cognition

Kennings: The Metal-Crushing Metaphors of Old English

Explore the metal-crushing metaphors and poetic riddles of Old English known as Kennings. From the "whale-road" to the "bone-house", discover…

5 days ago

Malapropisms: The Linguistics of the Wrong Word

Named after the character Mrs. Malaprop from a 1775 play, malapropisms are linguistic errors where a speaker substitutes a correct-sounding…

5 days ago

Broken Plurals: Why Arabic Rejects Suffixes

Unlike English, which relies on suffixes to denote plurality, Arabic utilizes "Broken Plurals"—a system where words are shattered and rearranged…

6 days ago

A Measure for Everything: How Mandarin Categorizes the World

In Mandarin Chinese, you cannot simply say "three books"—grammatical rules force speakers to categorize the world through specific classifiers based…

6 days ago

Nivkh’s 26 Ways to Count: A Linguistic Marvel

Explore the fascinating linguistic landscape of the Nivkh language, where counting isn't as simple as 1, 2, 3. With over…

6 days ago

Oulipo: Writing Under Constraint

Discover Oulipo, the French literary group that combines mathematics and writing to prove that strict constraints are the key to…

6 days ago

Bridge Bidding: A Syntactic Card Game

Contract Bridge is more than a game of strategy; it is a complex linguistic exercise involving a rigid syntax and…

6 days ago

CamelCase vs. snake_case: The Grammar of Code

In the dialect of computer programming, spaces are illegal, forcing coders to adopt unique orthographic rules like CamelCase and snake_case…

6 days ago

Ambigrams: When Art Meets Typography

Explore the fascinating intersection of cognitive science and typography through ambigrams—words designed to be read from multiple orientations. This post…

6 days ago

Tic-Tac: The Hand Signals of Bookmakers

Explore the fascinating "closed kinetic system" of Tic-Tac, the dying sign language of British racecourse bookmakers. This article analyzes how…

6 days ago

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