Lexicon Valley
305 episodes — Page 3 of 7
Ep 205Why Do Languages Have Gender?
Why do so many languages divvy up nouns into seemingly arbitrary categories? Visit Lexicon Valley. A Booksmart Studios production. Episode 205: "Why Do Languages Have Gender?" With John McWhorter. Produced and edited by Mike Vuolo. All rights reserved. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 204Forgetting Your Roots
When the apple falls far from the tree. Visit Lexicon Valley. A Booksmart Studios production. Episode 204: "Forgetting Your Roots." With John McWhorter. Produced and edited by Mike Vuolo. All rights reserved. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 203Future English Speaker, Can You Read Me?
At what point will the language we speak now be incomprehensible to our progeny? Visit Lexicon Valley. A Booksmart Studios production. Episode 203: "Future English Speaker, Can You Read Me?" With John McWhorter. Produced and edited by Mike Vuolo. All rights reserved. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 202Getting Got
The many subtle nuances of one of our most common verbs. Visit Lexicon Valley. A Booksmart Studios production. Episode 202: "Getting Got." With John McWhorter. Produced and edited by Mike Vuolo. All rights reserved. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 201On the Origin of English
A fringe theory about English for which the evidence is intriguing. Visit Lexicon Valley. A Booksmart Studios production. Episode 201: "On the Origin of English." With John McWhorter. Produced and edited by Mike Vuolo. All rights reserved. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 200White Author, Black English. Problem?
Is it appropriation for a white novelist to render Black speech? X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 199Do Cats Have Language?
The way that animals communicate is fascinating, yes, but a far cry from human speech. X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 198Sergeant, Corporal, Colonel
The peculiar language of our military ranks. X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 197To Reason Why
How come? What for? The many ways to ask why. X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 196When Talking to Your Mother-in-Law Is a Minefield
On codeswitching among family members and relations. X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 195The Incredible Story of the Traveling Creole
A creole language that boomeranged between two continents. X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 194This Am a Minstrel Stereotype, Right?
On Black English and the verb to be. X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 193When Jews Adapted Spanish
Linguistic inspiration from historian Alan Mikhail’s new book God’s Shadow: Sultan Selim, His Ottoman Empire, and the Making of the Modern World. X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 192Does English Have a Future?
Do languages even need a future tense, or can we get along just fine without it? X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 191Defund Karen
Social justice movements yield a trove of new catchphrases and words. X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 190Beyond the Five Ws
Inquiring around the world. X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 189Tweety Bird and Toddlerspeak
How do children pick up language so readily? X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 188Coronavirus: Isolation and Aspiration
Are certain consonants to blame for spreading germs? X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 187Our Indigenous Languages
The wonderfully complex Native American tongues. X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 186I Just Can't!
Yes, linguists have language peeves too. X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 185The Many Meanings of Too
The word too is far more versatile than you think. X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 184Sicko, Whacko, Weirdo
What's with that long o sound we stick on the ends of words like neato and, yes, fatso? X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 183A Myth Surrounding Mandarin
Chinese has no grammar, right? Wrong! X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 182From Uptalk to Vocal Fry
Women are the most prolific language innovators. X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 181In What Order Did Languages Arrive in Europe?
Cutting edge research gives linguists new insight. X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 180Digging Up the Past
It may be ancient history, but we need a way to talk about it. X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 179Verbs on the Move
Like the boy said in that song: you come and go, you come and go. We all do. X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 178Does Processes Rhyme With Knees?
Is our pretentiousness causing us to pronounce words wrong? X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 177A Bisl Yiddish
Yiddish is the gefilte fish of Germanic languages. X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 176Private Parts
How did cock come to mean a male chicken and a penis? X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 175The Soft Power of Like
Words and phrases that are often dismissed as filler are actually conveying politeness. X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 174Men, Women and Children
The weird plurals of sentient beings. X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 173Zombie English
Dead parts of our language have a way of sticking around. X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 172Let's Do Lunch
Come table-hopping as we discuss the linguistic quirks of mealtime terms. X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 171How to Think Like a Linguist
The alphabet doesn't quite capture the many sounds we make. X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 170Has English Gotten Less Complex?
English pronouns in particular have simplified over time. X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 169S#!t, Hell, and Darn
Dissecting three common curse words. X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 168This Family Speaks 1,200 Languages
From Javanese to Tagalog, the wonderful Austronesian languages. X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 167Language vs. Dialect
A language is a dialect with an army, to paraphrase a renowned linguist. X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 166The Internet Loves the Exclamation Point!!
On some of the deep forces that shape human language. X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 165Why Is “Ph” Pronounced That Way?
We have two F sounds in English but only one is spelled with the letter F. X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 164Does Language Affect Thought?
Another look at the so-called Whorf Hypothesis, the idea that the language you speak affects your perception of the world. X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 163A Fleeting Glance
Reflections on transience. X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 162The Romance Languages
On French, Spanish, Italian, etc. — otherwise known as the Romances. X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 161Why Do Some Americans Say Warshed?
Why do people often pronounce an R sound where it doesn't belong? X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 160Flores Man vs. Sulawesi
A linguistic mystery on an island archipeligo of Indonesia. X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 159The Lingua Francas
You could speak fluently with half the world's population if you knew these 20 or so languages. X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 158Can Climate Influence Language?
As many as half the world's languages are tonal, but a tiny fraction are spoken in arid climates. X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 157When Ain’t Was All Right
On the the first person singular of to be. X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ep 156The Semitic Tongues
On the triconsonantal roots of Semitic languages. X: @lexiconvalleyFacebook: facebook.com/LexiconValleyWebsite: booksmartstudios.com/LexiconValley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices