Much to the astonishment of some of my friends and family, I traveled to Israel on a seven-night press trip, returning home on April 8, less than a week before Iran launched its attack on the country.
04.04.2024 - 00:09 / atlasobscura.com
Full disclosure: My editor asked me to answer this question—“What’s the fastest language in the world?”—because I like writing about both language and strange, global superlatives. Pretty quickly I realized that there’s a basic problem (albeit a fun one!) with the question: We first have to determine what we even mean by “fastest.” Does that mean the number of words or syllables spoken in a set amount of time? The amount of information conveyed? The language with the fewest words or syllables to convey a set statement? The language that can be understood when cranked up to the highest speed? What even is English jacked up to 4x? 10x?
Francois Pellegrino is mostly a quantitative linguist, meaning his work often includes measuring differences among languages and hunting for explanations behind those differences. He’s worked on language speed a few times, including on one study that compared 17 different languages in a variety of metrics.
Pellegrino prefers looking at syllables rather than individual sounds (phonemes, to linguists) or words. “So the sounds per syllable, you have two ways to look at it,” he says. “You have one way, which is to look at how fast they are produced and what kind of information they convey. But you can also basically ask people to listen to unknown languages and ask them whether it sounds fast or not. So you have the perceptual aspects, and the articulatory and production aspects.”
There are a whole bunch of metrics used to measure all this stuff. There’s the total number of syllables per unit time, which you might think would be fairly simple to measure but is not; Pellegrino’s team decided to rely on the “canonical” pronunciation, so the word “probably” would be noted as three syllables even if the speaker pronounces it “probly.”
Then there’s “information density,” which theoretically refers to the quantity of information conveyed per second. This is even tougher; it turns out to be an absolute nightmare to actually define. There’s a technical meaning devised by a guy named Claude Shannon that involves, basically, how quickly a listener can reduce their uncertainty about the message they’re getting. This involves calculations of the number of possible syllables in a language, the relative popularity of each of those syllables, and the probability that a certain syllable will follow another. All the Shannon stuff is kind of abstract and involves a lot of math that, frankly, made my head hurt.
Linguists like Pellegrino have found that there’s an inverse correlation between, basically, how many syllables you can cram into one second and how much information you can cram into one second. Japanese, for example, has an extremely high number of syllables spoken per second. But
Much to the astonishment of some of my friends and family, I traveled to Israel on a seven-night press trip, returning home on April 8, less than a week before Iran launched its attack on the country.
Traveling by train is one of Ireland’s great if under-appreciated pleasures.
The city of Amsterdam will ban nearly all new hotels and restrict the number of tourists who can stay overnight each year in its latest effort to combat overtourism.
Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport (ATL) has once again been crowned the busiest airport in the world, serving a whopping 104.6 million travelers in 2023. The Airports Council International (ACI), the trade association of the world’s airports, published its annual rankings on Monday. Most notably, Atlanta’s international airport saw an 11.7% increase in traffic from the previous year when it also ranked as the busiest airport in the world. The demand for domestic flights remained robust, with ACI’s report indicating a recovery of 96.8% of the 2019 passenger traffic level. However, the most encouraging trend was the resurgence of international air travel, which experienced a robust 36.5% growth and welcomed 90.4% of passengers from pre-pandemic numbers in 2019.
Amsterdam has desperately been trying to shake off its ‘party capital’ image - with limited success.
"OMG. I am SO JEALOUS."
London is a city of many historic hotels, but perhaps one of the most iconic is The Connaught—and it has an iconic bar to match. The Connaught Bar, though it only opened in 2008, exudes a classic tony air that gives the impression it’s been there since the hotel was first built in 1815. But make no mistake: As classic as this place is, it’s a thoroughly modern affair for the new millennium, sporting a hyper-posh design—overstuffed leather chaises, romantic soft lighting, intricate ceiling details, plenty of Deco-esque lines; think Gatsby glamour but if he grew up in Mayfair—and a cutting-edge cocktail list to go with it. Now, 100 of those luxurious libations have been collected into a beautiful new book, The Connaught Bar: Recipes and Iconic Creations, out April 10.
With the recent release of the acclaimed Hulu historic epic TV miniseries Shogun, travelers are itching to explore firsthand the land of samurais, geishas, picturesque villages and urban centers throughout Japan that epitomize the thrilling spirit of Shogun. Based on James Clavell’s 1970s novel, Shogun is the story of William Adams, better known as Anjin-san, who rose to become the top advisor to Shogun Tokugawa Ieyasu in feudal Japan in the early 17th century.
There’s magic in a good hotel bar—you never know who is coming or going or what interesting things they might be getting up to pre- or post-cocktail. Hotel bars are one of the best ways to cultivate a feeling of travel at home, or on the other hand, enjoy a nightcap before heading up to your hotel room or a refreshment before exploring your destination.
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For English-speakers, Romanian is easier to learn than German. And you’ll be speaking Swahili sooner than Polish.
All three new hires have deep experience in the PR, technology, property and hospitality industries.