The questions never stop, and neither do we.

  • What’s the past tense of yeet, and why is English past tense so strange?
  • Can etymology help you spell rhythm?
  • Should French teachers have to speak with a Parisian accent?
  • Do’s and don’ts? Dos and don’t’s? Where do the apostrophes go?
  • Why do some people use a trilled [r], when their language doesn’t?
  • Is there a way to tell a language from a dialect once and for all?
  • Are there places where men and women have to speak differently?
  • Is word amnesia contagious?

We take all the questions on this episode of Talk the Talk.

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Promo

TtT promo 2019-05-21 with Teri Campbell: High Valyrian

Daniel and Teri are not big Game of Thrones fans. And they don’t speak High Valyrian. But they could potentially learn it, because it’s one of the more popular languages on Duolingo, the language learning app.

Also at https://www.patreon.com/posts/27016450

Cutting Room Floor

Cutting Room Floor 364: R-R-R-R

Hedvig drops another gem of knowledge about why rhythm is spelled that way, and it doesn’t make Daniel and Ben happy. 

Why use an apostrophe for possessive? Do like the Swedes, and use a colon! What the heck. Punctuation is arbitrary, nothing is forbidden.

Plus: the surprise behind the version of the Lakota language that Kevin Costner spoke in Dances with Wolves.

Also at https://www.patreon.com/posts/cutting-room-364-27097188

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Show notes

Want to Learn to Speak High Valyrian? Duolingo’s ‘Game of Thrones’ Lessons See Spike in Popularity – NBC Chicago
https://www.nbcchicago.com/news/business/High-Valyrian-Duolingo-Game-of-Thrones-Lessons-510096211.html

Duolingo: The Most Popular Language Learning App | Online Course Report
https://www.onlinecoursereport.com/duolingo-the-most-popular-language-learning-app/

Category:Old English strong verbs – Wiktionary
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Category:Old_English_strong_verbs

Old English/Verbs – Wikibooks, open books for an open world
https://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Old_English/Verbs#Strong_verbs

Old English Language Grammar by Cyril Babaev
http://babaev.tripod.com/archive/grammar43.html#8

sprecan – Wiktionary
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/sprecan#Etymology_2

23 difficult words to spell | OxfordWords blog
https://blog.oxforddictionaries.com/2015/08/06/words-everyone-spells-wrong/

Why are ‘rhyme’ and ‘rhythm’ spelled like that?
https://theweek.com/articles/447183/why-are-rhyme-rhythm-spelled-like-that

Laura Bell Bundy’s racist(?) caricature (Message Board)
https://www.broadwayworld.com/board/readmessage.php?thread=1019168

Cardi B Explained What “Okurrr” Means So Now You Can Go Back To Pretending To Be Cool
https://www.buzzfeed.com/shylawatson/cardi-b-explained-what-okurrr-means-so-now-you-can-go-back

Katie Kaboom: I grind my teeth when I walk past this sign in the office. I know why it bothers me, but tbh don't know what else they could have done. DOS AND DON'TS? DO'S AND DON'T'S? Ahh let's call the whole thing off. Sign: THE DO'S AND DONT'S OF…
Meme: There are four rules

Why Languages and Dialects Really Are Different Animals
https://thewire.in/culture/why-languages-and-dialects-really-are-different-animals

Macrolanguage vs. Dialect – A Linguist in the Wild
http://www.personal.psu.edu/ejp10/blogs/thinking/2008/04/macrolanguage-vs-dialect.html

What’s the difference between a language and a dialect?
https://www.pri.org/stories/2017-06-21/dialect-versus-language-whats-big-deal

Online calculator: Levenshtein Distance
https://planetcalc.com/1721/

Mutual intelligibility between closely related language in Europe. (PDF)
https://www.rug.nl/research/portal/files/49613447/Mutual_intelligibility_between_closely_related_language.pdf

Ubang: The Nigerian village where men and women speak different languages – BBC News
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-45262081

When women and men speak differently – Oxford Scholarship
https://www.oxfordscholarship.com/view/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198723752.001.0001/acprof-9780198723752-chapter-9

5 Cultures Where Men and Women Really Don’t Speak the Same Language – K International
https://www.k-international.com/blog/men-and-women-dont-speak-the-same-language/

Retrieval-Induced Forgetting – an overview | ScienceDirect Topics
https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/neuroscience/retrieval-induced-forgetting

On the role of item similarity in retrieval-induced forgetting. – PubMed – NCBI
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11958725

Tip of the Tongue and Retrieval-Induced Forgetting: Selection and Inhibition Accounts | ScienceBlogs
https://scienceblogs.com/developingintelligence/2007/04/20/post-12

Memory loss: When to seek help – Mayo Clinic
https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/alzheimers-disease/in-depth/memory-loss/art-20046326

Transcript

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