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Andrew Garrett @andrewgarrett.bsky.social · 19d

Awesome passive-aggressive brackets! (The original failed to capitalize "Zeitgeist".)

Source: storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

Text from a judicial opinion: "Similarly, in one of many, often repetitive, and laudatory (toward President Trump) but superfluous allegations, the pleader states, 'The Apprentice' represented the cultural magnitude of President Trump’s singular brilliance, which captured the [Z]eitgeist of our time."

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Ursula K. Le Guin @ursulakleguin.com · 22d

This fall brings not just one but two exhibitions about Ursula and her work.

In Portland, A Larger Reality: Ursula K. Le Guin opens October 31st at Oregon Contemporary.

In London, The Word for World: The Maps of Ursula K. Le Guin opens October 10th at the AA Gallery.

Ursula K. Le Guin, wearing a white button-down shirt, sits amid a pile of cushions, resting her head on her fist. Image by Marion Wood Kolisch | Courtesy Portland Art Museum

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Andrew Garrett @andrewgarrett.bsky.social · 22d

www.nytimes.com/2025/09/15/w...

She Held Her Baby for an Hour. Then the State Took Her Away.

www.nytimes.com

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Andrew Garrett @andrewgarrett.bsky.social · 23d

Also not said in the letter: "therefore also we chose to turn in the Berkeley faculty, staff, and students who anybody ever complained once about, so the government can deport them or whatever"

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Andrew Garrett @andrewgarrett.bsky.social · 23d

I'm very proud of this paper, now published in Anthropological Linguistics: "Alfred Kroeber’s Documentation of Inuktun (Polar Inuit)," a study of the earliest substantial documentation of Inuktun (NW Greenland) and what it shows about Inuit dialects and change.

muse.jhu.edu/pub/17/artic...

"1.Background. Few episodes in the history of American anthropology and linguistics are as disturbing as the treatment of six Inughuit (Polar Inuit) people brought from northern Greenland to New York City in 1897 at the behest of Franz Boas. Living in the world’s northernmost permanently inhabited place, later dubbed Thule by Knud Rasmussen, Inughuit people were objects of fascination for Americans and Europeans. This was partly due to their environment (with its three-and-a-half-month winter night and seven months of solid sea ice) and proximity to the North Pole, but also because of their apparent isolation. Inughuit people occupy “an island in an ocean of ice” (Gilberg 1984:577) and were thought to have been unaware of other people before the arrival of European explorers. In short, they were exemplars of the ethnographic fantasy of “uncontaminated” indigenes."

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Andrew Garrett @andrewgarrett.bsky.social · 25d

"It is important to refuse the notion that this is just how things are right now, invoking a feckless realpolitik that justifies complicity with a brutal and rising authoritarianism."

www.chronicle.com/article/when...

Opinion | When Universities Become Informants

A practice from the McCarthy era makes an ugly return.

www.chronicle.com

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Andrew Garrett @andrewgarrett.bsky.social · 26d

"[T]he decision to send the information to the Trump administration was made by the University of California’s systemwide general counsel. ... Berkeley’s counsel declined to share with [Judith] Butler the contents of the files."

www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

UC Berkeley shares 160 names with Trump administration in ‘McCarthy era’ move

Prominent professor Judith Butler among students and faculty investigated for ‘alleged antisemitic incidents’

www.theguardian.com

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Uwe Edelheid feat. mariazielenbach @mariazielenbach.bsky.social · Sep 7

In finally finished reading The Unnaming of Kroeber Hall by @andrewgarrett.bsky.social cover to cover and wooow, it's so good!
Big recommendation for all linguists, anthropologists, ethnologists, Ursula K. LeGuin fans and everyone else!
So many things 100% relevant to my work to reflect on

Cover of the book The Unnaming of Kroeber Hall: Language, Memory, and Indigenous California. Shows hands in blue latex gloves scratching off letters from a white wall

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Andrew Garrett @andrewgarrett.bsky.social · Sep 8

Thank you, I'm really flattered!

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Larry the Cat @number10cat.bsky.social · Sep 5

The most important news from today's reshuffle:

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Andrew Garrett @andrewgarrett.bsky.social · Sep 5

www.bpr.org/2025-09-01/t...

This album of songs for Gaza is in Yiddish, a language nearly eradicated by genocide

People are responding to the humanitarian crisis in Gaza in many ways. Earlier this month, a fundraising album of songs for Gaza was released in Yiddish, a language nearly eradicated through genocide.

www.bpr.org

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Andrew Garrett @andrewgarrett.bsky.social · Sep 5

You should! It was great.

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Linguist List @linguistlist.bsky.social · Aug 29

Jobs: General Linguistics: Assistant Professor - Language Revitalization - Linguistics, University of California Berkeley

Description: Assistant Professor - Language Revitalization - UC Berkeley Position Description: The Department of Linguistics at the University of California, Berkeley, has been authorized to make an appointment in Language Revitalization. The position will be filled at the rank of assistant professor (tenure-track). Duties will include teaching (up to three courses per year); undergraduate and graduate advising and supervision of student research; development of a successful and origin

dlvr.it

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Dr. Nick Posegay @nposegay.bsky.social · Aug 27

There will be many casualties from UChicago ending ('pausing') PhD admissions in Humantities, but one which I am keenly aware of: this is close to a death sentence for teaching cuneiform in the United States (esp. Sumerian, Hittite, Elamite, Eblaite, Luwian) and it will affect the whole world.

