Apostrophe's!

Ahh - a blog celebrating apostrophe abuse. It goes well with the "Blog" of "Unnecessary" Quotation Marks.

Letter sentences

Our latest word game: sentences made up only of words that are letter names.

O G J I C Y U R N A B T P

"Oh gee, Jay, I see why you are in a bee teepee."

Happy as a CIAM

This blog taps into something deep within my psyche. I can just about guarantee I'll see a half-dozen of these today as I head into Champaign for groceries. Thanks, I think, Mrs vH.

Let's orchestrate metacognitive systems!

Gitcher edumacation jargon here!

We'll envision process-based manipulatives in order to effectively exploit impactful scaffolding and morph interactive life-long learning into strategic infrastructures.

Now we need some grants to apply for.

The Irish roots of American slang

Here's a NYT article on Daniel Cassidy's work on American slang, much of which he traces to Gaelic words brought here by Irish immigrants. Also, here are a couple of articles on slang from Mr Cassidy in Counterpunch. He's the director of the Irish Studies program at the New College of California in San Francisco.

And here's a critique of Cassidy's work from lexicographer Grant Barrett.

UPDATE: Cassidy has taken a lot of heat in the lexicography blogosphere for his phonetic matching; here's a similar approach to video subtitling, courtesy of the matchless Buffalax.

Sehnsucht

TSO suggested in an email that sehnsucht was the word I was looking for yesterday. The Germans come through again in the word department - here's an essay on CS Lewis, joy and sehnsucht.

Treppenwitz, schadenfreude, sehnsecht - soemtimes I wish I'd learned German.

Misheard in an oral culture?

Or a simple misspelling? I found "chickhen wire" offered on a local freecycle list. Sorta makes sense.

That was cool

How about Thai, Japanese, Chinese and Korean?

สวัสดีครับ, สวัสดีค่ะ

こんにちは, ｺﾝﾆﾁﾊ

你好

안녕하세요, 안녕하십니까

Can I do this?

Post in Russian and have everything just work?

Здравствуйте!