linguistic

Wordle 517 answer for November 18: Today’s puzzle is a tough one. It is a word that only linguists would be familiar with. If you’re not one, then check Wordle hints, clues, solution. Wordle 517 answer for November 18: Today's Wordle is definitely going to claim some streaks and ruin a lot of people's day. The word is right up there with the toughest words we have ever seen in this game. And it is nothing short of a surprise that even after 500 puzzles, the game can throw such curve balls towards us. This is a word…

Credit: CC0 Public Domain After the revelations about the 2016 U.S. presidential election being influenced by Russian-generated "fake news," many people became more critical towards news on social media. "Fake news" was subsequently coined by several dictionaries and language organizations, such as the Language Council of Norway, as being the 2017 word of the year. In Norway many of us learned that if something appears to be…

Many languages in the world use words like “mama” or “papa” for “mother” and “father”. Languages with “mama” are colored in red, and languages with “father” are colored in blue. Credit: J.-M. List Is it true that many languages in the world use words similar to "mama" and "papa" for "mother" and "father"? If a language uses only one word for both "arm" and "hand," does it also use only one word for both "leg" and "foot"? How…

France’s national linguistic watchdog, the Académie Française, has banned the official usage of a number of phrases borrowed from English to describe the world of gaming. Instead of “esports,” government workers should refer to “jeu video de competition.” Instead of talk of “pro-gamers,” they must discuss the activity of the “joueur professionnel.” And instead of “streamers,” they must refer to the “joueur-animateur en direct” — and so on. The changes, reported by AFP, were made in coordination with the French…

MIT linguist Shigeru Miyagawa is the author of the new book, “Syntax in the Treetops,” published today by the MIT Press. Credit: MIT Press. Credit: Melanie Gonick, MIT. If you are in Bucharest and impatiently waiting for, say, your children to head off to school in the morning, you might hear yourself saying something like, "Haideţi caţi întârziat, ce mai!" Or: "Obviously, you are late!"…