Tag Archives: language

The “trick to ambiguity”

Posted on July 12, 2015 by Robert Basil

From the great Language Log: Most of the ambiguity contained in normal language use is passed over without any awareness on the audience’s part of the potential for double meanings. If one of the two intended meanings in an ad … Continue reading →

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Ginormous

Posted on January 16, 2015 by Robert Basil

Bryan Garner, lawyer and English language usage scholar, on one of my favourite words: A portmanteau is a type of luggage with two separate sections. A portmanteau word is formed by combining the sounds and meanings of two different words. Linguists … Continue reading →

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Changing Norms

Posted on October 23, 2013 by Robert Basil

Reuben Fischer-Baum of Jezebel has made a wonderfully entertaining GIF that presents six decades of the most popular names for girls, “state by state.” He writes: Baby naming generally follows a consistent cycle: A name springs up in some region … Continue reading →

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Dogma versus Rules of Thumb

Posted on September 8, 2013 by Robert Basil

Language Log is an always stimulating group blog on language and linguistics, with posts that range from earworms and usage advice to research tools and sociolinguistics. The comments sections are as illuminating as the posts themselves. A recent post called … Continue reading →

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The Art of Scolding, cont’d.

Posted on June 8, 2013 by Robert Basil

“We have somehow not successfully received your professional-development documentation,” a Dean’s Office colleague wrote me in an email early in my career at Kwantlen. The sentence both charmed and alarmed me, especially the phrase somehow not successfully received, which seemed … Continue reading →

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On National Grammar Day: A love letter to language

Posted on March 4, 2013 by tierneywisniewski

It’s fitting that I should write this post on National Grammar Day. Choosing and arranging the right words with the right endings in the right order with the right punctuation isn’t even close to the most interesting thing I could … Continue reading →

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