Matt Gordon (not that one though)
@anotherlinguist.bsky.social
Sociolinguist, dialectologist, person who has uttered the phrase "chain shift" too many times.
I've had the luxury of mostly avoiding listening to Jimmy Johnson (football coach of teams I hated), but it warmed my dialectologist's heart to hear him, in a recent documentary, say "sick at my stomach".
December 2, 2025 at 8:23 PM
I've had the luxury of mostly avoiding listening to Jimmy Johnson (football coach of teams I hated), but it warmed my dialectologist's heart to hear him, in a recent documentary, say "sick at my stomach".
Copilot introduces the long (& displaced) 13th cen. BCE.
September 15, 2025 at 3:18 PM
Copilot introduces the long (& displaced) 13th cen. BCE.
These epithets for the teams are mostly innocuous & vacuous in a very genAI way but Maryland's stands out.
September 11, 2025 at 9:51 PM
These epithets for the teams are mostly innocuous & vacuous in a very genAI way but Maryland's stands out.
TIL the NFL team called the Arizona Cardinals used to be the Racine Normals, which would seem to raise some questions of the that-team-doth-protest-too-much variety
September 3, 2025 at 11:14 PM
TIL the NFL team called the Arizona Cardinals used to be the Racine Normals, which would seem to raise some questions of the that-team-doth-protest-too-much variety
AP story on MN shooting describes Cyrillic as "a centuries-old script still used in Slavic countries"
August 29, 2025 at 2:30 PM
AP story on MN shooting describes Cyrillic as "a centuries-old script still used in Slavic countries"
"The federal government may involve in kidnapping cases for several reasons" #CoPilotEnglish
August 25, 2025 at 2:36 PM
"The federal government may involve in kidnapping cases for several reasons" #CoPilotEnglish
Reposted by Matt Gordon (not that one though)
Today in RIGG AND STOLLEN!
Also: Is “yinz guys” in-bounds, or is it +/- the same thing as “y’all guys”? @anotherlinguist.bsky.social
Also: Is “yinz guys” in-bounds, or is it +/- the same thing as “y’all guys”? @anotherlinguist.bsky.social
August 7, 2025 at 2:54 PM
Today in RIGG AND STOLLEN!
Also: Is “yinz guys” in-bounds, or is it +/- the same thing as “y’all guys”? @anotherlinguist.bsky.social
Also: Is “yinz guys” in-bounds, or is it +/- the same thing as “y’all guys”? @anotherlinguist.bsky.social
Reposted by Matt Gordon (not that one though)
Now available for pre-order in hardcover for a mere $22.50 www.bloomsbury.com/us/banning-b...
Banning Books in America
This is a book about banned books in the U.S. - about reading them, teaching them, and assigning them under the shadow of political pressure not to.Banning Book…
www.bloomsbury.com
July 28, 2025 at 9:07 PM
Now available for pre-order in hardcover for a mere $22.50 www.bloomsbury.com/us/banning-b...
New dating/authorship info drops! Thanks Co-Pilot!
July 26, 2025 at 6:04 PM
New dating/authorship info drops! Thanks Co-Pilot!
How many of my students could explain this architectural "feature" in the hallway outside our classroom? Only 1, a 60-something retiree. Best guess: "a voting booth??"
April 22, 2025 at 4:03 PM
How many of my students could explain this architectural "feature" in the hallway outside our classroom? Only 1, a 60-something retiree. Best guess: "a voting booth??"
"After the 2nd edition came out in print in 1989 and like Dylan before them, the OED went electric." For the first time in 20 years of making this joke, my students got it. #mostofmyhumorisacompleteunknowntomystudents
March 8, 2025 at 7:41 PM
"After the 2nd edition came out in print in 1989 and like Dylan before them, the OED went electric." For the first time in 20 years of making this joke, my students got it. #mostofmyhumorisacompleteunknowntomystudents
To comply with the EO declaring English the official language, I've decided to change the title of my sociolinguistics class to the etymologically pure "Tongue Stuff with Friends"! So far, registration for next semester is doing great.
March 7, 2025 at 3:28 PM
To comply with the EO declaring English the official language, I've decided to change the title of my sociolinguistics class to the etymologically pure "Tongue Stuff with Friends"! So far, registration for next semester is doing great.
I'm officially "my dad was a student of yours" old!
March 5, 2025 at 9:59 PM
I'm officially "my dad was a student of yours" old!
