UCU Aberdeen to strike over widespread budget cuts
The Aberdeen University and College Union (UCU) has voted to for strike in response to widespread budget cuts at the University of Aberdeen (UoA), with a 60 per cent turnout…
Author Spotlight: John McWhorter
Sometimes, a writer comes along who temporarily takes over your thoughts. Their words stick in your head, simultaneously comforting and challenging you. One goes through a period of reading every…
Shifting linguistics: how we mimic those around us
Have you ever been on holiday, or been with a group of friends, or at a new workplace, and found that your accent or way of speaking has changed? Maybe…
Certificates, eating pattern corrections and learning balance: what Lockdown had taught me
Lockdown: a time when shops are shut, summer plans are cancelled, scholarships and semesters abroad whooshed away so fast that it’s hard to make sense of this strange new world…
The role of language in national identity
“A court of human rights cannot allow itself to suffer from historical Alzheimer’s. It has no right to disregard the cultural continuum of a nation’s flow through time, nor to…
Apu and the future of diverse representation
Last week it was announced that long-standing ‘Simpsons’ actor, Hank Azaria, would step down from his role as Apu Nahasapeemapetilon, after 30 years voicing the Indian immigrant owner of the…
Let’s talk about prescriptivists
I learned English when I was 11. It took me about six months to pick up, really, because I moved to the United States, enrolled in a regular American school…
Bilingualism: a new magic bullet?
Dr Thomas Bak is a reader at the University of Edinburgh School of Philosophy, Psychology and Languages Sciences. He is an expert in cognitive neuroscience, particularly in relation to language…