London Language

babies with an accent

BBC — babies cry with an accent

Mmm, the sentence that leaps out for me here as maybe involving a bit of a stretch is:

'they say the babies are probably trying to form a bond with their mothers by imitating them.'

It's great that they've got an audio clip to compare the crying.

Billy

Chomsky podcast

MIT Press just released this conversation between Samuel Jay Keyser and Noam Chomsky:

http://www.mitpressjournals.org/page/podcasts

linguistics-related gifts

cafepress — Linguistics T-shirts and Gifts

I'm very impressed by the linguistics-related gifts on offer here thanks to a graduate from Sussex

Billy

LINGUIST List student portal

LINGUIST List — new student portal

This is the message I just received announcing the LINGUIST list's new student portal. It looks great. Here's the link straight to the portal itself:

http://linguistlist.org/studentportal/

Billy

falling standards

Guardian — letters to the editor

I like this letter to the Guardian which appeared on Monday (in the context of the A level/GCSE 'debate'):

. . . . .

I see that, once again, this year's results are better than last year's (I aim to become a legend, says Bolt after demolishing 200m record, 21 August). Clearly a sign of falling standards. The men's 200 metres was much tougher in my day.

Anil Gomes

London

. . . . .

Billy

sausage and mash from cash machines...

Mail online — cockney rhyming cash machines

linguistics — an 'uncommon degree'

CNN - 10 unusual majors can get you these jobs

Linguistics is number 2 on this list of 'unusual majors' which might 'come in handy when it comes to finding a job'. One thing I've always thought about linguistics is that it is particularly effective in helping students develop thinking and communication skills.

Billy

please play

Tom Sutcliffe - Art that hits all the right notes

I enjoyed all the pieces in Tom Sutcliffe's column this week, but my favourite is the discussion of a notice in David Byrne's installation 'Playing the Building' at the Roundhouse in London (until the 31st August). He discusses the ambiguity and possible interpretations of the notice which asks visitors to 'please play'. Just the kind of thing you want to read when you're working on a book on pragmatics.

The other pieces are on diagetic and non-diagetic sound in (Ferris Bueller's Day Off and other) movies, and on that feeling you get that makes you wish everyone could just stop writing for a while so you don't feel so much like the sorcerer's apprentice rushing to catch up.

Billy

Who's Ray?

TLS - The real Raymond Carver

We discussed this in our writing module last year. It's a fascinating story and interesting to see the different opinions people have about which versions are 'better'. The answer, of course, is that it depends what you want your writing to do.

Billy

those amazing bees

Science Alert — Bees learn 'foreign' language

This is quite a story. My initial reaction is of course that this is not likely to be about bees developing multiilngual abilities but rather about us needing to rethink what exactly bees are doing and how exactly their dances work.

I've emailed Vicky de Rijke (Middlesex's expert in duck 'regional accents') to ask what she makes of it all. Will let you know,

Billy