London Language

duz speling reely mater?

Guardian — Does Students' Spelling Matter?

Another debate about spelling. As a teacher and essay marker, I think poor spelling is maybe less serious than problems with content, argument structure, etc. But I think one of the main things students are working on is to develop their skills in  a particular genre, formal academic essay writing, and that includes spelling according to standard conventions. It's very easy to remember that it's will never occur in a formal essay (since this contraction should always be spelled out as it is) and to use a spell-checker, so we'll always point out mistakes like that to students.

Billy

2b or not 2b?

guardian — 2b or not 2b?

This is an article by David Crystal arguing that:

'texting has not been the disaster for language many feared ... On the contrary, it improves children's writing and spelling'

the last silent movie

Thanks to Artprojx I went to see this last night. Catch it if you can. It's showing in London a few more times this month. More details here

If you're interested in endangered languages, visit the Foundation for Endangered Languages

Billy

language teaching doubles in English primary schools

Times Online - Primary Schools Double Language Teaching

This increase was entirely expected given the government's aim to have all primary schoool chiildren studying a second language by 2010:

Education Guardian - All primary schools to teach foreign languages by 2010

But it's still good news and, of course, teachers in secondary school and higher education will be waiting to see what effect this has as these young linguists move through the system.

The Linguists

The Linguists was a big success at Sundance this year and is showing on the 7th of May as part of Endangered Languages Week

Endangered Languages Week

If you're near London from the 30th of April, there are lots of interesting events taking place during Endangered Languages Week

If they're lost, who are we?

If they're lost, who are we? — Washington Post

David Treuer on the loss of Native American language and culture. It's not all bad news:

'There were just over 200,000 Native Americans alive at the turn of the 20th century; as of the last census, we number more than 2 million.'

And the Blackfoot language is 'on the upswing'.

But the main message is that Native American culture is under threat.

The bit I found the most fascinating was the discussion of identity. Here's an extract:

'My favorite example of this difference was the question posed to an Ojibwe man by the Indian agent whose job it was to put him down on the treaty rolls. "Who are you?" the Ojibwe was asked, through an interpreter. "Oshkinawe nindaw eta," he replied, puzzled ("Only a young man"). The Indian agent noted this, and the Ojibwe man's family still bears his Anglicized response, Skinaway. The man had no thoughts, really, about himself as an Indian or as an individual. The question -- who are you? -- didn't even make much sense to him because the terms of identity didn't make any sense to him; they were not his terms. Nowadays, unlike Skinaway, many of us have come to rely on ways of describing ourselves that aren't ours to begin with.'

theft and inverted commas

JK Rowling sues over Harry Potter 'rip-off' — Times Online

Interesting ideas here about literary theft.

JK Rowling is objecting to the publication of a Harry Potter 'lexicon'. She's upset about the poor quality of the book and also says that the lack of quotation marks 'particularly galls' her. She says that if these had been appropriately used, 'most of the lexicon would be in quotation marks'.

Another issue this raises is whether the author of works of fiction has rights over reference works related to them.

She's also concerned that this might affect sales of her own planned encyclopedia which she plans to publish to raise funds for charities. She has been amazingly generous with her earning potential so I wonder how much impact this part of her claim will have.

'Linguists' at Sundance

Reuters - Linguists at Sundance

It seems linguists are the talk of the Sundance film festival this year.

Billy

endangered language

BBC - split imperils Mexican language

This is the story of how, to quote the story:

'An indigenous language in southern Mexico is in danger of disappearing because its last two speakers have stopped talking to one another'

Billy