Avsnitt
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Australian magpies are even cleverer birds than we thought. New research from Dr Stephanie Mason shows that they do two language-like things we used to think only humans could do: learn their calls socially, and combine their calls in a way that looks a lot like syntax. So are we calling this language? If so, how are the linguists taking it? Stephanie joins us to talk about magpies, media, and the territoriality of linguists.
Timestamps
00:00 Start
00:54 Intros: Your favourite bird
07:10 What's coming up: Magpies
09:34 Join us! Patreon spruikery
11:32 News: Jamaican MP shut down for speaking Jamaican in Parliament
19:35 News: Whale phonology
31:46 News: Unicode to include new genderless pronoun for Mandarin
36:37 News: China and the Rubio Workaround
38:16 Related or Not: New theme from Hugh!
40:05 Related or Not 1: SLAP, SMACK, and SWAT
45:45 Related or Not 2: SOUND
56:13 Related or Not 3: SPECK, SPECKLE, SPECTRE, and SPECTRUM
01:00:36 Talking about magpies with Stephanie Mason
01:03:38 About Australian magpies
01:06:17 The problem of anthropomorphism
01:15:21 What's the semantic content?
01:22:52 Linguists can be territorial about language
01:34:48 Social complexity drives new behaviours
01:45:19 Magpies learn their calls socially
01:49:42 Magpies combine their calls
01:58:44 Magpies learn calls across the lifespan
02:05:36 Finding those birds
02:08:10 Doing public engagement: Are metaphors actually helping?
02:17:26 Words of the Week: mog
02:24:54 Word of the Week: pied-à-terre
02:27:48 Word of the Week: dummymander
02:33:03 Word of the Week: Sooooo-ee!
02:39:22 Etymology of Guacamole
02:39:35 Comment: guacamole = testicle sauce?
02:41:28 The reads
02:46:28 Outtake -
Wherever Irish speakers in the world get together, you can have a "pop-up Gaeltacht"! And we're having one on this episode. We've got author and TG4 presenter Laura Pakenham taking us through the history and orthography of this great and resilient language. Laura is the author of Irish: History and Culture Through Language.
Timestamps
00:00 Start
00:24 Introducing Laura Pakenham
10:12 About Laura: Getting the gig
15:01 Navigating "correct" usage v. common usage
21:05 Different Irish voices on TG4
21:56 Getting feedback from Gaeilge speakers
24:33 Gaeilge as it is today
30:15 Irish is fun and cool, not so much a duty anymore
37:55 On coming to Irish as a learner
41:30 Related or Not: Theme
42:49 Related or Not: JIG, GIGUE, and JOG
49:51 Related or Not: HEATH, HEATHER, and HEATHEN
56:31 Related or Not: SCRAP and SCRUPLES
01:01:10 Gaeilge orthography and phonology
01:08:37 Gaeilge words and idioms
01:13:36 Why are things often referred to as "she"?
01:15:43 Favourite Irish words?
01:17:40 Irish diaspora and its linguistic impact
01:21:30 Advice for language advocates
01:23:59 The reads -
Saknas det avsnitt?
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What goes on in our minds when we construct an utterance? Linguists often use syntax trees to represent the structure of sentences, but are they psychologically real? Yngwie Nielsen and Dr Morten Christiansen have found evidence for something else: we can recognise patterns in strings of words, even when they don't form coherent "treelets". They're giving us a walkthrough of their latest work.
Timestamps
00:00 Start
00:31 Introductions: Yngwie and Morten
05:19 Insights into linguistics communication
07:45 What are syntax trees?
09:13 Why linguists love syntax trees
14:15 Treelets vs chunks: Looking beyond hierarchical structure
17:46 Wanna and gonna: Words that cross treelet boundaries
22:43 How to prime someone
28:18 Priming in this experiment: People do recognise chunks
32:26 Are people just filling in the treelet blanks?
35:23 Were they accidentally smuggling in treelets?
38:47 Do we process both treelets and chunks?
42:23 DensiTrees: A way of representing fuzzy networks
44:01 What are we doing mentally when we make an utterance?
47:20 What is language for?
49:29 Grammatical glue: How do we connect chunks?
53:23 Being able to language is bonkers
56:30 Should we be studying language differently?
01:01:09 Wrap-up and goodbyes -
What will happen to the languages of climate refugees? Dr Mary Walworth has been working with the small island community of Nusi in Papua New Guinea, which was recently featured in an episode of Pole to Pole with Will Smith. What's it like doing media for a large audience, and more importantly, how do we help speakers hold onto their language? Dr Walworth joins us for this episode.
Timestamps
00:00 Start
00:45 Intros
04:00 What's coming up on this episode
06:58 New patron shoutout and spruik
09:05 News: Air Canada CEO resigns over English communication
14:34 News: Banning foreign language election information in the UK
23:54 News: Can LLMs pass the Wug Test?
34:03 News: Does closing your eyes help you hear better?
