Author: Heather Meadows

Today on Language Log, Mark Liberman presents some phrases, their apparent meanings, and their “actual” meanings (originally spotted in an article in the Economist). Pretty damn funny.

(I think I’m becoming a fan of Mark Liberman.)

Today is Sean and my second wedding anniversary :)

When we first met–in person, that is–we went on a date down to Riverwalk and just strolled around, looking at everything. I’ve loved it there ever since and have gone back several times. Today, in celebration of our two years of marriage, we went back there and wandered around together :)

I took my camera, but only got a few pictures. I took a couple of pictures of Sean, and he took one of me, but none of them really came out splendidly, as it was getting dark. Still, I’ll have them to remember the day by :) Sometime, we need to get a professional picture made of the two of us.

Slashdot links today to a fascinating proposal by Ravi Purushotma of MIT (*sigh*, MIT…) concerning how video games (“You’re Not Studying, You’re Just Playing That Sims Game of Yours”), the Internet (“You’re Not Studying, You’re Just Browinsg the Web”), and other multimedia technologies (culminating in “You’re Not Studying, You’re Just Doing What You Enjoy — Wow”) can help students of language learn more effectively. (You’ll note that the article is somewhat dated; Mr. Purushotma links to an updates and comments page at the end of his piece.)

It’s all very intriguing, and it makes me wonder why stuff like this isn’t already being done. Here’s just one example, demonstrating how the technology of digital music can be used to teach:

Now that most digital songs are using ID3v2 or higher, one feature useful for language learners is that synchronized lyrics can be embedded directly into MP3 files. Combined with an OCR-capable translator, this allows learners to follow along with a foreign song as it is playing (see Figure 10). For older songs, synchronized lyrics can easily be inserted or retrieved from online databases.

In an ideal world, rather than clicking each word for an electronic translation, we would simply have a bi-lingual friend or teacher always standing beside us whenever we wanted to listen to a foreign song — ready to translate any unfamiliar words for us. While always using a friend may not be so realistic, it can be simulated practically using 3D spatialized sound technology. By delaying the timing at which a given sound is delivered to each ear, insertions can be made to songs that sound as though they are coming from a physical location different from the ambient song. This allows educators to embed instructional content directly into a song (or other audio content) while still maintaining a clearly audible distinction so as not to detract from the main song. (see Figures 11, 12, and 13).

I must admit that I am the most interested in browser-based technologies. Purushotma says:

Much like the language data for The Sims, the user interface descriptions for the latest Mozilla and Netscape Web browsers are stored in editable files. This allows anybody with knowledge of XUL, a language similar to HTML/XML, to rapidly reconfigure the layout and design of the browser interface. In most browsers, the upper right hand corner includes a logo known as a “throbber” which animates while loading a Web page. During my German class, I replaced my throbber with a small frame pointing to a Web site containing a randomized vocabulary word from the current chapter of my textbook. Instead of displaying a corporate logo, the throbber in the top right corner displayed a German word and image while loading a Web site, followed by the English translation when loading was complete.In my case, this simply served to flash new vocabulary words while I was waiting for Web sites to load, although such a system could be extended in any number of ways (see Figure 8).

There’s no mention of Internet Explorer here, but I’m long past expecting IE to do anything cool. I just use it because most websites are compatible with it. If I can figure out a way to embed Japanese vocabulary into Firefox, that may be all the impetus I need to switch to that browser. [Edit: See below.]

The prospect of “interrupting” my browsing with language study made me think of “Life Inter rupted”, the article I linked last week about the drawbacks of multitasking. Would embedding learning materials into my browser be too overwhelming? I think it could be, but I also think it could be useful. My preference, then, would be to have a way to shut it off when I felt like minimizing my inputs.

Ultimately, it’s a great article by Purushotma, and a good first step. I hope I can find some resources in this vein. If anyone knows of any, please post them in the comments! I’m primarily interested in learning Japanese, but Spanish would also be useful.

[Edit 2:26pm]: The link to the replaced “throbber” leads to Mr. Purushotma’s personal website. There, I found that there is not only a toolbar for IE, but also an entire page dedicated to his theories for and work concerning technology and language learning.

From New Scientist, via BoingBoing.

