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 » Translating the Odyssey.
Anthony Verity, who has recently translated Homer’s Odyssey, has some things to say about it at OUPBlog: The toughest challenge for the 21st century translator is undoubtedly that of register. As we all know, no one ever spoke Homeric Greek. It is an amalgam of different dialects, predominantly Ionic, whose effect is to set the story apart from the everyday, … [Link]
Omniglot blog » It’s in your east hand
An episode of Word of Mouth I listened to recently discussed the language of directions, and how in some languages directions are absolute rather than relative. So you don’t have a right hand or left hand, for example, but a north or south hand, or an east or west hand, depending on which way you’re facing. In some languages directions … [Link]
Language Log » "Big league" vs. "bigly": a coda
After I posted "The history of Trumpian 'big league' (now even bigger league!)" on Sunday, there was a flurry of media coverage on the hotly contested question of whether Donald Trump says big league or bigly. A sampling: "So, Which Is It: Bigly Or Big-League? Linguists Take On A Common Trumpism" (NPR, 10/23/16) "Yes, Trump Really Is Saying 'Big League,' … [Link]
Language Log » Paleographers, riches await you!
"Hefty award offered for deciphering oracle bone characters" (China Daily, 10/28/16): The National Museum of Chinese Writing on Thursday launched an award program to encourage people from around the world to help decipher oracle bone inscriptions. According to the museum based in Anyang City in central China's Henan Province, where oracle bones and script were discovered from the Ruins of … [Link]
Language Log » Algorithms: Threat or Menace?
Muhammad ibn Musa al-Khwarizmi (see also here) … was a Persian mathematician, astronomer, and geographer during the Abbasid Caliphate, a scholar in the House of Wisdom in Baghdad. In the 12th century, Latin translations of his work on the Indian numerals introduced the decimal positional number system to the Western world. Al-Khwārizmī's The Compendious Book on Calculation by Completion and … [Link]
Urban Word of the Day » Do it for the vine!
when you want someone to do something, take your phone and say "do it for the vine" while recording him, then he'll do it because of the "social" pressure. rebecca: "hey dude, someone told me you know how to wiggle wiggle like anyone else" mike: "are you kidding? there is no way rebecca: "do it" mike: "no" rebecca: "do it! … [Link]
Language Log » Daigou: a Mandarin borrowing-in-progress in English
Surprisingly few words have been borrowed from Mandarin into English in recent years. Most of the Sinitic borrowings in English — and there are not many — are from other topolects (Cantonese, Shanghainese, Hokkien, etc.), and they occurred nearly a century or more ago. "Chinese loans in English" (7/10/13) Since the founding of the PRC, most of the terminology borrowed … [Link]
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