This week saw the death of Dar, a chimpanzee who was taught American Sign Language.
With the passing of more and more of these animals, it’s time to look at the future of ape language research. What was this work …
Author: Daniel Midgley (page 32 of 41)
What’s in the Copiale Cipher?
Until recently, no one knew. It’s an 18th century document written by a German secret society, and it contains a mixture of ordinary letters and strange symbols. Now, computational linguists have used modern techniques to …
Birds do it. Whales do it. Even elephants are getting in on the act.
No, we’re not talking about using language, but some of our animal friends are having a pretty good try at making human-like sounds. What’s going on?…
Language lovers are buzzing about the new government white paper: Australia in the Asian Century.
It’s got language learning at its heart. So why are linguists cautious about its content? How hard can it be to learn a language, …
A conservative pundit has reignited the debate around the word retard by using it as a slur.
Advocates for people with intellectual disabilities are taking the opportunity to renew their call to “end the r-word”. Is it insensitive to use …
Why do human languages resemble each other?
Is it coincidence, or do our brains come hard-wired with a language? A new experiment suggests another possibility: humans adapt language in ways that make it easier for human brains to process.
Linguist …
Last week saw two political exchanges on the world scene — Julia Gillard’s denunciation of misogyny in Australia, and Joe Biden’s performance in the US Vice Presidential debate.
The two exchanges were notable for their words, but also for their …
Language is always changing. That’s true for spoken languages, but it’s also true for signed languages.
A new study of British Sign Language shows that younger signers are avoiding older, more offensive signs and using new versions instead. What’s with …
Do you read banned books?
It’s Banned Books Week — when we celebrate books that have been targeted for being obscene, indecent, blasphemous, and seditious. Banning (and sometimes burning) books is popular in the USA, but there’s plenty of censorship …
Recent years have seen a groundswell of support for the recognition of Australian Indigenous languages, but the future of many of these languages is in doubt.
Into this environment comes a new Parliamentary report making recommendations for their teaching and …
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