Sometimes people ask me to recommend a good book on linguistics for the general reader — not a textbook, not a technical treatise, just an informative (and accurate) explanation of what linguistics is all about. I’ve never quite been sure… Read More ›
Linguistics
Voynich
“A mysterious document that has bedeviled scholars and top cryptographers for more than a century,” says the Boston Globe. Is it written in code? Is it art? How old is it? Read the article for some tantalizing information — and lack of… Read More ›
Suppose math tells you something that goes against your preconceived beliefs. What do you do?
Yale Law School’s Dan Kahan and three other researchers make the case that those more skilled at math are less likely to come to the correct conclusion on controversial matters—even when the numbers to support that conclusion are clear, empirical,… Read More ›
Cryptology? Cryptography? Crypto?
One of my students claimed that I was being inconsistent because I sometimes wrote cryptology, sometimes cryptography, and sometimes just crypto. What’s going on here? I suppose I could quote Walt Whitman on the subject of contradicting myself, or I could quote Emerson on the subject… Read More ›
And God Said
Brandeis professor Joel Hoffman’s wonderful linguistic analysis is surprisingly readable and engaging. I recently read his full-length book, And God Said: How Translations Conceal the Bible’s Original Meaning, which is filled with such analysis. Normally I’m not enthusiastic about quoting other readers’ reviews… Read More ›
Where did ten weeks go?
How did I manage to go ten weeks without blogging? Just overtaken by events, I guess. But I’m determined to resume my almost-daily posts, starting today. So stay tuned, as they used to say. (Does anyone actually say “stay tuned”… Read More ›
Grammar rules you can forget…according to The Guardian
The great science section in The Guardian is broadly conceived, sometimes including articles about math and linguistics in addition to the fields that more commonly fall under the category of “science.” Recently an article with the title “Ten grammar rules you… Read More ›
Kill the apostrophe!
Youve got to read James Harbecks essay, “Kill the Apostrophe!,” appearing in The Week this week. (“The Week this week”? That certainly sounds odd. Oh, well.) After reading it, youll be convinced, as I was, that apostrophes should just go away. Many of… Read More ›
Linguistics, math, and second chances
What a terrific speech! It was delivered in 2008 by the distinguished Stanford linguist Ivan Sag, who died too young just five days ago. It manages to take the reader all the way from youthful indiscretions to problems with college… Read More ›
An Egyptian cartoon…not
I was just flipping through a Middle Egyptian textbook that I had bought at a used book store last year (not to be confused with a used bookstore), and I came across this cartoon drawn by an unknown previous owner… Read More ›
The whole nine yards
It isn’t often that you see an article about linguistics in the New York Times — and on the front page of the Arts section to boot! But that’s what happened yesterday, in a piece about the etymology of the expression… Read More ›
Popsicles, law, and language
Companies have to protect their trademarks, of course. There are even a few well-known examples where trademarks were lost because they weren’t protected — Wikipedia cites aspirin, dry ice, escalator, kerosene, laundromat, linoleum, phonograph, thermos, videotape, and zipper — so… Read More ›
MIT does not equal Mitt
They don’t even sound alike. An MIT alumna was nearly prevented from voting in Florida because she was wearing an MIT shirt. A poll worker thought she was illegally campaigning for Romney inside the polling place.
Independent study
Every year there are quite a few students who want to learn more than the regular courses can offer them, so they find a faculty advisor and create an independent study. Sometimes it’s truly created by the student, with the… Read More ›
From Elvish to Klingon
I know what you were thinking as soon as you saw this title. I can read your mind, so I know that you were thinking something like this: This is obviously a fluffy but nerdy book. It must be a tongue-in-cheek,… Read More ›
Teaching science through language
We like to claim that linguistics is a science, but I’ve never before seen any explicit discussion of using it to teach scientific principles. An intriguing abstract from Anne Lobeck suggests some possibilities along those lines, particularly pointing out that linguistics… Read More ›
Please do not poster on this gate
Apparently poster has become a verb. If Harvard says so, it must be true. This sign appears on the gate of the fence that separates Harvard Yard on the south from the Science Center and Memorial Hall on the north:
OK
I recently read OK: The Improbable Story of America’s Greatest Word, by Allan Metcalf. For some unaccountable reason this book has only two customer reviews on Amazon; there must be some good reason for that. Anyway, Metcalf tells you everything… Read More ›
Slides from my talk on linguistics
I have posted the slides from my linguistics talk, but I’m not sure how useful they are without audio. The talk, after all, was an oral presentation accompanied by slides, not a visual presentation accompanied by audio. So I’m going… Read More ›
Making order out of chaos
Yesterday evening I delivered the first lecture in our new Beyond the Classroom series, described as follows: Weston High School is pleased to announce a new series of talks for the whole community led by our esteemed faculty members on a broad… Read More ›
Learning Strategies 