#ForensicLinguistics course in/for #German at HHU, Dusseldorf, 28 - 29 September 3926.

The name of the York restaurant "Ate O'Clock" caused a colleague from Teesside genuine puzzlement for a long time, because of the persistence of the contrast in her vowel system. I imagine that's also true of some people from York city itself.

eight-ate | Our Dialects eight-ate

The 'ate~eight' contrast is a long-standing feature of English in northern England. It's not based on orthography. It'd be more accurate to say that the orthography reflects the contrast. See here for more details:

www.ourdialects.uk/maps/eight-a...

Much as living spoken languages vary across space, they change over time. The only languages which don't change are dead ones.

It also makes no sense to insist that the 'rules' of written English should equally apply to the spoken language. Language just doesn't work that way.

Some readers get vexed by expressions they don't like, yes, but this kind of handwringing has no effect on how languages actually change.

A station where you catch trains? A train station. Like a bus station is one where you catch a bus. Sorry, omnibus. (Charabanc? What's the proper name for it?)

SS2026 Language, Speech, and AI: An Online Forensics Summer School Welcome to the annual FACTOR Summer School, running 0930-1445 on both Thu 11th and Fri 12th June 2026. Each even year (2026, 2028, etc.) …

The FACTOR Forensic Linguistics and Speech Science Summer School (@factor-lu.bsky.social) is back on June 11th & 12th, and we're going online this year!

Two days of language, speech, and AI, all on the theme of protection, privacy, and proactive synthesis: wp.lancs.ac.uk/factor/summe...

Conservative norms for written standard British English are all very well, but I was talking about English speakers, not a particular style of formal prose.

I come from Scotland. There's no sign of society descending into chaos because people there use 'gotten'. It's more consistent if you do!

Cover image of Volume 3 of Mouton de Gruyter's 'Varieties of English' handbook series, 'The Pacific and Australasia' (2008).

Unfortunately for the linguistic prescriptivists out there, the chances of modern English speakers paying any attention to what the Times style guide recommends are essentially zero. It's irrelevant.

'Gotten' is used in Australia/NZ, as noted in relevant chapters in this book, for example.

We'd better stop using 'forgotten', then, as that word surely must also be ugly to the modern ear.

Has 'gotten' passed out of international English? Who decided that, and when? All the millions of people around the world who still use 'gotten' must not have gotten the memo!

You may dislike it, but 'gotten' isn't an Americanism. It shows up in texts from the Middle English (late mediaeval) period, and later can be found in writing by the likes of Walter Raleigh, Thomas Hobbes and David Hume.

I assume you're OK with 'ill-gotten', 'misbegotten' and 'forgotten'. Or... ?

This is very sad news. Ronnie was my Director of Studies (academic supervisor) when I was an undergrad at Edinburgh from 1987 to 1992, and I also took several of his classes. He was a key figure in setting me on the path I'm following today, almost 40 years later. RIP, Ronnie.

Presumably both <r>s were pronounced in 'Feverer' when that form was borrowed into English, given that English hadn't yet started derhoticising.

The Routledge Handbook of Ethics in Forensic Linguistics The Routledge Handbook of Ethics in Forensic Linguistics is the first comprehensive reference work to explore the ethical dimensions of forensic language analysis across a range of applied and academi...

Delighted to announce this book is finally being published! Over 3 years in the production. I've written Chapter 3 - Ethics and Professional Conduct Oversight in Forensic Linguistic Expert Evidence.
#ForensicLinguistics #Ethics #ExpertEvidence

Definition of ZHUZH a small improvement, adjustment, or addition that completes the overall look, taste, etc. of something… See the full definition

Merriam-Webster says this:

www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/z...

Initial and final /ʒ/ are OK in loans like 'genre' and 'rouge', so the oddness is more to do with the spelling than the phonotactics. One of those words that's a cinch to pronounce but hard to know how to spell (like 'cinch').

Ptarmigan - Etymology, Origin & Meaning "wing"). See origin and meaning of ptarmigan.

No, it was put in the spelling by someone who thought the Gaelic name of the bird, tàrmachan, was Greek in origin. Gaelic, like English, doesn't allow /pt/-initial words (in the pronunciation; Gaelic spelling is renowned for using ink very liberally).

www.etymonline.com/word/ptarmigan

A red grouse (Lagopus scotica) I encountered in the Pentland Hills near Edinburgh last summer, demonstrating its very human-like alarm call. He seemed extremely cross that I'd had the audacity to ride my mountain bike across his patch and chased me along the trail for quite some distance.

