Language Log: Cnoinented metalanguage
Another example of e-publishing string-replacement gone wrong, from the Kindle edition of Ed McBain's Blood Relatives, originally published in 1975: The problem here, of course, is that someone turned...
View ArticleLanguage Log: Proto-Indo-European in Prometheus?
Reader K.D., who earlier alerted us to a case of hieroglyphic prescriptivism, has sent in this fascinating note: In the recent Ridley Scott Alien-prequel Prometheus Proto-Indo-European plays a small...
View ArticleLanguage Log: The door forbids to open!
Toni Tan spotted he following warning on a door in Toronto on Memorial Day weekend: The inelegantly worded Chinese sign reads thus: Cǐ mén bùnéng kāi! Rènhé rén bùnéng cóng cǐ jìnchū, wéizhě yánchéng!...
View ArticleLanguage Log: MAO praised my graceful
Simon Hunter spotted the following on a student's desk: Máo zhǔxí kuā wǒ zhǎngde shuài 毛主席夸我长的帅 "Chairman Mao praised me for being handsome." The author of this breathless sentence was evidently...
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