John Gordon Ross

A Man for All Reasons

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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 » Up or down

Sunday 31 July 23:30:31 UTC 2016

Joe Heller's cartoon for 7/29/2016: [h/t Jason Baldridge] No matter your political preference, this is a very interesting, cool exercise in discourse structure. #linguistics pic.twitter.com/t9p64jxJDh — Jason Baldridge (@jasonbaldridge) July 29, 2016 [Link]

Language Log » Shiok, shiok

Sunday 31 July 21:55:01 UTC 2016

Taylor Swift sings "shake, shake", but in Singapore and Malaysia, everybody is saying "shiok, shiok". Source: "Where or how did the phrase Shiok or Syiok used in Malaysia & Singapore originate?" (Quora, Feb. 2015) Recently, there were two missed opportunities for me to bring up "shiok". "Singlish: alive and well" (2/14/16) "New Singaporean and Hong Kong terms in the OED" … [Link]

languagehat.com » The Art of Translating Foreign Fiction.

Sunday 31 July 21:25:20 UTC 2016

Rachel Cooke writes (for The Observer) about the importance of the right translation; she begins: Last year, I decided to treat myself to a new copy of Bonjour Tristesse by Françoise Sagan, a novel I have loved ever since I first read it as a teenager, and whose dreamy opening line in its original translation from the French by Irene … [Link]

Omniglot blog » Language quiz

Sunday 31 July 11:53:31 UTC 2016

Hôtel Le St-James, Vieux Montréal Today’s quiz is a bit different. The question is, what do you call the (red and black) canvas canopies over the windows in the photo? I could easily google the answer, but just want to see if any of you know it without googling. If you don’t know, why not make something up? I don’t know what these things are … [Link]

Urban Word of the Day » Jagoff

Sunday 31 July 7:00:00 UTC 2016

A rude assholelike person. originated in pittsburgh "Yinz were acting like jagoffs the other night, all drunk on Ahrns n'at" [Link]

languagehat.com » Orangutan Learns to Control Vocalizations.

Sunday 31 July 0:02:34 UTC 2016

Rachel Premack’s Washington Post story on Rocky, an 11-year-old orangutan who has learned to control the pitch and volume of his vocalizations, is admirably restrained for a newspaper story on language, carefully stating: Shumaker noted that this shouldn’t be equated with the words and communication of humans. Rocky’s grunts have no deeper meaning — other than that, Shumaker believes, Rocky … [Link]

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