John Gordon Ross

A Man for All Reasons

John Gordon Ross header image 3

Language Stuff

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

Language Log » The extent of Melania's plagiarism

Wednesday 20 July 13:01:28 UTC 2016

The Trump campaign officially maintains that there was no plagiarism in Melania Trump's speech at the Republican convention. Campaign chairman Paul Manafort was astonishingly disingenuous: "These were common words and values"; "To think that she'd be cribbing Michelle Obama's words is crazy"; "There's no cribbing. What she did was use words that are common words"; "Care and respect and passion, … [Link]

Language Log » Intersecting hypocrisies

Wednesday 20 July 12:20:23 UTC 2016

Tuesday's political news was dominated by the discovery that Melania Trump's Monday-night convention speech copied a couple of paragraphs from Michelle Obama's 2008 convention speech (see here, here, here, here, and here for some background and discussion — Update: the latest explanation is here.). And today, we learn that Donald Trump Jr.'s Tuesday-night speech borrowed some phrases from a 2015 … [Link]

Omniglot blog » Montreal

Wednesday 20 July 9:37:40 UTC 2016

Tomorrow I’m off to Montreal for the North American Polyglot Symposium, which takes places on Saturday and Sunday (23/24) at Concordia University. I’m giving a talk on the origins of language. This is a subject that we can only really speculate about, unless someone invents a time machine, so I’ll discuss the various theories that have been proposed. This will … [Link]

Urban Word of the Day » Drake Effect

Wednesday 20 July 7:30:00 UTC 2016

The feelings that get stirred up whenever a Drake R&B song comes on, where you start missing people that you don't even know. Guy 1: Have you heard that one song by Drake? Guy 2: Nah, what is it? Guy 1: *plays it* Guy 2: OMGAHHHH, STEPHANIEEEEE Guy 1: …We don't even know a Stephanie. Guy 2: I CAN'T HELP … [Link]

Archive

No Comments

0 responses so far ↓

  • There are no comments yet...Kick things off by filling out the form below.

You must log in to post a comment.