The longest word in the English language

I used to think that the longest word was  "supercalifragilisticexpialidocious" from the Mary Poppins movie song. Of course, that word is gibberish (nonsense) - The actual real longest word is:

"Pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis." 45 letters! It is the scientific name for a type of lung disease. Did you try and say that word? Hint: there are 19 syllables.

Getting back to music, can you learn English from songs?

You probably will not learn English from many American Rap songs, other than street slang that will not be useful in your day to day speaking skills.

example: In a lyric: "They say I'm 730, say I spaz out."

-Foxy Brown, "730"

730 means crazy and comes from New York City. It is a city code used when a perp ( perpetrator) suffers from a mental disorder. "spaz out" also means to act in a crazy manner. "He spazzed out when he saw his new car was scratched."  "He went 730 when he saw the scratch on his new car."

Fa shizzle (some say: fo shizzle) means 'for sure', 'absolutely'  In a lyric: "Fa shizzle my nizzle, the big Snoopy D-O-double-jizzle back up in the hizzle."

-Snoop Dogg, "Suited N Booted"

The only word in that ridiculous lyric that really caught on is fa shizzle. Originated in California.

Crunk means crazy or drunk and it originated in Memphis and Atlanta.  In a lyric: "She getting crunk in the club I mean she work."

-Ying Yang Twins, "Get Low"

Link for Dictionary.com and more rap slang: https://www.dictionary.com/e/know-rap-slang-regional/

So you can pick up some slang words in these rap songs but for the most part, the sentence will remain unintelligible. For the reader of this blog who wants to actually try and improve their English speaking skills through music, here is a link for a girl named Vanessa who is teaching you some English by asking you to listen to 11 songs. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ebSUtMoYPw

Now Vanessa can be a bit too cheerful for me especially in the morning before I've had 3 cups of coffee but she speaks clearly and makes some excellent points about listening to English. As she speaks, write down the names of the songs she is recommending.

First one ( at 3.02 in the video) is: Uptown Girl by Billy Joel,

2nd is: We Can Work It Out by the Beatles

3rd: Hallelujah by many artists, written by Leonard Cohen.

4th: Somebody to Love by Queen

And so on......next group of 4 are newer and more upbeat.

5th: I'm Yours by Jason Mraz