english as she is spoken Why is the English language so weird and inconsistent? Blame the printing press. Thom Dunn

down's syndrome How the language of special education denigrates kids with disabilities Thom Dunn

tense How to talk about time in a language that doesn't have any tenses Thom Dunn

italian music History of Prisencolinensinainciusol, the gibberish English song that charmed Italy and the world Thom Dunn

herself Watching "Herself" while reading "Himself" Thom Dunn

humans vs chimps Noam Chomsky on Nim Chimpsky and the emergence of language Thom Dunn

singular pronouns Our centuries-old use of "they" as a singular pronoun Clive Thompson

coronacoinages "Pandemic" is the Dictionary.com word of the year. Thom Dunn

sand people "The Mandalorian" recruited a Deaf actor to create the Tusken Raiders' sign language Thom Dunn

expletive infixation A great fucking explanation of expletive in-fucking-sertion Thom Dunn

merriam-webster The Merriam-Webster Dictionary has officially changed the definition of "racism." Thom Dunn

garbage language What is "garbage language" and why is it so hard to avoid using? Thom Dunn

multilanguage A fascinating map of the most spoken languages in every US state besides English and Spanish Thom Dunn

Dante Dante's Hell re-imagined as linguistic sins Gareth Branwyn

dictionaries The Merriam-Webster dictionary's word of the year is… David Pescovitz

dictionaries Fun interactive way to see what words were first used in print in a particular year David Pescovitz

Great apes How to speak chimpanzee David Pescovitz

elf The colonialism behind fantasy's vaguely Irish Elves Thom Dunn

talk radio Open archive of 240,000 hours' worth of talk radio, including 2.8 billion words of machine-transcription Cory Doctorow

emoji as emblems and gestures Because Internet: the new linguistics of informal English Cory Doctorow