The proposed calendar would make figuring out holidays, and college course schedules, much easier. That “extra week” every five or six years is interesting, too…it means a cluster of time that is unrelated to anything, which is kind of wild, and it also means that the seasons would shift just a little bit until the week was reached, and then snap back into place.

The idea is bizarre, but it could work.

His other idea, that everyone should operate on GMT, is also interesting. Nowadays, we can say “What time is it there?” to our friends in other countries in order to get an idea of what they’re up to. If everyone operated on GMT, we’d instead have to either ask directly what they were doing, or ask “What time of day is it there?”, or come up with a whole new paradigm in our heads to cover the timezone difference. I don’t know, I think the calendar idea has more merit.

Still, I don’t really think either of them would catch on.

According to Snopes, the pictures I linked before may not be of the recent tsunami at all.

I was unaware that China celebrated a “tidal festival”.

Snopes has another picture; this one looks extraordinarily fake.

Or does he?

From Mainichi:

Kaoru Kobayashi, 36, a former worker for a Mainichi Shimbun sales agent, has told investigators that he initially denied the allegations and wouldn’t cooperate with investigators because he wanted to be sentenced to death.

“I thought I would be punished with the death penalty if I damaged investigators’ impression of me,” he said.

Is this reverse psychology? Ridiculously stupid reverse psychology? (Granted, Kobayashi has already proven that he’s missing a few brain cells.)

Or was I on the right track before? Was he dissatisfied with his life, trying to break free of the mold? Was his eventual goal to be stopped and to gain “redemption” by being punished by his culture?

I’d like to know what drives people to commit such sick acts.

In the meantime, why not give Kobayashi his wish?

From Mainichi:

An 800-year-old “holy” cedar tree in a quake-hit Niigata shrine crashed to the ground on New Year’s Day in front of locals making their first prayers of the year.

This story reminded me of the trees in Nikko and the Toshogu Shrine. Those trees are gargantuan and very, very old.

And the culture truly owns those trees, as it has been around for just as long as they have.

I wonder what makes a tree holy…how it becomes so, over time.

In the year 2005 I resolve to: Fire my boss. Get your resolution here

Hey, sounds like a good idea to me…

These pictures really give you an idea of how dangerous and scary it was…

…Darth Vader.

From Fans!.

Oh, ha, ha. That’s hilarious. Pardon me while I attempt to rein in my overwhelming giggles.

Because obviously, if someone disagrees with my politics, they are either 1) Evil, or 2) Too stupid to do anything but listen to Evil people. My opinions are, of course, infallible.

Yes, this comic hits the nail right on the head. Oh however did you get so clever, Mr. Campbell?

I think if it had been someone other than Campbell it wouldn’t have bothered me so much. Usually when I see oversimplified “ha ha Bush is stupid” comic strips I either ignore them, or, if they’ve become too much a part of the comic, stop reading that comic.

But T’s known for good character development. He’s not simpleminded when it comes to personalities. I am accustomed to intelligent plots in Fans!, not gross oversimplifications and political prejudice. I find my own intelligence insulted whenever I try to imagine why he’d turn off his brilliant writer’s mind and portray the President like this.

He damn well better surprise me tomorrow.

Mainichi: Bullet train passenger notices cracks in windows

At around 6:45 a.m., a passenger on the Hikari No. 342 superexpress bound for Shin-Osaka from Hakata found two windows on one of its eight coaches were cracked and alerted a conductor, West Japan Railway Co. (JR West) officials said.

That’s disconcerting, but I don’t really know why. The article doesn’t go into what might happen if the windows of a shinkansen happened to fully break. I’m imagining a vacuum effect from the high speeds that could send passengers flying out of the car, or even destabilize the entire train and wrench it off the tracks…but I don’t really know.

(Random fact: “Hakata” is the train station in Fukuoka. I’ve been there; my school group stayed over during our last night in Japan in 2001, and it was there that my “Indian food in Japan” tradition began. I have not, however, been to Osaka.)

And I think that’s a good thing. Plasma screens look a hell of a lot better than LCDs, in my opinion.

I read an article a few weeks back that claimed that Japan as a whole had essentially dismissed plasma screens in favor of LCD. I remember finding that extremely odd; it’s a wonder I didn’t blog about it.

From Asahi.com:

PDP TVs are facing increasing competition from liquid crystal display TVs, which are being made larger, and the emergence of other types of flat-screen technologies.

