Linguistics as a field of study flourished tremendously beyond the hopes of its founders. Modern linguistics started a cognitive revolution in the 1950s and has been extending ever since. Thanks to linguistics we know so much more about human languages than ever before, from their origins, why are there so many of them, and how to use […]
Problems That Are Still Not Solved In Linguistics. Read More »
Linguists, led by Chomsky, did a wonderful job in describing how language works. By thoroughly studying a handful of human languages, they devised a theory, i.e. Universal Grammar, which could explain all possible human languages with all their hidden features and peculiarities. Every single language fits in there nicely. They could account for all the differences among
Here is the language that disproves Universal Grammar. Read More »
When you want to decide on what to read in language and linguistics, it is never easy to pick a reading list; there are just so many books out there under the label of linguistics, especially since publications in linguistics have been growing like wildfire in the last couple of decades. So with your limited time and the unlimited
We can’t predict the future, but we can certainly learn from the past. And the answer to the above question is a resounding NO. Of course, you may have a difference of opinion, but consider the line of reasoning first. While it is true that more than 50% of the 6000-7000 languages in the world are
Will Everyone In The World Eventually Speak English? Read More »
What if I told you that you have a blueprint for speaking a certain language? When you come across a grammatical sentence that matches our blueprint, you easily process it and accept it as a sentence that belongs to your (native) language. But, when you come across an ungrammatical sentence that doesn’t match the blueprint,
These Sentences Are Perfectly Grammatical. Learn How They Trick You. Read More »
Did Proto-Indo-European, or any reconstructed language for that matter, really exist? Of course it did, linguists say so! But do you know how were they able to know that? Humm! No worries, this is what this article is all about.
Here is How Linguists Know That Extinct Languages Existed. Read More »
No one disagrees that English is such a weird language. It has been the largest language to have been thoroughly studied, revealing more its peculiarities. Today, we brought some of the strangest facts that research has revealed about English. Aside from being a language where one drives in a parkway and parks in a driveway,
Interesting Facts About the English Language that You Didn’t Know. Read More »
Among the languages that enjoy significant prestige and history is obviously English. The greatness of English, ironically enough, was inherited not from the speakers it has today, and as the language of the Free World, but from its great history, a history of blood and sacrifice. So see how English stumbled its way to the modern
Ladies and gentlemen, meet the peculiar etymology of a very peculiar word: ‘thing’.
The pathetic story behind the English word “thing”. Read More »
