Thing what I learned today (warning: contains language)

I listened to language/linguistics podcasts on my walk in this morning. One of them was the episode of Slate's Lexicon Valley featuring an interview with Melissa Mohr, whose book Holy Sh*t is about the history of swearing. It's fascinating on all sorts of fronts -- the talk about Roman use of body parts as insults based on their own sense of sexual propriety (put simply: It's better to be a pitcher than a catcher, which probably tells you everything you need to know about their society in regards to gender roles; there's likely a reason that the most prominent hater of women on the interwebs these days uses a Latin name.)

But the Roman stuff is only the beginning.

( warning: Contains an offensivev word you'll likely never hear me utter out loud )

Thing what I learned today (warning: contains language)

I listened to language/linguistics podcasts on my walk in this morning. One of them was the episode of Slate's Lexicon Valley featuring an interview with Melissa Mohr, whose book Holy Sh*t is about the history of swearing. It's fascinating on all sorts of fronts -- the talk about Roman use of body parts as insults based on their own sense of sexual propriety (put simply: It's better to be a pitcher than a catcher, which probably tells you everything you need to know about their society in regards to gender roles; there's likely a reason that the most prominent hater of women on the interwebs these days uses a Latin name.)

But the Roman stuff is only the beginning.

( warning: Contains an offensive word you'll likely never hear me utter out loud )

Question for the Canadians

As mentioned in the last post, I listened to language-oriented podcasts en route to work today. One of these was an episode of PRI's The World in Words in which Patrick Cox interviewed Julie Barlow, co-author of The Story of Spanish.

It was a great interview overall (and one that absolutely sold me on the book, as there's a history of Spanish that makes French seem dull, frankly), but at one point, Barlow noted the influence of "Celtic" words, and pronounced that word with a soft C, like one might when talking about the Boston basketball team.

That's something that would annoy me from anyone, and doubly so from a linguist, but I also know, as someone who stumbles around spoken words all the time, that it's easy to mess up. But neither she nor Patrick seemed bothered by it, so I'm wondering: are there parts of the world (specifically parts of Canada*) where this is the accepted pronunciation?

Normally, I chalk this up to a reader's vocabulary (someone who's seen the word in print, but never heard it uttered), but I doubt that's the case here.

(Aside: If you like language podcasts, both the aforementioned Lexicon Valley and PRI's The World in Words are worth listening to.)

*Per her Wikipedia page, Barlow is from Hamilton, Ontario

Question for the Canadians

As mentioned in the last post, I listened to language-oriented podcasts en route to work today. One of these was an episode of PRI's The World in Words in which Patrick Cox interviewed Julie Barlow, co-author of The Story of Spanish.

It was a great interview overall (and one that absolutely sold me on the book, as there's a history of Spanish that makes French seem dull, frankly), but at one point, Barlow noted the influence of "Celtic" words, and pronounced that word with a soft C, like one might when talking about the Boston basketball team.

That's something that would annoy me from anyone, and doubly so from a linguist, but I also know, as someone who stumbles around spoken words all the time, that it's easy to mess up. But neither she nor Patrick seemed bothered by it, so I'm wondering: are there parts of the world (specifically parts of Canada*) where this is the accepted pronunciation?

Normally, I chalk this up to a reader's vocabulary (someone who's seen the word in print, but never heard it uttered), but I doubt that's the case here.

(Aside: If you like language podcasts, both the aforementioned Lexicon Valley and PRI's The World in Words are worth listening to.)

*Per her Wikipedia page, Barlow is from Hamilton, Ontario

Little-known fact about DC's New 52

Since the New 52 reboot, Superman has made over $10,000 saving the world from Solomon Grundy.

Little-known fact about DC's New 52

Since the New 52 reboot, Superman has made over $10,000 saving the world from Solomon Grundy.