Category: interviews (page 3 of 7)

314: International Mother Language Day (featuring Ingrid Piller)

How do we keep mother languages alive?

Governments, organisations, and the public are starting to recognise the importance of maintaining home languages as a way of preserving language diversity. But how do we do this? Where are we falling short?…

313: That’s Cool. That’s Hot. (featuring Maria Koptjevskaja Tamm)

Boiling with rage. A warm embrace. A cool time in a hot town.

How do we think about heat and cold, and how does this work its way into language? And does this have anything to do with what the …

306: Deception Detection (featuring Victoria Rubin, Sarah Cornwell, and Sophie Richard)

Sometimes it can be hard to tell the real news from the fake news.

But language researchers are building tools that can detect deception online. And they’re working on detecting satire. Can their system spot the fakes better than you …

305: Updating Shakespeare (featuring the artists of the Oregon Shakespeare Festival)

Time to check in on Shakespeare.

Away from the glare of the footlights, the Play On! project is underway to translate all the Bard’s works into Present-Day English. How is it progressing? What’s staying, and what’s going?

We’re talking to …

303: Creoles 2 (featuring John McWhorter, Knut Olawsky, & Ji-Soo Kweon)

We’re continuing our discussion of a controversial paper about how new languages get started.

When you start talking about creole languages, the linguistic becomes the political very quickly. So what are linguists saying about this work? And is there anything …

302: Creoles 1 (featuring Damián Blasi)

How do Creole languages arise?

A controversial new paper is rocking the linguistic world. Are Creole languages different from other languages? How do they start? And what does this all mean about the human language ability?

Daniel Midgley speaks with …

296: Geophonetics, Round 3 (featuring Caleb Everett)

What’s the relationship between climate and sound?

A linguist has released a trio of papers showing that the sounds we use may be influenced by the air we breathe.

Is there anything to it? How have other scientists reacted? And …

294: Trademarks and Slurs (featuring Simon Tam)

Freedom of expression is again in the news.

Simon Tam has won his case before the US Supreme Court, allowing him to trademark the name of his all-Asian rock band, the Slants. But this ruling opens the door to …

286: Lexical Appropriation (featuring Nicole Holliday)

Are some words off-limits?

Many of us are aware of cultural appropriation: using symbols and clothing that pertain to another culture without attribution. But how does this relate to language? Is it okay to use the slang that originates …

281: The Emoji Code (featuring Vyvyan Evans)

Why does everyone ❤️ and 😡 emoji?

Emoji have been received enthusiastically in our electronic communication, and yet complaints about them continue. Is there anything wrong with using them? Are they really the equivalent of modern-day hieroglyphics? Do they represent …

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