Almost everyone uses language, so inevitably almost everyone thinks they are an expert in it. I don’t consider myself an expert, though most of my work requires at least language competence and sometimes actual skill, but I do follow the blogs featured on this feeds page.
(If you are wondering where the translation-related feeds have all gone, I have put them on their own page.)
Most of the blogs represented here are in English, most of the time, but don’t be surprised to find other languages used. Go with the flow – I occasionally find myself pleasantly surprised at how much I can grasp in languages I have never seen before.
Language On the Net
languagehat.com » Svetlana Boym, RIP.
Having greatly enjoyed the writing of Svetlana Boym (LH posts 1, 2), I was sorry to learn of her death from this reminiscence by Cristina Vatulescu: August 6, the first morning we woke without Svetlana among us, found me in the old Jewish Quarter in Bucharest, in a hotel room, with an archive day ahead of me. The previous day, … [Link]
Language Log » Of mynas and miners, bells and whistles
Over at Spicks & Specks, Greg Pringle has a virtuoso post on "The Bell Miner: How orthography and ornithology catalysed a new folk etymology" (8/9/15). It's about an Australian honeyeating bird — Manorina melanophrys — that used to be called the Bellbird, but was renamed Bell Miner through association with the South Asian bird called in Hindi the mainā मैना … [Link]
Language Log » Recommended For You
Alexander Spangher, "Building the Next New York Times Recommendation Engine", NYT 8/11/2015: The New York Times publishes over 300 articles, blog posts and interactive stories a day. Refining the path our readers take through this content — personalizing the placement of articles on our apps and website — can help readers find information relevant to them, such as the right … [Link]
Omniglot blog » Language quiz
Here’s a recording in a mystery language. Can you identify the language, and do you know where it’s spoken? [Link]
Urban Word of the Day » Thesaurus Rex
A person who uses a word program or internet thesaurus in order to make their papers or written works appear smarter by replacing common words with larger or uncommon words. The phrontistery is a Thesaurus Rex's wet dream. "Since when does Bismark use the word jackanapes?" "Since he became a Thesaurus Rex."
[Link]
languagehat.com » Corpus Linguistics in the Courts.
Gordon Smith has a Conglomerate post about a Utah Supreme Court case, State v. Rasabout, which involved the question of whether a man was properly convicted of 12 counts of “unlawful discharge”: was each shot a separate “discharge,” or should the 12 shots together be considered a single “discharge”? The court held that “each discrete shot” is one “discharge,” but … [Link]
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