39:48 Related or Not: Theme
40:23 Related or Not: GORGE, ENGORGE, and GORGEOUS
48:09 Related or Not: ANY and MANY
51:54 Related or Not: GUAVA, GUACAMOLE, GUARANÍ, GUARANÁ
01:00:20 Interview with Mary Walworth
01:45:52 Word of the Week: bimbofication
01:54:00 Word of the Week: glottophobia
01:55:50 Word of the Week: liveness check
01:57:54 Comment from Colin: CLAN and PLANTA
01:59:03 Comment from Lauren: crash blossoms
02:02:49 The Reads
02:08:09 Outtake -
"More people have listened to this episode than you have." Why does this sentence look so right, but feel so wrong? When your grammar says one thing, but your brain says another, you may have found a linguistic illusion. We're talking to Dr Dan Parker, author of Linguistic Illusions: A Case Study on Agreement Attraction.
Video for this episode: https://youtu.be/_9BcmMZrH7s
Timestamps
Start: 0:00 Intros: 0:27 News: 6:30 Related or Not: 34:22 Interview with Dan Parker: 49:53 Words of the Week: 1:38:00 Comment: 1:54:16 The Reads: 1:58:19 Outtakes: 2:05:39 -
How do you define what blue is? What even IS colour? Turns out, the quest to define colours was happening along with a standardisation crisis and a dictionary crisis at the venerable Merriam-Webster. Lexicographer and author Kory Stamper tells us all about it, and about her new book True Color.
Timestamps
Start: 0:00 Intros: 1:17 News: 12:40 Related or Not: 33:34 Chat with Kory Stamper, author of True Color: 50:43 Words of the Week: 1:41:58 Comment from Lauretta: 2:04:57 The Reads: 2:08:14 Outtakes: 2:16:48 -
We all have an accent — or several! And we use them to communicate things about us, and highlight aspects of our identity. So what's going on with the accents we hear? Are we losing some accents, or are they just changing? Dr Valerie Fridland is the author of Why We Talk Funny, and she joins us for this episode.
Timestamps
Start: 0:00 Intros: 0:30 News: 6:25 Related or Not: 17:59 Interview with Valerie Fridland: 36:53 Words of the Week: 1:50:34 The Reads: 2:21:21 Outtakes: 2:26:14 -
We're talking to Dr Kelly Wright, friend of the show and data czar for the American Dialect Society. They run the biggest and most prestigious Word of the Year event, and she was there when the 2025 WotY votes came in. She's talking us through all the words we missed. Plus we get to some listener feedback.
Timestamps
Start: 0:00 Intros: 0:41 The ADS WotYs for 2025: 7:12 Related or Not: 1:00:51 Listener comments: 1:09:53 The Reads: 1:20:28 Outtakes: 1:27:01Video version of this episode:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PXpfrXdWEW8
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Video for this episode: https://youtu.be/Mqf05kN-TaI
It's Word of the Year season, and we're counting down our Words of the Week of the Year! In the time-honoured tradition, we gathered them all up from our 2025 shows, and let everyone vote. And we're going to give a mention to everyone else's words as well. We're joined by our friends and patrons, so come see them in chat!
Timestamps
Start: 0:00 Intros: 1:31 Everyone else's words: 5:57 Related or Not: 34:34 Our Words of the Week of the Year: 51:35 Comments: 1:22:04 The Reads: 1:26:36 Outtakes: 1:30:50 -
You know the story. The language you speak doesn't determine your savings. If your language has a future tense, there's no impact on the way you see or describe the future. Language and perception are separate.
Well, maybe it's time to revisit this. Séan Roberts and Cole Robertson are finding a cognitive connection, not with how our language makes us talk about the future, but with how our language lets us express uncertainty.
Also, Annemarie Verkerk and Hedvig Skirgård team up to test out language universals. Which ones are getting knocked over?
Timestamps
Start: 0:00 Intros: 0:36 News: 6:08 Chat with Annemarie Verkerk and Hedvig Skirgård: 23:06 Related or Not: 49:22 Interview with Séan Roberts and Cole Robertson: 1:10:38 Words of the Week: 2:18:09 Comments: 2:37:20 The Reads: 2:42:37 Outtakes: 2:50:05 -
We've asked linguists about how language began, but what would an evolutionary biologist tell you? Prof Madeleine Beekman says it's part of a complex web of body, brain, and community, and at the heart of it is (perhaps surprisingly) childcare. Madeleine is the author of The Origin of Language: How We Learned to Speak and Why.
Timestamps
Cold open: 0:00 Intros: 0:42 News: 9:07 Related or Not: 30:02 Interview with Madeleine Beekman: 49:43 Words of the Week: 1:40:49 Comments: 2:01:30 The Reads: 2:08:07 Outtakes: 2:17:38 -
Among so many great word games, crosswords still reign supreme. How have they survived — and even expanded — in our digital age? What goes into a good puzzle, and will computer techniques take over? Daniel chats with author Natan Last about his book Across the Universe: The Past, Present, and Future of the Crossword Puzzle.
