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This blog previously delved into the question of foreign diacritics and whether or not to include them in English text. Mulling this issue again recently

Until very recently, my knowledge of proximal and distal demonstratives could have fitted not so much on a postage stamp as a pin head. That

Are you one of those people who routinely watches TV with the subtitle on because otherwise you can’t understand what the characters are talking about?

This blog has tackled impenetrable texts before when discussing the mysterious runic inscriptions on the Rök stone in Sweden, but few texts can rival the

What is linguistic reappropriation? Linguistic reappropriation (also referred to as reclamation or resignification) is the process by which a word intended as a pejorative is

This blog recently delved into Polari, a form of slang used as a kind of secret language by people working in theatres, fairgrounds and markets

The quality of machine translation output is undoubtedly improving, and translators may be prompted to question their future with increasing volumes of post editing machine

What is Polari? Polari is a form of slang associated with gay subculture, brought to mainstream attention in the UK by Kenneth Williams in Round

Over the last few months, several news stories about language in the UK have caught my eye and prompted me to wonder if there is

During a bleary-eyed start to the day recently, discussion at the breakfast table turned to the pros and cons of different alarm clock devices and

This blog is brought to you by speech recognition, which I was finally forced to embrace having fractured my shoulder cycling at our local velodrome.

Let’s face it, getting side-tracked is all too easy. So it’s not surprising that languages have devised syntactic mechanisms of handling linguistic digression without the

Most translators will be familiar with Microsoft Word’s spell-checker, and probably its grammar checker too. Many is the time those tools have saved me from

This blog recently described a study investigating sound symbolism, in other words non-arbitrary mappings between phonetic properties of speech sounds and their meanings. Researchers described

Getting your name in the dictionary by having something named after you might seem to be a pretty cool achievement, a way to achieve linguistic

Like most translators, I have a love-hate relationship with my spell checker. I begrudgingly admit it regularly saves me from crimes against punctuation and grammar,

Ukraine is currently in the news for all the wrong reasons. Less controversially it has been hanging out in my folder of “unwritten” blog post

This blog recently examined different strategies for solving Codeword puzzles, including frequency analysis or letter counting. This involves using an understanding of the frequency of

Recently this blog took a brief tour of three different approaches to interpreting legal meaning in English law. These strategies range from literal interpretations to

  Look at the shapes depicted on the right. In a 2001 study on sound symbolism, VS Ramachandran and Edward Hubbard report that 95% of

‘Small men command the letter of the law. Great men serve its spirit.’ J.C. Marino The idea that someone might adhere to the letter of

It is only a short while since this blog examined the fraught history of virus naming, but Covid seems determined to keep this topic in

What is a codeword puzzle? A codeword puzzle is a crossword grid in which each letter of the alphabet has been substituted by a number

This week’s blog explores pseudo-anglicisms, words that take lexical elements from English to create a neologism that is unknown in English or used with a

Turn-taking is an essential part of any successful conversation, and interruptions can infringe the ability to exchange information on an equal basis. Many studies over

Language borrowing involves a fascinating process as words transition from having an unmistakably foreign status when they are initially imported to eventually being very much

“Conflict is inevitable, but combat is optional”, as US pastor Max Lucado puts it. Humans may be bound to disagree, but the manner in which

The coronavirus pandemic has cast a fresh spotlight on the phenomenon of geographical naming illnesses. Whether intentional or not, the practice often suggests an element

It is not often you get a chance to shoehorn a discussion of phonetics into dinner table conversation, but a recent mishearing presented an opportunity

Trademarked names can be a tricky problem for translators. It is not unusual to find the source language has a widely used generic term for

Linguists would normally relish the prospect of a dictionary definition entering the public consciousness and becoming a heated topic of debate. But few have wanted

To celebrate this year’s Book Lovers Day (back in August) the language learning marketplace Preply compiled a report on The Most Translated Books in the

According to a survey by the British Council, Latin is only taught at key stage 3 in 2.7% of the UK’s state schools compared to

Translators regularly come across errors, omissions and other indications of documents that are works in progress in the source language. My favourite is when I

BBC’s Law in Action programme recently described an interesting linguistic quirk in Scottish law, which is currently under scrutiny. Under Scots law, jury trials can

Such are the vagaries of the Twitter algorithm you can never quite be sure what will pop up on your timeline. Sometimes it successfully manages

While digging into a bit of historical linguistics, I was reminded of the fact that Frisian is English’s closest relative on the continent, with Scots

This blog has delighted in linguistic pedantry before, but the bar has been set to a whole new height by a group in Quito, Ecuador

Here we delve into the charming world of the contranym, a word that has two distinct meanings that are contradictory or opposite. These words are

Fictional portrayals of translators are not particularly common (although this blog previously reviewed films featuring translators and interpreters), so it was with great excitement that

Everyone makes mistakes. Even translators. I will admit there is a certain pleasure in seeing how translation mistakes can go rogue, sometimes even becoming the

We are all familiar with references to cybersecurity and different forms of encryption to ensure digital information can be exchanged without being intercepted by a

As a dabbler in just two languages (German and English) I have always admired those who master many and are genuine polyglots. Despite my best

Recently I have done some comparison of post-editing and human translation to evaluate the overall quality of the MT engines before they are used. These

Translating idioms is a tricky business at the best of times. But even greater caution is needed when a saying is almost identical in the

What are eggcorns? Mishearings are a common source of amusement to anyone with young children. We have friends who still refer to “school insect days”