Dominic Watt
@domwatt.bsky.social
Senior Forensic Consultant, J P French International / Honorary Professor of Linguistics, University of York, UK. Now based in Berlin. Also rides bikes and runs a bit.
Well... possibly. The online Oxford English Dictionary says the following, but it's accompanied by a long set of notes which suggest that the the great auk might originally have been named after a place, i.e. a white headland or island. Great auks themselves didn't have white heads.
October 31, 2025 at 7:16 PM
Well... possibly. The online Oxford English Dictionary says the following, but it's accompanied by a long set of notes which suggest that the the great auk might originally have been named after a place, i.e. a white headland or island. Great auks themselves didn't have white heads.
As suggested by the extract from Daniel Jones' "Outline of English Phonetics" that I posted earlier, until recently it could well have been 'an horizontal line' for some speakers who'd normally avoid /h/-dropping. Goes to show how arbitrary (= silly) many rules of 'proper pronunciation' are.
October 14, 2025 at 12:28 PM
As suggested by the extract from Daniel Jones' "Outline of English Phonetics" that I posted earlier, until recently it could well have been 'an horizontal line' for some speakers who'd normally avoid /h/-dropping. Goes to show how arbitrary (= silly) many rules of 'proper pronunciation' are.
Jones says this, on p. 203 of the 1969 edition of his 'Outline of English Phonetics'. 'An historic(al)' hangs on among English English speakers who avoid /h/-dropping, but 'an hotel' is archaic. For habitual /h/-droppers, it's a different story: 'an' would be the expected form.
October 14, 2025 at 9:02 AM
Jones says this, on p. 203 of the 1969 edition of his 'Outline of English Phonetics'. 'An historic(al)' hangs on among English English speakers who avoid /h/-dropping, but 'an hotel' is archaic. For habitual /h/-droppers, it's a different story: 'an' would be the expected form.
The Rock Dove is the unlikeliest of your three species (≠ feral pigeon).
Seeing oystercatchers, as I did today in coastal East Lothian, always puts me in mind of the letter writer to the British Trust for Ornithology who claimed to have sighted "a puffin carrying a carrot".
Seeing oystercatchers, as I did today in coastal East Lothian, always puts me in mind of the letter writer to the British Trust for Ornithology who claimed to have sighted "a puffin carrying a carrot".
June 21, 2025 at 9:40 PM
The Rock Dove is the unlikeliest of your three species (≠ feral pigeon).
Seeing oystercatchers, as I did today in coastal East Lothian, always puts me in mind of the letter writer to the British Trust for Ornithology who claimed to have sighted "a puffin carrying a carrot".
Seeing oystercatchers, as I did today in coastal East Lothian, always puts me in mind of the letter writer to the British Trust for Ornithology who claimed to have sighted "a puffin carrying a carrot".
Could have been! www.rspb.org.uk/birds-and-wi...
June 21, 2025 at 8:43 PM
Could have been! www.rspb.org.uk/birds-and-wi...
Using "z" in words like "equalizing" isn't really an American thing. It was used to write British English before the US existed, and it still is. It's one of the spelling conventions stipulated by Oxford University Press, for instance. See
academic.oup.com/pages/for-au...
academic.oup.com/pages/for-au...
May 17, 2025 at 8:50 AM
Using "z" in words like "equalizing" isn't really an American thing. It was used to write British English before the US existed, and it still is. It's one of the spelling conventions stipulated by Oxford University Press, for instance. See
academic.oup.com/pages/for-au...
academic.oup.com/pages/for-au...
According to the PHOIBLE repository of cross-linguistic phonological inventory data (phoible.org), the voiced retroflex approximant [ɻ] is present in 306 of the languages in the database, or 10% of the world's spoken languages.
It's unusually popular in Australian languages, by the look of it.
It's unusually popular in Australian languages, by the look of it.
January 17, 2025 at 11:03 PM
According to the PHOIBLE repository of cross-linguistic phonological inventory data (phoible.org), the voiced retroflex approximant [ɻ] is present in 306 of the languages in the database, or 10% of the world's spoken languages.
It's unusually popular in Australian languages, by the look of it.
It's unusually popular in Australian languages, by the look of it.
Some of the names shown on Stewart Bremner's Scots map of Scotland must count.
I haven't seen 'Edinburrae' before. Anyone know how established or accepted it is?
www.scotslanguage.com/articles/nod...
I haven't seen 'Edinburrae' before. Anyone know how established or accepted it is?
www.scotslanguage.com/articles/nod...
November 21, 2024 at 12:26 PM
Some of the names shown on Stewart Bremner's Scots map of Scotland must count.
I haven't seen 'Edinburrae' before. Anyone know how established or accepted it is?
www.scotslanguage.com/articles/nod...
I haven't seen 'Edinburrae' before. Anyone know how established or accepted it is?
www.scotslanguage.com/articles/nod...
Looks like Ø is being used in the 'zero' sense by this German cosmetics firm.
November 19, 2024 at 1:23 PM
Looks like Ø is being used in the 'zero' sense by this German cosmetics firm.