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linguistics

The Strange Persistence of First Languages

After my father died, my journey of rediscovery began with the Czech language.

November 2, 2015

Why Red Means Red in Almost Every Language

The confounding consistency of color categories.

July 20, 2015

5 Languages That Could Change the Way You See the World

How habits of speech can shape our thoughts.

March 3, 2015

Shakespeare’s Genius Is Nonsense

What the Bard can teach science about language and the limits of the human mind.

The Family That Couldn’t Say Hippopotamus

The origins of language are not what inherited disorders seemed to suggest.

September 2, 2014

Cracking Avatar’s Language Codes

A fictional language makes the jump to reality.

October 10, 2013

44 Years of Debating the First Words Ever Spoken on the Moon

It’s amazing that we aren’t uncertain about words more often.