language change

The Secret Code of Scribes

Before the printing press, scribes used a secret code of symbols and shortcuts to write faster and save precious parchment.…

5 months ago

Hey Siri: The Unwritten Grammar of Voice Commands

Have you ever noticed you talk to Siri differently than you talk to a person? We've developed a unique "Machine…

5 months ago

English Doublets: Words That Deceive

** Have you ever wondered why *shirt* and *skirt* sound so similar? They are "etymological doublets"—words from the same root…

5 months ago

Language Carbon Dating: The Science of Glottochronology

Ever wonder how linguists estimate when languages like Spanish and French split from their common ancestor? The answer lies in…

5 months ago

The Linguistics of ‘Google It’: When Brands Become Verbs

Ever wonder how "Google" went from a company name to a common verb in our dictionary? This article explores the…

5 months ago

The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows

Have you ever felt a longing for a place you've never been, or the bittersweetness of a fleeting moment you…

5 months ago

The Balkan Sprachbund: A Linguistic Melting Pot

What happens when unrelated languages live side-by-side for centuries? In the Balkans, languages as different as Albanian, Greek, and Romanian…

5 months ago

The Comma That Rules a Nation

The U.S. Second Amendment's meaning hinges on a single, hotly debated comma. This grammatical ambiguity has fueled a centuries-long battle…

5 months ago

The Press That Froze Language

The invention of the printing press was a revolution not just for knowledge, but for language itself. Before Gutenberg, language…

5 months ago

How Dictionaries Decide Who Lives and Who Dies

Ever wonder how words like "rizz" become official while others fade away into obscurity? This post goes behind the scenes…

5 months ago

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