Linguist, writer, nerd
When a Roman emperor updated the alphabet – and basically nobody listened to him. A common response to my profuse public pontifications about the history of the alphabet is ‘could we add new letters?’ With the phonemically faulty state of English spelling in mind, the question is one that I enjoy; it’s heartening to see [ ]
Or: Why don’t people in the Iliad and Odyssey write anything down? Sing, goddess, of how Homer is all the rage right now. My timelines have become streams of Nolan-inspired analyses, hot takes and fun facts. While there are many wrathful (and often untenable) criticisms and some complaints of Homeric fatigue to wade through, I [ ]
Or: Wait, shouldn’t those two English words be spelled with SH? Despite its reputation and the infamous evidence to the contrary, I’m committed to demonstrating how regular English spelling actually is. Yet words like sugar and sure, I admit, mock that vocation. In being pronounced as if they began with SH, the pair require me [ ]
It’s often nice to spot familiar faces where you don’t expect them, like an unforeseen run-in with a friend while on holiday. Joy in unexpected encounters is possible in the intellectual realm too; during my wanderings through the linguistic past, I’ve delighted in meeting languages and their humans whom I already know from elsewhere. One [ ]
In the sea between Britain and Ireland, there lies a much smaller island that is geographically and politically separate from the two landmasses on either side. This land is nominally subject to its own Lord, passes laws in a Tynwald, and is called home by 84,000 humans, a population of tail-less cats, an internationally famous [ ]
A personal newsflash: today (June 2nd) sees the US release of my bestselling banquet of historico-linguistic nerdery, Why Q Needs U – that book about the alphabet and the English language that came out in the UK last October and has consistently haunted British bookshops since then. Despite its British origins and (very) British author, [ ]
Once, in my halcyon days of doctoral studies, I gave an informal presentation that ended not with the typical slide “any questions?”, but rather “any answers?”. The talk’s topic fitted into my overall research into the word order of ancient Indo-European languages. My task was to acquire, present, evaluate and compare the available evidence, upon [ ]
It seems all too appropriate that a language infamous for its quirks of spelling should display a quirk of spelling in its very name. The word English would reasonably guide total newcomers to pronounce it with a short E, like the one typically to be heard in pen. Instead, their ears are due to be [ ]
As stable as they may seem, every sound of every spoken language, at some point in the past, didn’t exist. The incessant shifting of speech involves the innovation of sounds, when either new ones are born or old ones transform. Consequently, within the sounds that a particular spoken language (such as Modern English) makes use [ ]
I remain resolute in the belief that ordinary, ten-a-penny words are far more interesting than the rare jewels and prized flowers of any language’s lexicon. Miss me with your petrichor and antidisestablishmentarianism; I’d much rather tell you about apple. This isn’t my contrarian streak speaking. I take genuine joy in the fact that tracing the etymology of [ ]