Category Archives: Language-Sites

‘Dictionary of American Regional English’ nearly complete and tweets

Posted on December 20, 2010 by Kevin

If you’re interested in American dialect words, look no further than the Dictionary of American Regional English (DARE). The nearly completed multi-volume dictionary (with Volume I, A–C released in 1985 and Volume V, Slab–Z due in 2011 [Fall 2010 newsletter]) … Continue reading →

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Buffy (and SNL) ‘much’ much?: Slang research with Hulu.com, Part 2

Posted on June 8, 2008 by Kevin

[EDIT (6/7/10): I broke this long post up into two posts.] This is Part 2 (Part 1) on finding early uses of American slang and colloquialisms from the television clips and episodes on Hulu‘s (language corpus of) shows from NBC … Continue reading →

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SNL NOT!: Slang research with Hulu.com, Part 1

Posted on June 8, 2008 by Kevin

Having trouble finding early uses of slang and colloquialisms? If you’re looking for instances of American (and possibly Canadian) ones, the television clips and episodes on Hulu from NBC Universal (NBC, USA Network, Bravo, Sci Fi, Sundance Channel, Oxygen) and … Continue reading →

Posted in Comedy / Humor Media, HUMOR, LANGUAGE, Language-Sites, Linguistics, Words / Dictionaries | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

‘The Extensive Hip Hop Rhyming Dictionary’: Phrasal rhymes

Posted on February 18, 2008 by Kevin

If you’ve been here to Language and Humor Blog before, you may have noticed a certain lack of roadway license. Er, street cred. That’s all about to change with this post about The Extensive Hip Hop Rhyming Dictionary (On-line Records, … Continue reading →

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Lingro: Free Web page translation by word and more

Posted on November 30, 2007 by Kevin

You can get whole Web pages translated (Google Language Tools, Babel Fish, etc.), but here’s a free tool to translate any individual word on a Web page you want: Lingro (via Education Week). Lingro works for English-English and both to … Continue reading →

Posted in English as a Second / Foreign Language, Foreign Languages, LANGUAGE, Language Technology, Language-Sites, Words / Dictionaries | Comments Off

Marathon of ‘Word Girl’ kids’ vocabulary show

Posted on November 21, 2007 by Kevin

Look, up in the sky! It’s a . . . well, it’s a superpowered word-loving girl. This Friday, November 23, 2007, America’s PBS public broadcasters will air a two-hour marathon of their new children’s vocabulary TV show Word Girl (check … Continue reading →

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Freerice: Vocabulary quiz helps UN food program

Posted on November 13, 2007 by Kevin

Do you like words? If you want to test your vocabulary and add to it while helping to feed the hungry people of the world, try Freerice. Here’s how it works: For every correct answer to FreeRice’s online vocabulary game, … Continue reading →

Posted in English as a Second / Foreign Language, Foreign Languages, LANGUAGE, Language-Sites, Words / Dictionaries | Comments Off

Free access to OUP foreign-language dictionaries 10/2007, quizzes

Posted on October 17, 2007 by Kevin

In honor of National Dictionary Day (American lexicographer Noah Webster’s birthday), Oxford University Press USA is offering free access to its online French-English, German-English, Spanish-English, and Italian-English dictionaries (oup.com/online/freeoldous/). [EDIT (6/6/10): dead link] This free access is from October 15 … Continue reading →

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English-dialect link roundup

Posted on September 29, 2007 by Kevin

Here are some links about a variety of dialects of English: Recording Highland Scots Cromarty fisher dialect (20 short audio interviews of octogenarians Bobby and Gordon Hogg) Compiling a Yorkshire dictionary (including the terms attercop, ettle, and pafalled) Revising a … Continue reading →

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Site update: Humor about Japan / Japanese language

Posted on September 21, 2007 by Kevin

I’ve started expanding this site beyond the blog. To start off, I’ve added some fun with Japanese language and culture: animated GIF images quizzes, some of which are based on song parodies, and puns. You can now see a link … Continue reading →

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