But a senior Pioneer official said: “Plasma is more appropriate than LCDs for TVs that are 40 inches or larger. We believe PDPs will continue to share the flat-screen TV market with LCDs.”

I know I’d rather have a huge plasma TV than a huge LCD TV.

ESTP “Promotor”. Action! When present, things begin to happen. Fiercely competitive. Entrepreneur. Often uses shock effect to get attention. Negotiator par excellence. 4.3% of total population.

OR

ESTJ “Administrator”. Much in touch with the external environment. Very responsible. Pillar of strength. 8.7% of total population.

ENTJ “Field Marshall”. The basic driving force and need is to lead. Tend to seek a position of responsibility and enjoys being an executive. 1.8% of total population.

OR

ESTJ “Administrator”. Much in touch with the external environment. Very responsible. Pillar of strength. 8.7% of total population.

Via Kirkie. It said that “The current algorithm breaks the tie randomly so refresh the page to see alternate results”, so that’s why there are two results for actualized and preferred.

Also, I’ve been having a lot of fun editing the HTML to get rid of superfluous tags and to use CSS wherever I can, and let me just say that testing code in Blogger’s “Preview” is a bitch. Blogger’s posting page uses CSS styles for HTML elements. This is pretty standard for websites now, but it means that when I preview my own code, they render in Blogger’s styles. The upshot is that I have no idea if it’s going to look right on my site until I actually post it. ;P

You may have noticed that I’ve subscribed to Language Log, a blog for linguistics professors (apparently, based on a quick scan through the usual contributors list; there’s no “About” page). It is refreshing and interesting to read the thoughts and analyses of people who are working in the field. Several times, I’ve thought about linking to articles and commenting about how cool they were.

Today, however, I’m actually going to do it, as today’s post “Near? Not Even Close” by Mark Liberman is absolutely delightful. It’s deliciously snarky, well-informed, and comprehensible.

And it ends with a tongue-in-cheek call to action:

Once again, I blame the linguists for failing to educate the public — and the pundits — in the basic techniques of grammatical analysis.

What’s interesting is, that first link goes to an analysis of the study about front and back vowels that I discussed aeons ago. Some great stuff in that piece, including the following:

The nature of the English lexicon of names makes it impossible that Perfors’ list was strictly controlled, phonologically and otherwise. You can’t contrast (say) Beet and Boot, or Bit and Butt, or other “names” that differ only in the front-back dimension of their main-stressed vowel. Even if you could, the names would not be equally common (overall or in a particular age range), or equally associated with famous people, or whatever. Instead, the list of names with front vowels surely differed from the list of names with back vowels in many other ways, phonetically and otherwise. Perfors doesn’t give the complete list that she used, or the raw results, so it’s hard to tell whether there are any other plausible differences. And if she didn’t start the study with the hypothesis that front-back was going to make the difference, but instead considered the 20 or so obvious phonological alternatives — high vs. low vowels, labial vs. non-labial consonants, one syllable vs. two, open syllables versus closed, etc. — then there’s the statistical problem of multiple tests. And what’s the distribution of sexual orientations of the hotornot.com “subjects”? These are the kinds of annoying, picky little questions that reviewers (are supposed to) ask for publication in refereed journals. Perfors may well have answers for such questions, and if she publishes in a well-refereed journal, she’ll have a chance to bring them out.

(This reminds me of the piece I wrote about my problems with the way media writers “analyze” poll results.)

Liberman “blames” the linguists at the end of that piece, too, linking to “No Professor Left Behind“, which is the same piece he linked second in the recent article. In this one, he discusses a lack of scansion ability in modern English professors. Here’s the amusing conclusion:

I blame the linguists. We’ve somehow allowed a generation or two of intellectuals to grow up without elementary skills in the formal analysis of speech and language. Simple phonetic transcription, fundamentals of morphology and syntax, elements of logic, basic verse scansion…

Just in case you don’t get it, that’s a wry joke. There’s been a broader educational trend away from formal analysis and specific skills, in favor of problem-solving and “learning to learn”. In that context, blaming linguists for the fact that English professors can’t scan is like blaming philosophers or religious leaders for the fact that MBAs are unethical.

Still, who else is going to fix the problem?

So maybe it’s time for a new national program: No Professor Left Behind.

As you can see, there’s lots of stuff to learn from Language Log, and lots of fun to be had along the way.