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 » Tablet V of the Epic of Gilgamesh.
This piece by Osama S. M. Amin is about a fragment of Gilgamesh that was discovered in 2011 and published in 2014, so it’s not exactly breaking news, but I hadn’t been aware of it and I suspect many of my readers will be in the same boat. Here’s Amin’s summary of the salient points: ● The revised reconstruction of … [Link]
Language Log » Trump fights to break what?
Brendan Mohler, "Donald Trump fights to break wind farm in Scotland", Golf Magazine 10/9/2015. The headline writer failed to use more obvious verbs like "stop" instead of "break"; did they also foresee the line break? 
[h/t J.K.] [Link]
Language Log » Toddler pronounced useless
Someone may be able to figure out how this document came into existence — Drew Hangman, "Toddler Dies after Visiting Petting Zoo of E.Coli Infection", Statesman Tribune 10/9/2015: A Maine toddler was pronounced useless after contracting an E. coli an infection following a go to to the Oxford County Truthful. Based on a report from WMTW, the 20-month toddler Colton … [Link]
Language Log » Japanesey Chinese
A new wave of Sino-Japanese borrowings? During the last century and a quarter or so, Chinese has absorbed a large number of borrowings from Japanese: "Recent Japanese loanwords in Chinese" (7/22/13) "'And the greatest Japanese export to China is…'" (8/21/12) "Sino-Nipponica " (7/26/15) "Metaphysics has ruined Chinese" (5/27/15) Previously, such borrowings have largely been restricted to lexical items, there having … [Link]
Language Log » Hangul Day
Akdong Musician's "Like Ga Na Da": See the Wikipedia article if you're not already familiar with the Hangul writing system. And Hangul Day on October 9 is really a thing. Alex Baumans writes that "I don't think any other alphabet has such a catchy theme song". [Link]
Urban Word of the Day » auto erect
When text is auto-corrected into something sexual. "I'm excited to be eating dick tonight!" *duck I mean duck what an auto erect
[Link]
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