Language & Literary Criticism: Experiences from Multilingual / Translated Poetic Works
A battered copy of Tomas Tranströmer’s The Deleted World is near-always on my kitchen table or beside my bed (unless I’ve decided to introduce the Swedish poet to a friend). The bilingual edition, translated by Robin Robertson, is a constant reminder for me to engage language–particularly my second language, Swedish–from the ubiquitous creativity of poetry […]
Six Fun Dutch Words
I’ve always enjoyed the weird words in other languages that just make the language feel more unique. Portmanteaus were my obsession when I was a young teenager (supernerd), and, honestly, I couldn’t get enough. Nowadays, I’m into phrases that couldn’t quite be translated into English or phrases that express a normally unexpressable emotion behind them. […]
Language party
The way I see it, French is a bit like the person who organises really sophisticated parties. ‘We put the passé subjonctif là, et the passé simple là…then there’s room for the wine in the middle.’ It’s not an interesting party. Swiss French is in the corner, trying to explain that he isn’t actually French, […]
Silly Linguistics Issue #71 is now available
Issue #71 is now available to subscribers If you are not a subscriber, you can get a subscription by clicking here https://sillylinguistics.com/membership-account/membership-levels/ Silly Linguistics Trivia #2By Forest A Bird’s Eye ViewBy Trevor Attenberg Inscripts – Writing as TechnologyBy Reagan O’Brien Be!rs: How Taboos Work Their Way into Our LanguageBy Skylar Millet Arrival: The Lexicon of […]
Dispatches from Linguists: Speech Therapy Observation
This month’s dispatch comes from Tiffany Marcum, who takes us through her experiences learning how American Sign Language is used. I found a job that let me use my special skill – American Sign Language! The position was Habilitation Technician and I would work with adults with serious developmental delays. As new employees, they put […]
Vocabulary Items – The Squatters of the Brain
Look at the picture below. Imagine you are having a conversation in your native language and your talking partner asks you what the image depicts. Your brain would instantly know the correct answer and let you say it out loud at once – if you are a native English speaker, it is a ‘cat’. If […]
