“English is a window to the world”. Isn’t that beautiful and so absolutely true? That’s a metaphor. In fact, a powerful one I’ve used several times in this podcast to invite you to open up yours too.

Metaphors add colour and meaning to our lives and help us make sense of the world.

In this episode, we’re going to look into these figures of speech – and their close relation, the simile – to show you how to unleash their power and spice up your conversation in English.

You will see that, as we, humans, think in images, they’re everywhere in our daily lives, translating abstract concepts into ideas we can understand.

The book mentioned in this episode is “Metaphors We Live By”, by George Lakoff and Mark Johnson.

If you want to read the poem by Emily Dickinson, you can find it here: https://poets.org/poem/hope-thing-feathers-254

Do you like our podcast? Plase share it and leave us a review. You can follow me on Instagram and TikTok: @beatriz_alessi @bia.alessi

Mixing and sound design by @sandrodourado

#ESL #englishasasecondlanguage #englishfornon-nativespeakers #listeningskills #englishlovers #englishwithinspiration

Have you ever wondered why some people seem to have all the luck in the world and it seems to come easy to them? Perhaps it’s more than just “luck”. It might be serendipity.

According to the Oxford Dictionary, serendipity is the fact of something interesting or pleasant happening by chance.

That’s more common than you might think. It happened to me one day, in the summer of 1993, in New York. Out of the blue, I ran into the one person who could lead me to no other than Luciano Pavarotti, the opera legend.

Yes, that was serendipitous! And you will also hear a version of the fairy tale that inspired the word, as we know it today.

With every episode of this podcast, I want you to travel in your imagination and improve your English listening comprehension.

The book mentioned in this episode is The Serendipity Mindset:The Art and Science of Creating Good Luck, by Christian Busch.

Do you like our podcast? Plase share it and leave us a review. You can follow me on Instagram and TikTok: @beatriz_alessi @bia.alessi

Mixing and sound design by @sandrodourado

#ESL #englishasasecondlanguage #englishfornon-nativespeakers #listeningskills #englishlovers #englishwithinspiration

If you think the word English doesn’t have a plural, think again! There are so many Englishes spoken around the world that it’s no exaggeration to say there is no such thing as a “proper”native speaker.

That is a myth, according to David Crystal, a British linguist considered a legend in the study of the English language.

In this episode of The English Adventure, we explore this multitude of Englishes to make better sense of the world out there and feel more comfortable in our own accents. And you will also hear about my experience working for the BBC World Service, my first dive into global English.

With this podcast, I want to help you sharpen your ear and improve your English listening skills.

If you want to learn more about the 70-year history of Bush House as the headquarters of the BBC World Service, you can find it here: https://www.bbc.com/historyofthebbc/buildings/bush-house

And if you’d like to see it from the inside, here’s a touching farewell video:

https://vimeo.com/37666928

Do you like our podcast? Plase share it and leave us a review. You can follow me on Instagram and TikTok: @beatriz_alessi @bia.alessi

Mixing and sound design by @sandrodourado

#ESL #englishasasecondlanguage#englishfornon-nativespeakers #listeningskills #englishlovers#englishwithinspiration