"Republicans have expressed interest in trying to define fetal liability legislatively sometime during this session." Local story about efforts to defy voters & re-ban abortion contains a fun typo (at least I hope it's a typo).
February 19, 2025 at 3:51 PM
"Republicans have expressed interest in trying to define fetal liability legislatively sometime during this session." Local story about efforts to defy voters & re-ban abortion contains a fun typo (at least I hope it's a typo).
Workshopping a new super-niche retort to someone who misses the point: That's like thinking the problem with "Anglo-Saxon" is blatant Jute erasure!
February 17, 2025 at 9:24 PM
Workshopping a new super-niche retort to someone who misses the point: That's like thinking the problem with "Anglo-Saxon" is blatant Jute erasure!
Rollercoaster of emotions today in a meeting discussing research proposals when I heard an Indian colleague say "the study involves several wizards" only to realize it was actually "several visits"
February 14, 2025 at 4:46 PM
Rollercoaster of emotions today in a meeting discussing research proposals when I heard an Indian colleague say "the study involves several wizards" only to realize it was actually "several visits"
Per a rumor i'm starting, the speech pathology dept. spent $1.2M on this machine in an effort to combat the LOT/THOUGHT merger by implanting rounded low/mid back vowels in the phonologies of young Midwesterners.
February 4, 2025 at 5:50 PM
Per a rumor i'm starting, the speech pathology dept. spent $1.2M on this machine in an effort to combat the LOT/THOUGHT merger by implanting rounded low/mid back vowels in the phonologies of young Midwesterners.
An AI error or have I accessed the internet of the future???
February 2, 2025 at 4:29 PM
An AI error or have I accessed the internet of the future???
"How [adj] is this?" - my favorite dumb post-game interview question
December 28, 2024 at 8:26 PM
"How [adj] is this?" - my favorite dumb post-game interview question
Reposted by Matt Gordon (not that one though)
Oh hey look! After three years of hard work by so many awesome contributors, the folks at the @americandialect.org and @dukepress.bsky.social, the 109th Publication of the American Dialect Society is a real book!
December 12, 2024 at 6:16 PM
Oh hey look! After three years of hard work by so many awesome contributors, the folks at the @americandialect.org and @dukepress.bsky.social, the 109th Publication of the American Dialect Society is a real book!
I fooled my students into being temporarily interested by announcing that we were going to talk about the ambiguity of the sentence "IT'S GIVING TUESDAY"
December 4, 2024 at 1:26 AM
I fooled my students into being temporarily interested by announcing that we were going to talk about the ambiguity of the sentence "IT'S GIVING TUESDAY"
Reposted by Matt Gordon (not that one though)
Natalie Schilling covered all that and more about trademarks in the latest Grammar Girl podcast. This episode also has info about the history of "thanks."
Read: https://buff.ly/4igdkNe
Listen: https://buff.ly/3VjKIsl
Watch: https://buff.ly/3ZbgF7v
Read: https://buff.ly/4igdkNe
Listen: https://buff.ly/3VjKIsl
Watch: https://buff.ly/3ZbgF7v
How to write about trademarks. Why we say 'thank you.' | Grammar Girl Quick and Dirty Tips for Better Writing
1034. First, we look at how writers should use trademarked terms like "Kleenex" and "Google," including when to capitalize them and how to avoid legal pitfalls. Then, we look at the way the word…
grammar-girl.simplecast.com
December 1, 2024 at 5:32 PM
Natalie Schilling covered all that and more about trademarks in the latest Grammar Girl podcast. This episode also has info about the history of "thanks."
Read: https://buff.ly/4igdkNe
Listen: https://buff.ly/3VjKIsl
Watch: https://buff.ly/3ZbgF7v
Read: https://buff.ly/4igdkNe
Listen: https://buff.ly/3VjKIsl
Watch: https://buff.ly/3ZbgF7v
as i tell my students, we call this "open O" or, if you want to reveal that you're not paying attention, "backwards C"
November 30, 2024 at 8:59 PM
as i tell my students, we call this "open O" or, if you want to reveal that you're not paying attention, "backwards C"
Teaching about John Baugh's work on linguistic profiling (involving calling landlords & using different accents), I was reminded of the student years ago whose main takeaway was horror in discovering that housing discrimination was illegal.
November 22, 2024 at 5:31 PM
Teaching about John Baugh's work on linguistic profiling (involving calling landlords & using different accents), I was reminded of the student years ago whose main takeaway was horror in discovering that housing discrimination was illegal.