Friday fun with the doge meme
Learn a little something about language humor at Much Reading. Wow. over at The American Scholar. Jessica Love explains the linguistic humor of the doge memes. Like the ones shown here.
Happy Friday!
Learn a little something about language humor at Much Reading. Wow. over at The American Scholar. Jessica Love explains the linguistic humor of the doge memes. Like the ones shown here.
Happy Friday!
I’ve been talking about the role of writing for professionals for nearly 25 years. My “talk” has always taken place in a university classroom or an academic journal. I’m not ready to stop talking in those contexts, but I am tired of their constraints. So why not talk with fewer (or at least different) constraints here? There are things…
Just taking a second to vent my frustration about the lack of plain language on the ballot I read this morning. Here’s a sample. As someone with an earned doctorate in English linguistics and writing, I would place myself near the top of any chart displaying literacy skills among US citizens. But I had no…
Need a little meditation to get through the rest of the workweek? This 5-minute video displays the architectural alphabet created by Antonio Basoli. I found this at Futility Closet thanks to a link at A Walk in the WoRds. Happy Friday!
I’m feeling a little punch-drunk after a 36-hour mock accreditation marathon so thought I’d share something that fits my mood. The Onion recently published a great little piece about gang violence and the Oxford comma. Enjoy! Related articles The Best Shots Fired in the Oxford Comma Wars (mentalfloss.com) A Light-Hearted Lesson on the Oxford Comma…
Know your audience! The most common platitude about workplace writing. Well . . . duh . . . who could argue with that? It certainly doesn’t describe what pros have learned. What amateurs need is GUIDANCE for getting to know the right things about their readers. My guidance, based on a chapter new to the third edition of Revising Professional Writing, focuses…
Within Western culture, there are few workplaces with ONLY men or ONLY women. In theory, our workplaces are gender neutral. Our language, however, sometimes perpetuates a world in which women are subservient to men. Sexist language is commonly characterized using six issues: pseudo-generic pronoun, he (e.g., When an employee asks for a raise, he should be brief.) pseudo-generic noun,…
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