THUH alien, or THEE alien?

It all depends on whether the next word starts with a vowel sound or a consonant sound. At least that’s the story. But one researcher is finding a lot of speakers are doing something very different — especially if they’re speakers of Australian English. What’s going on?

We’re talking to THEE sociolinguist Nick Wilson on this episode of Talk thuh Talk.

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Promo

Promo with Teri Campbell, 2019-03-19: The

Full interview

Interview with Nick Wilson (complete)

Dr Nick Wilson of Macquarie University has done research on THE. Better still, he’s led students through their own research. And he’s found some pretty cool things about just who is saying THUH alien instead of THEE alien. In this interview, Daniel and Nick get down to the details of what this study is finding about how this tiny word is acting a marker of identity.

Thanks to Nick for a fascinating interview, and to the Australian Linguistic Society for making this interview possible.

Also at https://www.patreon.com/posts/25478421

Cutting Room Floor

Cutting Room Floor 356: The

We’re girding our loins for another Cutting Room Floor post!

We start on a serious note: what should the media be doing differently in reporting violence?

Swedish doesn’t mind piling vowels together, but the real winner is Northern Norwegian. Who is the voice of the Star Trek computer? And if you’re an exponent, can you ‘expone’?

Also at https://www.patreon.com/posts/25553231

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Show notes

Don’t Name Them
http://www.dontnamethem.org

No Notoriety
https://nonotoriety.com

New Zealand Is Loath to Use Suspect’s Name to Avoid Amplifying His Cause | New York Times
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/19/world/asia/new-zealand-shooting-suspect-name.html

PHOIBLE
https://phoible.org

Human sound systems are shaped by post-Neolithic changes in bite configuration | Science
http://science.sciencemag.org/content/363/6432/eaav3218

How farming reshaped our smiles and our speech | Science
http://science.sciencemag.org/content/363/6432/1131

Softer, processed foods changed the way ancient humans spoke
https://theconversation.com/softer-processed-foods-changed-the-way-ancient-humans-spoke-113599

Did Dietary Changes Bring Us ‘F’ Words? Study Tackles Complexities of Language’s Origins
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/14/science/language-origins-agriculture.html

Mind Your ‘Fs’ and ‘Vs’: Agriculture May Have Shaped Both Human Jaws and Language – Scientific American
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/mind-your-fs-and-vs-agriculture-may-have-shaped-both-human-jaws-and-language/

The Ability to Pronounce “F” and “V” Sounds Might Have Evolved Along With Diet | Science | Smithsonian
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/ability-pronounce-f-and-v-sounds-might-have-evolved-along-human-diet-180971710/

Cooking And Evolution: Did Softer Foods Give Us The F-Word? : The Salt : NPR
https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2019/03/14/703100483/did-cooking-really-give-us-the-f-word

Holy fudge: soft foods helped humans form ‘f’ and ‘v’ sounds – study | Science | The Guardian
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2019/mar/14/soft-foods-helped-humans-form-f-and-v-sounds-research

The curious reason humans could not say the word ‘farming’ before it even existed
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/2019/03/14/curious-reason-humans-could-not-say-farming-birth-farming/

Humans couldn’t pronounce ‘f’ and ‘v’ sounds before farming developed | New Scientist
https://www.newscientist.com/article/2196580-humans-couldnt-pronounce-f-and-v-sounds-before-farming-developed/

F’s and V’s Might Have Appeared After Agriculture – The Atlantic
https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2019/03/farming-hunter-gatherers-labiodentals-linguistics/584950/

Language Log — F-word diets
http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=42138

Humans couldn’t pronounce ‘f’ and ‘v’ sounds before farming developed : linguistics
https://www.reddit.com/r/linguistics/comments/b169du/humans_couldnt_pronounce_f_and_v_sounds_before/

Urban Dictionary: BIG OOF
https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=BIG%20OOF

I learned my lesson about taking a razor to my eyebrows. Big oof. : blunderyears
https://www.reddit.com/r/blunderyears/comments/avtn6p/i_learned_my_lesson_about_taking_a_razor_to_my/

Turning this franchise around : Tinder https://www.reddit.com/r/Tinder/comments/avv2iw/turning_this_franchise_around/

The Future of Contraception
http://www.publichealthstrategies.net/what-does-it-even-mean-to-be-a-womanif-men-manage-fertility/

Full text of ‘On The Meaning Of Life’ — “contracept” appears p. 120 https://archive.org/stream/in.ernet.dli.2015.470245/2015.470245.On-The_djvu.txt

Strange Planet
https://www.instagram.com/nathanwpylestrangeplanet/?hl=en

Transcript

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