linguistics

Everett pointed to the word xibipío as a clue to how the Pirahã perceive reality solely according to what exists within the boundaries of their direct experience—which Everett defined as anything that they can see and hear, or that someone living has seen and heard. “When someone walks around a bend in the river, the Pirahã say that the person has... See more

The pace at which we’re creating new words, then recontextualizing their meanings in hyperbolic, meme, and joke formats, is moving faster than ever before, in our age of relentless online discourse.

Language fluency is activism. This is not about reclaiming purity, but embracing pluralism and contradiction. We reject colonial amnesia through language learning, even informally.

Babelification

Language, as a social instrument, is more than its content. It’s also a signifier defining the speaker. Therefore language, whether expressed as slang, dialects, patois, or accents, is a marker of cultural identity. The language you use signals to other people: am I like you? Do we come from the same place? Do we share perspectives?... See more