Timestamps
Intros: 0:35 News: 4:42 Related or Not: 22:13 Interview with Natan Last: 37:56 Words of the Week: 1:24:52 Comment: 1:53:37 The Reads: 1:55:31 Outtakes: 2:02:50 -
The "Oh" show was an experimental linguistics performance lecture. It happened in June 2025 at Creative Time HQ in New York City. Actors, musicians, and audience came together (with at least one linguist!) to act out dialogues from conversational analysis, and have fun with language. Are there more ways we can perform linguistics? We're talking with artist and linguistics fan Maia Chao.
Timestamps
Cold open: 0:00 Intros: 0:38 News: 7:16 Related or Not: 40:03 Interview with Maia Chao: 55:08 Words of the Week: 1:30:31 Bonus chat with Caitlin Green: groyper: 1:54:40 The Reads: 2:07:48 Outtakes: 2:14:59 -
Martha Barnette is one half of the linguistics podcast A Way With Words, and author of the new book Friends With Words: Adventures in Languageland.
Her lifelong love of language has led her through some of the toughest questions lexicography has to offer, and she's answering questions from our live listening audience.
Why do we FALL pregnant? How can we use PRETTY to say something is "pretty ugly"? And once and for all, why do we really say "the whole nine yards"?
Video for this episode: https://youtu.be/aPikLncj2xI
Timestamps (audio)
Start: 0:00
Cold open: 0:27
Intros: 2:02
Chat with Martha about Friends With Words: 5:42
On Martha's life and language: 11:10
Related or Not: 36:27
Questions for Martha: 56:25
The Reads: 1:25:40 -
Creators have to be mindful of what to say and what not to say in their content. This affects the language we're exposed to — and what we say IRL. But it's part of an old process. Popular LingToker Adam Aleksic breaks it down. He's the author of the new book Algospeak: How Social Media Is Transforming the Future of Language.
Timestamps
Start: 0:00 Intros: 1:42 News: 12:25 Related or Not: 29:59 Interview with Adam Aleksic: 44:07 Words of the Week: 1:15:10 Comment: 1:37:56 The Reads: 1:39:56 -
We've all seen style guides that tell us what to say and what not to say. Has a style guide ever asked you what you wanted to say? Or challenged you to examine your thinking? This one does. It's the Conscious Style Guide by Karen Yin, and she joins us for this episode.
Timestamps
Cold open: 0:00 Intros: 0:35 News: 5:52 Related or Not: 31:13 Interview with Karen Yin: 48:43 Words of the Week: 1:30:10 Comments: 1:44:07 The Reads: 1:47:45 Outtake: 1:54:06 -
How did language start? What do all languages have in common? How does language really work? Many answers have been posed to these questions, but one thing is for sure: interaction is the combustion chamber where everything happens. We're having a chat with linguistic lion Stephen Levinson, author of The Interaction Engine.
Timestamps
Introductions: 0:19 These fascinating facts about language will make you (or Dr Levinson) a hit at any party: 3:47 The mechanics of speech production: 06:01 What's going on when we're talking or listening? 8:46 Cultural differences in conversational norms: 20:33 Universals of interaction: 22:10 Metaphors of space may have been a motivator for language: 25:53 The role of gesture in language development: 28:47 Cooperation and empathy in language: 34:59 What one thing explains the most about language?: 45:56Disclosure: Hedvig is employed at the Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics, where Dr Levinson is an emeritus director.
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How do large language models (LLMs) do their thing, and it is anything like how we do our thing? What can we learn about human language from this software? The answer might involve constructions — pairings of form and meaning that we use to make language. And here to discuss it with us is constructionist pioneer and linguistic legend, Professor Adele Goldberg.
Timestamps
Intros: 1:14 News: 7:13 Related or Not: 34:18 Interview with Adele Goldberg: 46:40 Words of the Week: 1:38:19 The Reads: 1:56:50 Bonus chat with Adele Goldberg: 2:03:16 Outtakes: 2:13:11 -
Gesture is everywhere. We wave our hands when we talk, even if we're alone. Signed languages are, of course, full languages that use gesture. And it could even be argued that emoji are the online equivalent of gesture. It's inescapable. And why would we want to do without it, when it's so useful? So we're talking about gesture and language with Dr Lauren Gawne, author of Gesture: A Slim Guide.
Our chat with Lauren is available on video, so you can see all the gestures! Link: https://youtu.be/kHPgyXhl8Kk
Timestamps
Intros: 0:19 News: 7:42 Related or Not: 23:20 Interview with Lauren Gawne: 44:10 Words of the Week: 1:32:53 The Reads: 1:48:10 -
It's Eurovision season! We love to talk about what we can learn about language from this international song contest, but even we didn't realise that there was so much to learn. Language choice, language policy, language and gender and metaphor — and all of this has been packed into a unit at Umeå University: Linguistics and the Eurovision Song Contest. Paulette van der Voet and Solveig Bollig are heading up the course, and they're here to tell us all about it… and nerd out with Hedvig besides.
Timestamps
Cold open: 0:00 Intros: 0:39 News: 7:39 Related or Not: 26:41 Interview with Paulette and Solveig: 38:53 Words of the Week: 1:30:08 Comment from John: 1:49:18 The Reads: 1:53:53 Outtakes: 2:02:25 - Visa fler
