, high frequency: that is the formula. 2. Speaking to visitors is a lesson too. French service workers, hoteliers, and market vendors who interact daily with international guests are getting consistent, real-world speaking practice in English, German, Italian, and Spanish. Without signing up for a course. 3. The exchange is genuinely bidirectional. International visitors practice French. Locals practice the visitors' languages. Both sides improve. The beach is not just a destination. It is an immersion environment that works in two directions simultaneously. Sophie Vignoles, linguist at Babbel, puts it this way: "Summer creates the low-pressure, high-frequency moments where language skills stop being abstract knowledge and start becoming real speech. It is one of the most underestimated settings for actually improving fluency." You do not need to travel abroad to practice a foreign language. And if you are already at home — the world is coming to you. Full TF1 Info article in the comments. #LanguageLearning #SpeakingPractice #Travel

💡 Humanity may once have spoken up to 10 times as many languages as exist today. 🧠 That was one of the biggest takeaways from this fascinating Yale study. 🗣️ Which endangered or regional language would you most like to see experience a revival?