Word For Word with Sophia Smith Galer

Roy Bualuan - better known online as human1011 - grew up in Indiana with Lebanese Arabic, French and English in his life. He studied physics at Notre Dame, picked up Modern Standard Arabic as a language requirement, and emerged from that first class with a surprise: the Arabic he'd grown up with and the Arabic he was now being taught were almost entirely different languages. In this episode, R...

Zing Tseng - journalist, author, and co-host of BBC's Good Bad Billionaire - grew up navigating Mandarin classes in Singapore, a Cantonese-speaking home, and the glorious linguistic chaos of Singlish.  In this episode, she and Sophia trace the languages that shaped her: from a teacher who told her "foreigners speak better Chinese than you do," to discovering, decades later, on a trip...

Dictionary Corner's secret weapon isn't English - it's German! In this episode of Word For Word, lexicographer, broadcaster and word detective Susie Dent joins Sophia Smith Galer at Casa Italiana in Clerkenwell to talk about the languages that made her - and made her one of the most trusted voices on the English language in Britain. Come for the etymology of "muscle" (hint: s...

Speaking Iraqi Arabic opened doors in the field - while her Hull accent raised eyebrows in the newsroom. In this episode of Word For Word , multi-Emmy award-winning journalist Hind Hassan joins Sophia Smith Galer to talk about how her languages have shaped her life and work. Hind reflects on growing up as an Iraqi in Hull and shares how speaking Iraqi dialect transformed her reporting on the groun...

Sathnam Sanghera can remember pretending to speak English on his first day at school, lest he give away that he could only speak Punjabi. Today, he’s the prolific writer behind numerous works including Empireland, Empireworld, The Boy With The Top Knot and Marriage Material. In this episode of Word For Word , journalist Sophia Smith Galer speaks with the author and broadcaster about how language,...

Many know BBC News presenter Maryam Moshiri for her ability to steer BBC news programmes through light and shade, helping us understand the world through its darkest moments as well as find a bit of relief and humour. But did you know she's also trilingual? In this episode of Word for Word, journalist Sophia Smith Galer talks to Maryam Moshiri about the languages that shaped her life - from sp...

Len Pennie doesn’t feel entirely at home in English or in Scots. So she writes in both. In this episode of Word For Word, poet and broadcaster Len Pennie joins journalist Sophia Smith Galer to explore what it means to live between languages. From growing up immersed in Scots without stigma, to discovering the shame and suppression surrounding, Len reflects on how a language can be celebrated on st...

Word For Word is a podcast about storytellers and the languages that made them. There'll be new interviews every week, hosted by award-winning journalist, author and content creator, Sophia Smith Galer. Season 1 starts very soon!!! Credits This is a Viralect original production, filmed by Omar Mehtab. Seren Jones is our executive producer. Sophia Smith Galer is the founder of Viralect and crea...