Tag: language

  • To X or Not to X

    To X or Not to X

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    by

    Brendan Barry
    in ,

    As it happens, the Latino culture largely remains x’ed out on using the term Latinx, according to a new survey from Pew Research. The issue of supplanting Latino/Latina with Latinx as a gender neutral replacement—or as a complementary alternative—emerged in the general discourse in that oh-so-fun year of 2020 when everything went well. One common…

  • British English vs. Irish English

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    Brendan Barry
    in

    The United Kingdom is known for having a large number of accents in a—compared to the United States—relatively small space. But then you add in Ireland and you have an entirely new level of linguistic diversity. Josh Katz, who several years ago made waves for his work on the differences in the States, completed some…

  • Native Languages of the World

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    Brendan Barry
    in

    Today’s post looks at an infographic from the South China Morning Post. The graphic in question looks at languages and how many speak them. Specifically, the graphic narrows the focus down to those native languages spoken by 50+ million people, of which there are 23 spoken by a combined 4.1 billion people out of the…

  • Looking at Languages

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    by

    Brendan Barry
    in

    Languages can be fascinating things. And not necessarily just in Klingon. Vox has a post using 23 maps and graphics to look at language. As usual with these sorts of things, some are good. Others not so much. Credit for the highlighted piece goes to Minna Sundberg via Dylan Matthews.

  • Twitter Language

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    by

    Brendan Barry
    in

    An MIT report looks at, among other things, the words used in tweets based on whether they were tweeted at home or at work. And, well, Malcolm Tucker would be surely disappointed. Because somebody screwed up and switched the words home and work. Clearly they should be reversed. Credit for the piece goes to the…

  • Linguistics Are…Um…Fun?

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    Brendan Barry
    in

    So today is Friday and that means it is time for some…um…lighter than usual content. Consequently we have a map from Quartz looking at the preferred use of um or uh. Credit for the piece goes to the Quartz graphics department.

  • Soda

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    by

    Brendan Barry
    in

    Happy Friday, everybody. I cannot say about you, but I certainly love seeing dialects and regional variations of words, phrases, pronunciations mapped out. So thankfully we have some work by Alan McConchie to look at today, specifically versus the soda vs. pop debate. As the screenshot shows, I come from a solidly soda camp. But…

  • The Curse(s) of the CEOs

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    Brendan Barry
    in

    It’s Friday, so we should try to take things a bit lighter. For me that usually means knocking back a drink or two and a swear-y exultation about it being the end of the work week. But, it turns out, I’m just trying to emulate our captains of industry. Bloomberg has gone through company conference…

  • Sppeling Wrds

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    by

    Brendan Barry
    in

    To day’s post comes frm teh Washington Post. It luuks at how esy it is to sppel eesy wrds wrong. But aparently I’s can spel wrds. Note teh way wrds speled wrng are coloured by frekwency. Cridet fr eht peice goes 2 Emily Chow and Kat Downs.

  • Linguistic Empires

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    by

    Brendan Barry
    in

    One of the main arguments used by Vladimir Putin to support any possible intervention in Ukraine is the suppression of the rights of Russian language speakers. The Economist wisely decided to wholeheartedly endorse the underlying principle of Putin’s logic and redrew the world map accordingly. You should read the article. Credit for the piece goes…