Author Archives: brinton

The more traditional sign offs (“Best”, “Best wishes”, “Sincerely”, etc.) may be being replaced by “xx” (=love). Where does this usage come from? https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/02/style/xx-email-signoff-signature.html

The apparently fake British accent of actors such as Katherine Hepburn explained: https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/how-a-fake-british-accent-took-old-hollywood-by-storm?utm_source=share_by_email&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=mailto_share

A speaker of a left-branching language (such as Japanese) may be better at remembering words, numbers, and spatial stimuli than a speaker of a right-branching language, research finds. https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/02/190204114641.htm

Studies are showing that vocal fry serves serious purposes. It may be used when speakers are in uncomfortable situations or when they are communicating information. Furthermore, younger people do not disparage those using vocal fry in the way that older … Continue reading →

A study in Philadelphia has shown that the speech of AAVE speakers is very often mistranscribed in court. For example, “The cop partner been got transferred”, where “been” indicates an event in the distant past, was transcribed “The cop partner, … Continue reading →

This article takes a balanced view of this grammatical “mistake”: https://www.chronicle.com/blogs/linguafranca/2018/12/05/why-do-i-really-really-want-to-say-had-went/?fbclid=IwAR3UHeRFyAemzFEcdlDP-5zgA8q-K5Pz6hiN2SQF0VtF4pWfSPRMpic8bRw

Surprisingly, it’s Telugu, a Dradivian language of southern India: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-45902204?fbclid=IwAR3MGj0g1J0jHX9-wX6MVJgfoCrsgN1MiVj003Gd-pKu8gJKP5JACmD4xlo

The term Latinx has been invented as a gender-neutral alternative for Latino and Latina. It has met with considerable controversy. If it is accepted, what will this mean for other languages with grammatical gender? https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-nation/wp/2018/09/14/latinx-an-offense-to-the-spanish-language-or-a-nod-to-inclusion/?utm_term=.cd96023148f7

While technically datum is singular and data is plural, usage seems to be changing, with data now more often treated as a singular collective noun: https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/594aj8/its-time-to-end-the-data-is-vs-data-are-debate

A recent internet meme has suggested that “tag” (as in the game of tag) is an acronym for “touch and go”. In this article, Ben Zimmer discusses this myth and some other fanciful etymologies: https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2018/08/that-meme-youre-sharing-is-probably-bogus/566582/ And, by the way, “tip” … Continue reading →