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 » Implicatures on Capitol Hill

Friday 9 June 15:14:18 UTC 2017

Those of us who teach introductory Linguistics courses owe a special debt to James Comey’s testimony yesterday before the Senate Intelligence Committee. This two-hour exchange offers us a broad and deep source of evocative and consequential real-world examples of the ways that what is said, what is meant, and what is communicated may be different. One salient example, of many, … [Link]

Wordorigins.org » satellite

Friday 9 June 13:45:00 UTC 2017

In his prepared statement to Congress of 8 June 2017 (released 7 June), former FBI Director James Comey wrote about a 30 March phone call he had with President Trump: The President went on to say that if there were some “satellite” associates of his who did something wrong, it would be good to find that out. Now that’s an … [Link]

Omniglot blog » Mysterious abbreviations (MABs)

Friday 9 June 11:07:11 UTC 2017

Recently I’ve noticed the abbreviation MSM appearing in some of the articles I read online. When I first saw it I guessed it had something to do with Microsoft – maybe Microsoft Media, or something like that. Eventually I worked out that it stood for mainstream media. According to Wiktionary, MSM can also stand for mirror, signal, maneuver – something … [Link]

Urban Word of the Day » Meat umbrella

Friday 9 June 7:00:00 UTC 2017

When you push all the meat onto the bottom of the chicken wing Dude I am going to turn this wing into a meat umbrella so I don't get my hands dirty [Link]

Language Log » Don’t forget to pay pay pay pay pay the rent

Friday 9 June 3:20:19 UTC 2017

Recently, signs like this one showed up in the Shanghai subway: Some of the signs stretch along corridors for tens of feet and have the same character repeated dozens of times. You can see photographs of them in this article. The sign in the photograph above says: Zūfáng fù fù fù fù fù fù fù fù shénme yājīn! 租房付付付付付付付付什么押金! “When … [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.