Cat Got Your Tongue?

I've long been obsessed with all things related to language, and have even recently begun researching programs to further my studies in linguistics, so it is no surprise that this caught my eye. The Times reported today in their Science section that the world's languages are dying off faster than Britney Spears fans. A little biblical history:

Genesis 11:1-9
New International Version (NIV)

1 Now the whole world had one language and a common speech. 2 As men moved eastward, they found a plain in Shinar and settled there.

3 They said to each other, "Come, let's make bricks and bake them thoroughly." They used brick instead of stone, and tar for mortar. 4 Then they said, "Come, let us build ourselves a city, with a tower that reaches to the heavens, so that we may make a name for ourselves and not be scattered over the face of the whole earth."

5 But the LORD came down to see the city and the tower that the men were building. 6 The LORD said, "If as one people speaking the same language they have begun to do this, then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them. 7 Come, let us go down and confuse their language so they will not understand each other."

8 So the LORD scattered them from there over all the earth, and they stopped building the city. 9 That is why it was called Babel — because there the LORD confused the language of the whole world. From there the LORD scattered them over the face of the whole earth.

But now, it seems, the languages are dying. The article reads:

Of the estimated 7,000 languages spoken in the world today, linguists say, nearly half are in danger of extinction and are likely to disappear in this century. In fact, they are now falling out of use at a rate of about one every two weeks.

Some endangered languages vanish in an instant, at the death of the sole surviving speaker. Others are lost gradually in bilingual cultures, as indigenous tongues are overwhelmed by the dominant language at school, in the marketplace and on television.

New research, reported today, has identified the five regions of the world where languages are disappearing most rapidly. The “hot spots” of imminent language extinctions are: Northern Australia, Central South America, North America’s upper Pacific coastal zone, Eastern Siberia and Oklahoma and Southwest United States. All of the areas are occupied by aboriginal people speaking diverse languages, but in decreasing numbers.

Isn't there something we can do to preserve endangered languages? Certainly there won't come a time when we will all speak the same tongue? That languages are disappearing from existence is disturbing in an almost Orwellian sense. According to the article, English is threatening "the survival of the 54 indigenous languages of the Northwest Pacific plateau of North America, a region including British Columbia, Oregon and Washington," while "many of the 113 languages spoken in the Andes Mountains and Amazon basin are poorly known and are rapidly giving way to Spanish or Portuguese." What's next, Newspeak?

Back to School

My hiatus from the blogosphere is officially over. Much has changed, though my obsession with all things grammatically correct certainly hasn't.

I have begun my final semester at NYU, and will finish with my Master's in December.

I moved into a much nicer, much larger apartment with one of my best friends.

I started a new internship at mediabistro.com.

I have taken on some freelance work, so I'm busier than ever!

I continue to take tap dance classes so as to increase my fluency in the language of tap dance.

Here's to my last semester. I can't believe I have been in New York for an entire year! Of course, I'm a nerd. I'm excited about school starting. Perhaps after this degree I'll shoot for a Ph.D...

Summer Break

My break from the blogosphere will end soon. This summer has been hectic; I've been burning the candle at both ends with my internship, tap classes, visitors, and summer socializing.

In the meantime, check out the differences in meaning between the words hiatus, sabbatical, and break. Or how about siesta, leave of absence, lull, intermission, and suspension They're subtle, yet significant.

But always know the stipulations of your time off. After all, "on a break" meant something very different to Rachel than it did to Ross.

Keeping the Faith

Thank goodness our justice system in this country got it right this time. This article references the egregious pants case I blogged about before.

The Name Game

Gwyneth Paltrow named her firstborn Apple. Bruce Willis and Demi Moore's daughters are Rumer, Scout and Tallulah. The wacky celebrity baby-name game doesn't stop there, though. Here's a link to a list of some of the oddest names given to the children of the rich and famous. These are a couple of my personal favorites:

Frank Zappa named his children Dweezil (son), Ahmet Emuukha Rodan (son), Moon Unit (daughter), and Diva Muffin (daughter).

Robert Rodriguez named his five children Rocket, Racer, Rebel, Rogue (all boys) and his daughter Rhiannon.

Rob Morrow and Debbon Ayer named their daughter Tu Simone Ayer. This makes her name, effectively, Tu Morrow. And here's a fun fact: Ayer means yesterday in Spanish.

Penn Jillette of the comedic duo of magicians Penn & Teller named his daughter Moxie Crimefighter.

And it's not just celebrities who are getting creative with what to call their offspring. Recently, in New Zealand a judge did not allow a couple to name their child 4Real, saying numerals could not be used. Check out that story here. Closer to home, my mom told me she once met a student whose given name was spelled quite unfortunately. His name is pronounced "Ty-ree," but spelled "Tire." I personally know of a girl whose parents named her Tyranny. Do these people have a dictionary? They might as well have opted to call her "Totalitarianism."

I applaud creativity, but this is absolutely absurd. Is it time to establish some sort of Department of Names for the sole purpose of making sure that no child will ever have to endure the endless torment that will inevitably ensue after his parents name him Tire? I've got six pregnant friends (and counting), and I expect that they will have the necessary compassion to name their as-yet unborn children something that won't cause undue teasing.

Tracy-Tracy-Bo-Bacy-Banana-Fanna-Fo-Facy-Me-My-Mo-Macy, TRACY! I think I did just fine. Thanks, Mom and Dad!

Tap Out

I've made it clear that I'm passionate about all things linguistic. I possess an affinity for idiomaticity and an ear for grammatical correctness. But it is not only the spoken language that interests me. Another of my passions is tap dance, which I regard as a different kind of language, but a language nonetheless.

Like English and Spanish, tap dance consists of words and phrases, patterns, truths and lies. Just as words have etymological roots, tap steps come from somewhere. An article in the New York Times discussed one of today's most popular tap dancers, Savion Glover, most recently recognizable for his contributions to the hit movie Happy Feet. He is currently appearing in Invitation to a Dancer, reviewed here. He is a magician on the floor, but just as occurs in many other intimate circles, not everyone sees eye to eye.

I was disappointed when I read that article, because Glover criticized the hoofers of today of being egocentric and money hungry, abandoning, in the process, organic tap dance education. Tap City comes to New York next week, and I have no doubt that many aspiring hoofers will be inspired by the language of tap dance.

An Expensive 'Suit'

Merriam-Webster defines egregious to mean conspicuously bad or flagrant. Judge Roy L. Pearson of Washington calls the conduct of Custom Dry Cleaners, with whom he entrusted the task of altering his designer suits, "egregious." He is suing the neighborhood cleaner for $67.3 million because they lost a pair of his pants. To me, Pearson's is the conduct that reeks of egregiousness (read: outrageousness).

The New York Times article is aptly titled Judge Tries Suing Pants Off Dry Cleaners, and is definitely worth a read. I applaud the clever copy-editor for the silly headline, which I think is quite appropriate for the ridiculousness of the described situation. The tone of the article is light-hearted and captures the absurdity of the case.

In the spirit of my inability to resist a good double entendre, I'll close with this: though, according to the article, Judge Pearson recently lowered his request for damages to $54 million, it's still quite an expensive suit.