Linguistics Links Worth a Look

Why Study Linguistics? - An informative slideshow produced by the Centre for Languages, Linguistics and Area Studies.

50 Years of Linguistics at MIT - A link to 11 MIT linguistics lectures.

Dyslexie, A Typeface Designed To Help Dyslexics Read - A video explanation about how dyslexics read and how this typeface created by a dyslexic designer improves the reading experience for those who suffer from dyslexia.

Shapecatcher: Unicode Character Recognition - Draw a character in the "drawbox" and this site will provide a list of the most similar unicode characters. The database has 10,877 characters currently. Great for IPA.

North American English Dialects, Based on Pronunciation Patterns - Tons of information, dialect maps and dialect samples.

Happy New Year (Phonetically)

/hæpi: nu:w jɪər/

Hope you all enjoyed your holidays.

Get Your Linguistics Game On

It's vacation week for many so why not play a game. Here are some fun games from the edifying sites Sporcle and Lumosity:

Sporcle - "mentally stimulating diversions"

Can you name the most commonly used words in the English language?
Can you name the words given their IPA pronunciation?
Can you name the triple homophones from the hints below?
Link to list of all language games on Sporcle

Lumosity - "reclaim your brain"

Word Bubbles
Word Sort


Image credit

Phonetic Typing Errors

The zdrankezd dhing habbenet earlier dotay.

What, exactly, is wrong with this sentence?

Here is a hint: It should read, "The strangest thing happened earlier today."

For some odd reason, I kept hitting the wrong keys while typing.

After about a half an hour, I finally noticed that the majority of my typos were the exchange of voiced for voiceless consonants and vice-versa.

Though the International Phonetic Alphabet represents sounds not letters, many of the symbols for sounds are the same as letters from the alphabet.

Because most of the counterpart phonemes are not close to each other on the keyboard, I have no explanation as to why this would have happened other than the fact that I have been reviewing the IPA with my class this week.

Picture credit to labnol.org

Introducing Scwhazam - A Portmanteau Superhero

+
=
Thank you Fussy.

Phonemetry - The Schwa

Phoneme + Poetry = poetry about phonemes

A curvaceous young phoneme called schwa
Said "I never feel strong. It's bizarre!
I'm retiring and meek
And I always sound weak
But in frequency counts - I'm the star!"

from One Stop English

I saw this poem while looking for additional IPA resources for my students. I immediately fell in love with it and thought I would share it with my readers.

P.S. The portmanteau is my creation.

Differentiating Between Phonemes - Theta and Eth

While teaching my class last week I was looking for a better way to illustrate the difference between the "theta" and "eth" phonemes because they are particularly hard for some people to differentiate.

I came across a wonderful post on Notes from a Linguistic Mystic that I have excerpted below:

A Tale of Two TH’s

Say “This thistle” a few times. Now, pay very close attention to the TH sounds at the beginning of each word. Put your hand on your Adam’s Apple (or equivalent area on your neck) while you say them. After a few tries, you’ll notice that, in the words of a friend of mine, the “TH” in “This” is “more buzzy”, or, put more scientifically, voiced. This sound, the TH in “This, That, The, There, Then, Those…”, is called an Eth (pronounced with a voiced, Eth sound). In the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA), it has this symbol:

The TH in “thistle”, or “theater, theory, think, thought, throw, through…” is called a Theta, and is Eth’s voiceless counterpart (Theta is to Eth as T is to D). Theta’s IPA symbol is, shockingly, a theta, as shown here: Aside from voicing, there is no difference between them. The sounds are produced with the tongue in the same position, the tongue is doing the same thing for both, and all the other various phonetic phactors (I couldn’t resist) are the same. The only difference between the the Theta and the Eth is vocal fold vibration, but what a difference it makes.

-Thank you Linguistic Mystic, this is one of the pest (Oops, I meant to say 'best' but I temporarily lost my voice) examples I have seen.