Researchers are training computers to recognize sarcasm on Twitter

Researchers are training computers to recognize sarcasm on Twitter Nathan Ingraham, @nateingraham Twitter contains multitudes. On any given day you’ll find earnest and passionate rumination, breaking news and analysis, silly hashtag games, horribly abusive idiots spewing hate and much, much more. Another constant across the platform is sarcastic reactions to all manner of events big and

The totes amazesh way millennials are changing the English language

The totes amazesh way millennials are changing the English language By Jeff Guo There’s a way that young people talk these days, and it’s totes hilars. You see it on Twitter a lot, people exclaiming about their totes delish spags or theirtotes redic boyfs. Linguists Lauren Spradlin and Taylor Jones call this practice “totesing” — the systematic abbreviation (“abbreviash”) of words to effect

Boom! Hok! A Monkey Language Is Deciphered, New York Times 8/12/2009

Boom boom! (I’m here, come to me!)

Krak krak! (Watch out, a leopard!)

Hok hok hok! (Hey, crowned eagle!)

Very good — you have already mastered half the basic vocabulary of the Campbell’s monkey, a fellow primate that lives in the forests of the Tai National Park in Ivory Coast. The adult males have six types of call, each with a specific meaning, but they can string two or more calls together into a message with a different meaning.

Erin McKean, a keen lexicographer

While browsing through the TED videos I came across this lovely, full of spank and enthusiasm lexicographer. After that I was hooked! I became such a fan that I thought that I could, maybe, gather in this post all the Erin McKean videos I could find online. This most certainly will not be an exhaustive list but I am sure if you watch even a couple of them you will become a fan and at the same time will see your dictionaries from a whole new perspective.