Seems like it is whenever I have most things to do that I find seriously fun things to distract me. Nothing new about that, it happens to all freelancers. But just at the moment, I have toothache and laughing is quite painful. And a Language Hat post has introduced me to Speculative Grammarian, “the premier […]
Entries Tagged as 'Language'
Linguistics for Lazy People
February 18th, 2009 · No Comments
Tags: Language
Street Sign Silliness
February 2nd, 2009 · No Comments
Punctuation purists led by John Richards, founder of the Apostrophe Protection Society, are up in arms over Birmingham City Council’s decision to omit apostrophes from street signs. Reactions have run from the usual indignation to outright horror. Apostrophe Abuse ironizes about it cleverly, calling Birmingham “the city where apostrophes arent welcome,” while Apostrophe Catastrophes goes […]
The End of Civilization As We Know It
February 1st, 2009 · 2 Comments
Over at You Don’t Say,* the blog of Baltimore Sun copy editor John McIntyre, there has been a discussion going on about Wikipedia. I must point out that the Wikipediaphobes have not, quite, said that the online encyclopaedia will bring about the End of Civilization etc. as the title of this post would suggest. On […]
Opposing Orwell
January 12th, 2009 · 1 Comment
David Beaver has a post on Language Log about George Orwell’s 1946 essay Politics and the English Language. I find much to disagree with in Mr Beaver’s post, and Language Log’s Comments Policy says “blog comments should be short. If you have a lot to say, post it on your own blog and link to […]
Tags: Language · Life · Writing
Hokey Cokey Nonsense
January 5th, 2009 · No Comments
There’s a light-hearted discussion going on over at Language Log about the Hokey Cokey, provoked by the Telegraph digging up the old story about its lyrics being anti-Catholic (a distorsion of “the Latin “hoc est enim corpus meum” or “this is my body” used by Catholic priests to accompany the transubstantiation during mass,” says the […]
Tags: Language · Translating
Liberal or Literal?
December 12th, 2008 · No Comments
Corinne McKay of Thoughts on Translation has touched a nerve with her post on “We just translateâ€â€¦or do we?” Translators have two often contradictory goals: accuracy of translation, and quality of language. She gamely mentions failing two translation tests in a row for different agencies, one on the grounds that her translation was “too faithful […]
Tags: Language · Translating
Etymology Knowledge Test
December 11th, 2008 · No Comments
A post on Talk Wordy to Me led me to an entertaining on-line etymology quiz which I recommend to language buffs. It is, as TW puts it, “freaking hard.” TW got 6 out of 10 right on two occasions before deciding enough was enough, and I am pleased to say that I got 7 out […]
Tags: Language
Call Me Don John
December 10th, 2008 · No Comments
Found on Overheard Everywhere (I run the feed from Overheard in the Office on the Whittle It page, but I love them all, even if many of the entries sound more scripted than accidentally eavesdropped on): The Best Apples Don’t Go Into Applesauce. Or Teaching English teacher (about Don Pedro in Much Ado about Nothing: […]
Fry and Laurie on Language and the Word “Gay”
December 10th, 2008 · No Comments
Absence from the UK meant I had never seen Fry and Laurie until I caught a post on Jill Sommers’ blog, Musings from an Overworked Translator (here’s a hint, Jill – ease up). She posted the following language-related Fry and Laurie YouTube video which made me laugh out loud even though I don’t know who, […]