2025-01-04 ‘Kicking Off’ a New Year
And now, Words and Their Stories, from VOA Learning English. One of the most popular sports in the United States is American football. In the U.S., “football” is a sport…
2025-01-03 Bosnia’s ‘Balkan Blues’ Music Honored by UNESCO
Every Friday, musician Enes Salman performs the Sevdalinka, an ancient form of love song from Bosnia and Herzegovina. Sevdalinka was recently included in UNESCO’s National Inventory of Intangible Cultural Heritage.…
2025-01-03 ‘The Blue Hotel,’ by Stephen Crane, Part One
We present the first of four parts of the short story “The Blue Hotel,” by Stephen Crane. The story was originally adapted by the U.S. Department of State. The audio…
2025-01-03 How to Summon Others
Hello! This week on Ask a Teacher, we consider part of a message from Henry. Here is one of Henry’s questions: Greetings VOA Learning English team. I am a regular…
2025-01-02 Program Helps Pakistani Women Learn to Ride, Gain Independence
Laiba Rashid is a 22-year-old Pakistani student in a special training program in the city of Lahore. The program, called Women on Wheels (WOW), teaches women how to operate two-wheelers,…
2025-01-02 Game Born in Mexican Prisons Brings People Together
On a Sunday afternoon in Mexico City’s Roma neighborhood, Rosa María Espinosa joins about 80 men in a park to play poleana. The almost 100-year-old game was created in a…
2025-01-02 Questions, Answers about Holiday Activities
Imagine you are talking to an American. You are curious to know about what they did during the holidays of Christmas and New Year’s. How can you ask about these…
2025-01-01 AI Tools Often Used for Fake Product Reviews
Artificial intelligence (AI) tools that permit people to produce online reviews have put sellers, service providers and buyers in unfamiliar territory, public protection groups and researchers say. False, or fake,…
2025-01-01 Some on Indonesian Islands Fear Mining Damage to Environment
Indonesia has the world’s largest known supply of nickel and major supplies of valuable minerals, including cobalt and bauxite. However, the mining industry there is being criticized for not protecting…
2025-01-01 Scientists Use Ancient Genes to Estimate Contact Between Humans, Neanderthals
Scientists have used ancient genes to learn more details about contact between Neanderthals and humans tens of thousands of years ago. Results of two recent studies estimate the two groups…
2024-12-31 Atomic Bomb Survivors Plan New Push for Nuclear Disarmament
Survivors of the U.S. atomic bombings on Hiroshima and Nagasaki said receiving a Nobel Peace Prize has given them new energy to campaign for nuclear disarmament. Next August will be…
2024-12-31 Researchers: Giant Sloths, Mastodons Lived with Humans in Americas
A sloth is a furry animal that lives mainly in South and Central America. It moves very slowly and spends most of its time in trees. But thousands of years…
2024-12-31 Start New Year by Setting Reasonable Learning Goals
In the Education Tips series, education experts in the United States give you ideas about how you can improve your English skills. This week, Eli Hinkel, a professor at Seattle…