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EveryLingua

 ·  18 lists  ·  653 words

Science and research

The laboratory, the measurement and the careful claim.

What holds these lists together

What joins these lists is less the subject than the way of talking: to assume, to demonstrate, to rule out, to say something with a reservation attached. German marks that caution in the grammar as much as in the words — soll and dürfte carry a hedge that English spells out with a whole clause — so somebody practising this category is practising a register as much as a field, and the register carries further than any one field does.

The 18 lists

C1Research and academic writingMaking a claim, backing it and citing it — in the register a German seminar paper is written in.40 wordsC1Physics and engineeringForce, energy and measurement — the vocabulary of a German school physics lesson and a technical manual alike.40 wordsC1Chemistry and materialsSubstances, reactions and the properties that decide what a material is used for.40 wordsC1Maths and statisticsDoing sums out loud in German, and reading a chart in a German newspaper.40 wordsB2The night skyWhat is overhead, what it is called in German, and the words for looking at it.40 wordsC1Astronomy and spaceflightFrom a planet’s orbit to the heat shield that brings a capsule home.42 wordsC1University and researchFrom enrolment to the defence, and the posts in between.48 wordsC2Archaeology and excavationTrench, layer and date — and what a single find can and cannot prove.36 wordsC2Archives and recordsWhat an archive keeps, what it destroys, and why keeping is a decision.23 wordsC2AstrophysicsLight, distance and mass — what can be inferred from what reaches us.43 wordsC2Running a libraryThe German of the back office: cataloguing, budgets, loans, preservation and the locked cabinet.24 wordsC2Books and librariesManuscripts, bindings, editions and shelves — the book as an object and as part of a collection.41 wordsC2DendrochronologyReading a tree as a calendar, ring by ring, and dating a beam to the year it was felled.31 wordsC1Continuing education and recognitionCourses, funding, qualifications — and who recognises them in the end.36 wordsC2Family history researchRegisters, charts and the words for a person the records have lost sight of.29 wordsC2Genetics and heredityFrom the base pair to the population, and what a genetic finding does and does not say.45 wordsC2CatalysisThe words of the laboratory and the plant for speeding a reaction up without being used up in it.27 wordsC2PalaeographyReading old handwriting, and telling from the letters alone when a page was written.28 words

Spread across the levels

The category runs across the levels — it is an area, not a difficulty. If you practise it, you can also choose a level at the top of the practice page and then get only the part that sits there.

LevelWordsShare
A230 %
B181 %
B28213 %
C127342 %
C228744 %

Practise this category

Multiple choice and gaps, across all 18 lists and all 653 words. Whatever you get wrong comes back tomorrow.