Annette Yoshiko Reed @annetteyreed.bsky.social · Aug 27

“Chicago has long helped to keep alive tiny fields & esoteric areas of humanistic study... Without the univ’s support, & the continued training of grad students who can keep these bodies of kn going, entire spheres of human learning might eventually blink out.” www.theatlantic.com/culture/arch...

If the University of Chicago Won’t Defend the Humanities, Who Will?

Why it matters that the University of Chicago is pausing admissions to doctoral programs in literature, philosophy, the arts, and languages

www.theatlantic.com

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jamelle @jamellebouie.net · Aug 22

a thought i have reading @clintsmithiii.bsky.social’s wonderful piece is that one reason the administration wants to erase any mention of the worst of our past is because it is intent on recapitulating those atrocities www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archiv...

Actually, Slavery Was Very Bad

The president’s latest criticism of museums is a thinly veiled attempt to erase Black history.

www.theatlantic.com

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Andrew Garrett @andrewgarrett.bsky.social · Aug 21

My memory of Malcolm Margolin is of his generosity. Once, speaking of Leanne Hinton, he said, "She makes me proud to be a human being."

Berkeleyside @berkeleyside.org · Aug 20

Writer, editor and publisher Malcolm Margolin, who promoted Indigenous cultural renewal across California, died Wednesday. He was 84.

‘A mighty redwood of a man has fallen.’ Remembering Malcolm Margolin, founder of Heyday books

Writer, editor and publisher Malcolm Margolin, who promoted Indigenous cultural renewal across California, died Wednesday. He was 84.

www.berkeleyside.org

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Andrew Garrett @andrewgarrett.bsky.social · Aug 20

Come be my colleague! UC Berkeley Linguistics has a tenure-track position in language revitalization.

aprecruit.berkeley.edu/JPF05022

Assistant Professor - Language Revitalization - Linguistics

University of California, Berkeley is hiring. Apply now!

aprecruit.berkeley.edu

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Andrew Garrett @andrewgarrett.bsky.social · Aug 18

They have a strong record of supporting Indigenous applicants (including in linguistics, though the bulk of grants are in science fields). You can see all past grant recipients here: www.amphilsoc.org/grants/lewis...

www.amphilsoc.org

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Katie Carmichael @drkatcarm.bsky.social · Aug 8

Another lovely Labov obit by @betsysneller.bsky.social @laurelmack.bsky.social and Meredith Tamminga. This one takes a birds eye view of how Labov has contributed to where the field is going, which is a nice forward-looking complement to Eckert's obit onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

Bill Labov: Looking Back, Looking Forward

Bill Labov passed away peacefully at home on December 17, 2024, with his wife and fellow Penn linguist Gillian Sankoff by his side. He leaves behind a legacy so large that it is hard to put into word....

onlinelibrary.wiley.com

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Andrew Garrett @andrewgarrett.bsky.social · Aug 12

I share your intuition, and surely it has been rare, but interestingly it is also documented continuously from the late 1500s to the present. (Ryland, 1780: "He searched up all the Hebrew copies he was able, and burnt them.")

www.oed.com/dictionary/s...

Oxford English Dictionary

The OED is the definitive record of the English language, featuring 600,000 words, 3 million quotations, and over 1,000 years of English.

www.oed.com

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Andrew Garrett @andrewgarrett.bsky.social · Aug 11

There's an unsurprisingly icky obituary at the icky "Heritage and Destiny" site. ("He founded Northern World, a cultural, non-political Journal of North European Friendship, with the particular goal of promoting reconciliation between the closely related nations of Northern Europe.")

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Andrew Garrett @andrewgarrett.bsky.social · Aug 11

Oddly, Wikipedia doesn't even note Pearson's death (though it was a couple of years ago).

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Andrew Garrett @andrewgarrett.bsky.social · Aug 8

It's a very capacious word.

how many r's in rearrange?

ChatGPT said:
The word rearrange has three r’s.

You said:
Are you sure?

ChatGPT said:
Yep — here’s the breakdown:

r e a r r a n g e
1st letter: r
4th letter: r
5th letter: r

So that’s 3 r’s in total.

You said:
How about blueberry?

ChatGPT said:
blueberry has three r’s too:

b l u e r b e rr y

5th letter: r

8th letter: r

9th letter: r

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Andrew Garrett @andrewgarrett.bsky.social · Aug 6

and about language & politics (Talking Power, 1990; The Language War, 2000). For an oral-history interview see: 150w.berkeley.edu/sites/defaul... 2/2

150w.berkeley.edu

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Andrew Garrett @andrewgarrett.bsky.social · Aug 6

My Berkeley colleagues & I are saddened by the death of our colleague Robin Lakoff. Her 1972 book Language & Women's Place created the modern field of language & gender. She also wrote articulately, passionately & impactfully about Latin linguistics (Abstract Syntax & Latin Complementation, 1968) 1/

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