LOL. OMG. BRB. Text messages and instant messenger programs have spawned a variety of abbreviations and shortcuts that are sneaking into colloquial English. In his new book, Txtng, David Crystal takes on the h8ers who want to know why kids these days are too lazy to use vowels.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=97700573
Tagged with texting text messaging technology reading literacy writing future
George Bernard Shaw ridiculed the British obsession with class, recognising that its most powerful expression was not in what someone said, but how he or she said it. Using a wealth of archive, we hear how the drive to hide linguistic, geographical roots often went hand in hand with a desire to be seen as part of the metropolitan set and we hear about the post war levelling and the move away from RP.
Tagged with accent rp bbc linguistics language english pronunciation
Andrew Cohen on some thoughts about language and acquisition of a second
Our industry has aged into double digits, but much of the language we use to describe what we do and how things work is borrowed or repurposed, sometimes without issue, but often leading to confusion. Having a distinct set of terminology is an important sign of maturity for a line of work, those words and phrases to lead the next generation of practitioners — and it's high time we set about creating it.
It’s almost impossible to imagine a world without words. But in this hour of Radiolab, we try to do just that.
We meet a woman who taught a 27-year-old man the first words of his life, hear a firsthand account of what it feels like to have the language center of your brain wiped out by a stroke, and retrace the birth of a brand new language 30 years ago.
Tagged with language philosophy radiolab words innovative radio
Have you ever been Plutoed (demoted)? Is your inbox clogged with "bacn" (spam by personal request)? Are you a lifehacker (master at optimizing everyday routines)? Jonathon Keats, artist and author of Virtual Words, explains how science and technology influence language, and vice versa.
http://www.npr.org/2010/12/24/132311754/How-Science-and-Technology-Influence-Language
Tagged with science technology vocabulary words lexis corpus spelling internet language linguistics
Brain Science Podcast #30 is a discussion of Christine Kenneally's book, The First Word: The Search for the Origin of Language.This episode concentrates on the emergence of the study of language evolution (evolutionary linguistics) from an area of area of inquiry that was banned in the 19th century to one that is flourishing and benefiting from new evidence from fields as diverse as genetics and studies in animal communication.
Professor Jean Aitchison delivers her first Reith Lecture from her series entitled ‘The Language Web’. She explores whether our language really is in decay and argues that we need to understand language, not try to control it.
Tagged with bbc reith lectures language words english book:author=jean aitchison
Huxley puts his amazing brain into tackling the subject of language. Always engaging….
Tagged with huxley language linguistics acquisition