Language Log

I don't think we've had one of these before.

In many earlier posts (e.g. "Candidates must be a student", 4/16/2009; "Xtreme singular they", 4/18/2008; "'Singular they', God said it, I believe it, that settles it", 9/13/2006; "They are a prophet", 10/21/2004), we've noted that they/them/their is often used with non-specific singular human antecedents, not only as an alternative to "he or she", "him or her", "his or hers", but even in cases where the sex of the antecedent is known.

But here's a case where the antecedent is a snake, and a generically definite one at that ("How spitting cobras shoot for the eyes", Discover Magazine 5/14/2010):

It may seem a bit daft to provoke a snake that can poison you from afar, but Young’s antics were all part of an attempt to show just how spitting cobras make their shots. Their venom is a potent defensive weapon, but it’s also completely useless if it lands on the skin or even in the mouth. To work, the cobra must aim for the eyes. Just think about how hard that is. The cobra must hit a moving target that’s up to 1.5 metres away, using a squirt gun attached to their mouth.

Andrew Jacobs' article on Shanghai's efforts to unmangle Chinglish generated tremendous interest — for several days it was the most e-mailed NYT article.  The Chinglish fervor also spawned a broader interest in strange signs from all over the world.  Several friends have called to my attention this wonderful collection of bizarre notices, placards, and postings in the Times that were sent in by bemused travellers.

Following up on "I'ma", 7/3/2005, Brett Reynolds sends this clip from the Art Blakey Quintet's A Night At Birdland, Vol. 2 [Live], the end of track 4, Now's The Time:

A transcription:

"Yes, sir, I'ma stay with the youngsters. When these get too old,  I'ma get some younger ones."

Hey, I hadn't realized that Language Log is now on Facebook and you can "like" it (in the old days that was becoming a "fan"). My dear son Morriss, the social media maven in our family, tipped me off! I've linked to it on my own Facebook page, but I expect word will spread faster by mentioning it right here. Someone will have to explain in the comments when and why it happened — I can only say it has happened!

Following up on their recent article about Chinglish, the NYT has a collection of "Strange Signs From Abroad" contributed by readers, confirming that sign-makers in less far-away languages are also sometimes too trusting of dictionary entries in languages they don't know very well:

Language Log reader Jan Dawson saw the preposition phrase of diversity in this passage, and knew immediately what it meant:

"Any practitioner of diversity will tell you that you can't bring in a few token people and get a real diversity of viewpoint," said Pamela Harris, the executive director of the Supreme Court Institute at the Georgetown Law Center. (http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/11/us/politics/11women.html)

It seemed fairly clear to Jan (and I think she's right) that of diversity here means something like "belonging to one of the formerly excluded groups associated with references to diversity such as women, Hispanics, African Americans, etc." — it's analogous to the common meaning of the phrase of color in phrases like person of color.

This is (meant to be) funny rather than accurate:

[Via Joe.My.God.]

That's the greatest philosopher in the world speaking, in a little book I'm reading so that I better understand the American spirit – Ayn Rand's Atlas shrugged, Random House, 1957; p. 735 in the 1992 edition.  Perhaps Rand had a really, really dry sense of humor.

How's this for a clever knock-off?

The most recent xkcd:

The title text (visible on mouseover as usual): "The article has twenty-three citations, one of which is an obscure manuscript from the 1490's and the other twenty-two are arguments on LanguageLog."

Jean-Paul Nerrière's "Globish" hits the media again, this time because Robert McCrum is using his space at the Guardian to push a new book with the same title. According to McCrum, "the globalisation of English, and English literature, law, money and values, is the cultural revolution of my generation" ("How English erased its roots to become the global tongue of the 21st Century", 5/9/2010).

The last time I posted about Globish ("Another day, another reprinted press release", 4/24/2005), I complained that the International Herald Tribune uncritically reprinted a nearly contentless press release promoting Nerrière's books and other products.  McCrum's book excerpt in the Guardian is quite different — it's chock full of what looks to me like a lot of mutually incompatible information, opinion, and analysis, most of it old news being passed off as the new new thing.

If you knew the background, you could see this one coming: "Welcome Replaces Costly for Honduras", NYT 5/10/2010: