Philosophy
One of the most amazing aspects of our linguistic faculties (and I don't mean Spanish professors) is our ability to create and understand entirely novel statements. It is one thing to be conditioned to respond to certain stimuli in linguistic ways. Someone hands you something, you say "Thank you." someone says "Thank you" to you, you say "You're welcome." But it is something else entirely to utter and comprehend sentences that have never been said before.
Teaching is interesting in this way, because if you speak enough, try to come up with enough new and useful metaphors, you will find yourself saying something every once in a while that you are sure has never been said before in the entire history of language, a completely new sentence.
And that's today's challenge. Come up with a sentence that you think has never been spoken or written. My offering:
- Evolution And Degradation Of Language
So, at a wonderful BBQ at YKW's place, the conversation turned to language. I mentioned that the short people had discovered MadLibs at the same time I was grading student papers, and this led me to think about parts of speech. I remarked how the...
- A Grading Thought Experiment
This is one of the times of year when those of my ilk turn from teachers into graders. A colleague of mine proposed an experiment the other day and I'm interested to see if your intuitions are the same as mine. Take a stack of papers, grade just...
- Not So Deep Tautologies
Hanno and I have written a couple of articles on how tautologies, sentences like "It's raining or it's not," can be used in conversation meaningfully. Since a tautology is always true, yes it is either raining or it isn't, it tells you nothing...
- Spanish, Ebonics, And Bushisms: English As Whose National Language?
So we've got another case of conservatives trying to crack down on that creeping menace...the Spanish language. Public libraries in suburban Atlanta will no longer acquire adult fiction in Spanish because immigrants reading John Grisham is a threat...
- Title Without A Paper
A classic from Hanno: Using one situation as a model of explaining another situation is called metaphor. If you were discussing the nature of metaphors and used another linguistic system as a model to illustrate how metaphors work, it would be a metaphorical...
Philosophy
Novel Statements
One of the most amazing aspects of our linguistic faculties (and I don't mean Spanish professors) is our ability to create and understand entirely novel statements. It is one thing to be conditioned to respond to certain stimuli in linguistic ways. Someone hands you something, you say "Thank you." someone says "Thank you" to you, you say "You're welcome." But it is something else entirely to utter and comprehend sentences that have never been said before.
Teaching is interesting in this way, because if you speak enough, try to come up with enough new and useful metaphors, you will find yourself saying something every once in a while that you are sure has never been said before in the entire history of language, a completely new sentence.
And that's today's challenge. Come up with a sentence that you think has never been spoken or written. My offering:
I like my drill sergeants like I like my tofu, extra firm.Others?
- Evolution And Degradation Of Language
So, at a wonderful BBQ at YKW's place, the conversation turned to language. I mentioned that the short people had discovered MadLibs at the same time I was grading student papers, and this led me to think about parts of speech. I remarked how the...
- A Grading Thought Experiment
This is one of the times of year when those of my ilk turn from teachers into graders. A colleague of mine proposed an experiment the other day and I'm interested to see if your intuitions are the same as mine. Take a stack of papers, grade just...
- Not So Deep Tautologies
Hanno and I have written a couple of articles on how tautologies, sentences like "It's raining or it's not," can be used in conversation meaningfully. Since a tautology is always true, yes it is either raining or it isn't, it tells you nothing...
- Spanish, Ebonics, And Bushisms: English As Whose National Language?
So we've got another case of conservatives trying to crack down on that creeping menace...the Spanish language. Public libraries in suburban Atlanta will no longer acquire adult fiction in Spanish because immigrants reading John Grisham is a threat...
- Title Without A Paper
A classic from Hanno: Using one situation as a model of explaining another situation is called metaphor. If you were discussing the nature of metaphors and used another linguistic system as a model to illustrate how metaphors work, it would be a metaphorical...