How many lakes are there in Scotland? A trick question perhaps?! On World Water Day, our freshwater advisory officer Ewan Lawrie takes a closer look at the answer. Dubh lochans on the blanket bog at Forsinard Flows National Nature Rese…

There are thousands to choose from - Assynt, Caithness, or the Isle of Lewis are particularly watery. More than one loch is a 'Lake'. There's even a Lake Superior, though it's ever so slightly smaller than its more famous North American counterpart!

scotlandsnature.wordpress.com/2021/03/22/h...

Accent bias logo. Four speech bubbles in four different coloured squares.

Since January 2022, we (me, 93% Club & SS) have been working a project that tackles accent bias in Higher Education, focusing on the 'elite' institution where we're based. Today, we're launching the project website which brings together all our work:

accentbias.ed.ac.uk

Thank you for your work! I regularly ride my bike up/down Donkey Lane to the Heriot-Watt campus and am very grateful for your efforts to keep the area as clean and tidy as possible. If only my fellow citizens would take their rubbish home, or just use bins. (Looking at you, Currie dog walkers!).

To me, the Scots pronunciation [ˈpɔlɪs] (rhymes with 'Hollis', 'solace', 'Wallace') doesn't encode animus towards law enforcement. Nevertheless, failing to adjust vernacular pronunciations like these is seen by some people as inappropriately casual, even disrespectful, in a courtroom scenario.

If you're Scottish, the central [a] vowel you use in 'Mam'/'Danny' is close(ish) to the back [ɑ] vowel many US English speakers have in 'Mom' and 'Donny'.

They also tend to use [ɑ] in foreign-origin words like 'pasta', 'plaza', or 'Mamdani', in favour of the front [æ] of their 'Mam' and 'Danny'.

If you like the Bewick's you'll also like the Whooper Swan, which looks very similar, but is bigger, and with even more yellow on its bill. You might need to head further north to see them, though.

birdfact.com/birds/whoope...

How about place names like 'Camden' or 'Trimdon'?

The <p> in the spelling of 'Hampden' (the Glasgow stadium) tends not to be pronounced, making 'Hampden' a perfect rhyme with 'Camden'.

No English speaker is likely to say that the name 'Emden' (the German city) is hard to pronounce, either.

Extract from the etymology section of the online Oxford English Dictionary's entry for 'penguin'. Summary Probably a borrowing from Welsh. Etymon: Welsh pen gwyn. Probably < Welsh pen gwyn white head (< pen head, headland (see pen n.1) + gwyn white: see gwyniad n.). Compare Dutch pinguin (1595 as fenguin; probably < English), German Pinguin (1599 as pagnies, 1606 as pencuius, both plural; < English or Dutch), Swedish pingvin (1685; perhaps < German), French pingouin (1598 in Middle French as pinguyn; < Dutch). Welsh pengwin Great Auk (1677 in a translation of quot. 1584), penguin (1872) is probably < English (compare also Welsh regional (northern) †pengwin bach little auk, razorbill (19th cent. in an isolated attestation)).

Well... possibly. The online Oxford English Dictionary says the following, but it's accompanied by a long set of notes which suggest that the the great auk might originally have been named after a place, i.e. a white headland or island. Great auks themselves didn't have white heads.

Penguin - Etymology, Origin & Meaning Originating in the 1570s for the extinct great auk of Newfoundland, "penguin" likely derives from Welsh pen "head" + gwyn "white"; meaning shifted to Antarctic sw...

www.etymonline.com/word/penguin

OK, thanks. In that case I'm a speaker of a variety (Standard Scottish English) that distinguishes FORCE and NORTH with some degree of consistency, depending on the age of the speaker. I worry that asking me to list lexemes that belong in either set is likely to open an unhelpful can of worms!

Thank you! I'll head up there tomorrow to take a look at your handiwork 🙏

Joey, at the end of your guide you say "If you are a native speaker of a variety that maintains a distinction between NORTH or CLOTH..." - does that mean between NORTH and FORCE/THOUGHT and/or between CLOTH and FORCE/THOUGHT(/NORTH)? I thought I'd better clarify.

Wells (1982) is now 43 years old 😬

The trend is towards greater uniformity, as dialect levelling and diffusion of new forms from centres of sociolinguistic gravity (esp. London) conspire to reduce the distinctions between varieties. If the dialect map of Britain were a jigsaw puzzle, the pieces would appear to get bigger over time.

Thrilled that The Oxford Handbook of Language and Prejudice, published barely a month ago, has won its first award: Curtin University's "Publication of the Year"! 🏆 (Co-editor Sender Dovchin works at Curtin.) 🎉 Get yours here 😉: global.oup.com/academic/pro...