Archive for Linguistics in the comics
Further mystification of the Japanese writing system
"Baby Pikachu? Japan panel weighs accepting unconventional readings of kanji for names"
KYODO, STAFF REPORT
The Japan Times (May 19, 2022)
What’s in a name? In Japanese, that’s complicated. [VHM: You can say that again! One of the hardest tasks in my graduate training as a Sinologist was learning how to pronounce Japanese proper nouns correctly. This is one of the reasons I wrote the dictionary described in this post.]
An advisory body to the justice minister has compiled a draft proposal on whether and how to accept — and record on the family register — unconventional kanji readings of names for newborns and naturalized citizens. In one cited example of so-called kirakira (sparkly) names, it would be acceptable for the kanji characters 光宙 read as pikachū, which could be a hit for fans of the Pokemon universe.
The proposal is part of the ministry’s push for digitalization of the family register, an effort that would be better facilitated by adding hiragana and katakana readings to kanji names.
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xkcd on statistical language
Today's xkcd:
Mouseover title: "Donate now to help us find a cure for causality. No one should have to suffer through events because of other events."
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Musical languages
The latest Dinosaur Comics:
The mouseover title: "whistle morse code with dot as a D note and dash as a G flat and you're already there, laying down the sickest of beats. a truly unwell beat"
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Advanced techniques
I'm in the process of composing a "cheat sheet" of DSP techniques for ling525, so today's xkcd is right on time:
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Headline words
The current xkcd:
The mouseover title: "Roundly-condemned headlinese initiative shuttered indefinitely."
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