Language Log

The comments on "Hypertonal conlang" (12/8/2024) include a lengthy back-and-forth about where the syllable break should be located in English words like "Cheryl". I was surprised to see that no one brought up the concept of ambisyllabicity, which has been a standard and well-accepted idea in phonology for more than 50 years. It continues to be widely referenced in the scholarly literature — Google Scholar lists about 2,170 papers citing the term, and 260  since 2020.

The most influential source is Dan Kahn's 1976 MIT thesis, “Syllable-based Generalizations in English Phonology”.  There's more to say about the 1970s' introduction into formal phonology of structures beyond phoneme strings (or distinctive feature matrices), but that's a topic for another time.

I recall Malaysia-based New Zealander Nigel Richards' multiple Scrabble championships in English and French from earlier years and thought that I had written about them, but apparently not on Language Log.  Now he has won again, this time in Spanish, so it's about time that he became known to our readership, if they don't already know him..

"Scrabble star wins Spanish world title – despite not speaking Spanish:  Nigel Richards has also been champion in English and – after memorising dictionary in nine weeks – French", Ashifa Kassam in Madrid, The Guardian (12/10/24)

The gap between spoken and written Sinitic is enormous.  In my estimation, it is greater than for any other language I know.  The following are some notes by Ľuboš Gajdoš about why this is so.

"The Discrepancy Between Spoken and Written Chinese — Methodological Notes on Linguistics", Comenius University in Bratislava, Department of East Asian Studies

The issue of choosing language data on which synchronous linguistic research is being done appears in many ways not only to be relevant to the goal of the research, but also to the validity of the research results. The problem which particularly concerns us here is the discrepancy between speech on the one hand and written language on the other. In this context, we have often encountered in the past a situation where the result of the research conducted on a variety of the Chinese language has been generalized to the entire synchronous state of the language, i.e. to all other varieties of the language, while ignoring the mentioned discrepancy between the spoken and written forms. The discrepancy between the spoken and written forms is likely to be present in any natural language with a written tradition, but the degree of difference between languages is uneven:  e.g. compared to the Slovak language, it may be stated that the situation in Chinese is in this respect extraordinary. Nevertheless, it is surprising that the quantitative (qualitative) research on discrepancies between different varieties of the language has not yet aroused the attention of Chinese linguistics to such an extent as would have been adequate for the unique situation of this natural language.

Todays' xkcd:

Mouseover title: "It works because a nautical mile is based on a degree of latitude, and the Earth (e) is a circle."

"Mysterious tablet with unknown language unearthed in Georgia", by Dario Radley, Archeology News (12/4/24)

Tablet with inscription in an unknown language, discovered in Georgia.
Credit: R. Shengelia et al., Journal of Ancient History and Archaeology

When I write in Chinese, I generally use pinyin input.  Yesterday, having finished a message to someone, I entered the following:  meiweiheng.  I was both surprised and pleased that up popped my full name in Chinese characters:  Méi Wéihéng 梅维恒.  In the past, I would usually have to call up the characters one or two at a time and choose the right ones from a list.  The fact that they came up in one fell swoop from "meiweiheng" was exhilarating.  It meant that I must be becoming better known on the Chinese internet.

Curious, I wondered what would turn up if I did a web search in Chinese, and was overwhelmed by the huge number of ghits.  But what briefly puzzled me was why this photograph was included at the top of the very first page:

When I went to the restroom at Heathrow Terminal 5 in London, I was stopped in my tracks by the sign "Cleaner's Sluice" on a door just outside.  I knew what a "sluice" was, in fact I knew several related meanings for sluice:

• • An artificial passage for water, fitted with a valve or gate, for example in a canal lock or a mill stream, for stopping or regulating the flow.
  • A water gate or floodgate.
  • Hence, an opening or channel through which anything flows; a source of supply.
  • The stream flowing through a floodgate.
  • (mining) A long box or trough through which water flows, used for washing auriferous earth.
  • (linguistics) An instance of wh-stranding ellipsis, or sluicing.

(Wiktionary)

That seems to be reader RBM's reaction to the headline "K-Pop Light Sticks Fire up Impeachment Protests in South Korea", Reuters 12/10/2024.

For whatever reason — maybe the picture at the top of the story — I understood the headline immediately. But the Berkeley Neural Parser makes the same mistake as RBM:

Today's SMBC:

According to the publicity page:

One fall day in 2018, Ellen Jovin set up a folding table on a Manhattan sidewalk with a sign that said “Grammar Table.” Right away, passersby began excitedly asking questions, telling stories, and filing complaints.

What happened next is the stuff of grammar legend.

Ellen and her filmmaker husband, Brandt Johnson, took the table on the road, visiting all 50 US states as Brandt shot the grammar action.

Chatting with my London cabbie on a longish ride, I was intrigued by how he frequently referred to "the Knowledge".  He did so respectfully and reverently, as though it were a sacred catechism he had mastered after years of diligent study.  Even though he was speaking, it always sounded as though it came with a capital letter at the beginning.  And rightly so, because it is holy writ for London cabbies.

From The Washington Post:

The Oxford English Dictionary blew it in The Oxford English Dictionary blew it in anointing “brain rot” as the word of the year.

First off, that’s two words. But the real miss was overlooking the rightful winner, “slop,” which was on the dictionary publisher’s short list for word of the year. That’s like Beyoncé losing the top Grammy award to Harry Styles.

From The Economist:

SOME YEARS it is hard to identify the main event, much less sum it up in a word. This is not the problem in 2024; the return of Donald Trump to the White House after a four-year absence is consequential not only for the world’s most powerful country but also for its neighbours and everywhere else. Which word can capture the mix of surprise, excitement and trepidation people feel as the MAGA movement returns to power?