Archive for Featured
Linguistics and Literature: Symmetry or Fiction?
by Tyler McPeek, Ph.D., Assistant Professor, Nagoya University of Commerce and Business *Note: this paper is part of the FLA Proceedings and has been accepted in revised and expanded form for inclusion in the 2017 FLA Journal of Language. Paper was presented: March 13, 2016. Gainesville, Florida, USA I’ve been…
Subfields of Linguistics: What is Phonology?
Welcome to the first article in the Subfields of Linguistics series, “What Is Phonology?” Phonology deals with the sound structures of languages. A linguist who focuses on this subfield is known as a phonologist. A crucial precursor to phonology is phonetics. By studying phonetics, linguistics get to know the sounds…
The Future of the English Language as a Global Lingua Franca
–Article by Tyler McPeek In some of my classes, students tell me that their professors in non-linguistics classes often wax-philosophical about the inevitability of Chinese as the next global lingua franca. Sometimes they even present it as an imminent development that has already started to take a foothold, due to…
The peculiarities of prescriptive versus descriptive grammar
–Article by Joel Deacon To get the basics of what grammar is and the distinction between prescriptive and descriptive grammar, please read Lee Ballard’s blog post “What is Grammar?” Prescriptive and Descriptive Grammar in the Classroom: Perhaps the term prescriptive grammar is more relevant when one is teaching a language…
What is Grammar?
–Article by Lee Ballard If we asked people to brainstorm on what they think about when they hear the word “grammar,” I think we would get some interesting results. When the word “grammar” comes up in conversation, I’ve noticed that people I meet regularly confuse it with a few things,…
How many languages should a linguist speak?
“Oh, you’re a linguist! How many languages do you speak?” –Article by Dong-yi Lin “What’s your major?” “Linguistics.” “So how many languages do you speak?” “Well, ah, mmm, you know, ……” This constructed dialogue depicts a scenario that many linguistics students have encountered or will eventually encounter in life. As…