Neuroscience
Today's Times has a story about linguists and anthropologists who try to recreate "dead" languages.
Linguists Find the Words, and Pocahontas Speaks Again
By JOHN NOBLE WILFORD
Published: March 7, 2006
See especially the chart, "Giving Voice to Lost Language", which shows the recreation of some Algonquian words that eventually passed into English, like raccoon and tomahawk.
- British & Irish Genes: Not That Far Apart
Last Tuesday's Science Times describes a new view of inhabitants of the United Kingdom as defined by geneticists at Oxford. "Historians teach that [the Brits & Irish] are mostly descended from different peoples: the Irish from the Celts and the English...
- A Linguistic Anthropologist In Brazil
Heard an interview with linguistic anthropologist Dan Everett (mp3) on "Sci Pod", New Scientist's podcast. Everett talks about the Piraha (pronounced "pita ha", best I can tell without a phonetic alphabet) people's lack of words for numbers and...
- Talks With Whales
Research News from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute: Warbling Whales Speak a Language All Their Own “Researchers have now mathematically confirmed that whales have their own syntax that uses sound units to build phrases that can be combined to form...
- Road Trip For Linguists
A New York Times linguistics road trip through the “Inland North Region” (upstate New York & Pittsburgh, in the story) with William Labov’s Atlas of North American English as a guide. In a useful twist for linguists, and an interesting application...
- More About Al Sayyid Bedouin Sign Language
The New York Times reported on Feb. 1, 2005 about a new sign language developing in the Negev desert of Israel. More recently, New Scientist covered the story as well, in their Oct. 22, 2005 issue. In A language is born, Michael Erard reports several...
Neuroscience
Recreating a Lost Language
Today's Times has a story about linguists and anthropologists who try to recreate "dead" languages.
Linguists Find the Words, and Pocahontas Speaks Again
By JOHN NOBLE WILFORD
Published: March 7, 2006
See especially the chart, "Giving Voice to Lost Language", which shows the recreation of some Algonquian words that eventually passed into English, like raccoon and tomahawk.
- British & Irish Genes: Not That Far Apart
Last Tuesday's Science Times describes a new view of inhabitants of the United Kingdom as defined by geneticists at Oxford. "Historians teach that [the Brits & Irish] are mostly descended from different peoples: the Irish from the Celts and the English...
- A Linguistic Anthropologist In Brazil
Heard an interview with linguistic anthropologist Dan Everett (mp3) on "Sci Pod", New Scientist's podcast. Everett talks about the Piraha (pronounced "pita ha", best I can tell without a phonetic alphabet) people's lack of words for numbers and...
- Talks With Whales
Research News from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute: Warbling Whales Speak a Language All Their Own “Researchers have now mathematically confirmed that whales have their own syntax that uses sound units to build phrases that can be combined to form...
- Road Trip For Linguists
A New York Times linguistics road trip through the “Inland North Region” (upstate New York & Pittsburgh, in the story) with William Labov’s Atlas of North American English as a guide. In a useful twist for linguists, and an interesting application...
- More About Al Sayyid Bedouin Sign Language
The New York Times reported on Feb. 1, 2005 about a new sign language developing in the Negev desert of Israel. More recently, New Scientist covered the story as well, in their Oct. 22, 2005 issue. In A language is born, Michael Erard reports several...