Sociolinguistics

The 7th Case: Why Ukrainian Retains the Vocative

While many Slavic languages have simplified their grammar over the centuries, Ukrainian has steadfastly retained the Vocative case—the "7th case"…

5 days ago

The Banned Letter: The History of Ukrainian’s ‘Ґ’ and ‘Ї’

Explore the fascinating political history of the Ukrainian alphabet, where a single letter can act as a revolutionary symbol. This…

5 days ago

Pasporta Servo: The Original Analog Couchsurfing

Decades before Airbnb or Couchsurfing existed, Esperanto speakers built a global, offline hospitality network called Pasporta Servo. By using a…

5 days ago

Meet Ў: The Letter Only Found in Belarusian

Discover the "Short U" (Ў), a unique Cyrillic character found exclusively in the Belarusian alphabet. We explore the linguistics behind…

5 days ago

Narkamaŭka vs. Taraškievica: A Tale of Two Spellings

Explore the fascinating linguistic divide in Belarus, where the choice between the official "Narkamaŭka" spelling and the classical "Taraškievica" is…

5 days ago

Why China Abandoned the “Latin of the East”

For over two millennia, the Sinosphere was united by a written language completely divorced from spoken speech—a "Latin of the…

5 days ago

Inside Kannywood: The Engine of a West African Lingua Franca

Explore how the vibrant film industry of Kano, known as Kannywood, serves as the primary engine for standardizing and spreading…

5 days ago

The Knight in the Panther’s Skin: A 12th-Century Time Capsule

While English speakers struggle to decipher texts from just 500 years ago, modern Georgians can read their 12th-century national epic…

5 days ago

The Aras River Divide: One Language, Two Writing Systems

Separated by the Aras River and two centuries of divergent history, the Azerbaijani language exists in a unique sociolinguistic split:…

5 days ago

A Century of Change: Azerbaijani’s 4 Script Swaps

In the 20th century, Azerbaijani speakers were forced to change their official alphabet three times—from Perso-Arabic to Latin, to Cyrillic,…

5 days ago

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