Read my latest In Brief article for Western Alliance.
Read my latest In Brief article for Western Alliance.
Read my latest In Brief article for Western Alliance.
I was asked to write something about myself for Western Alliance’s website. Read it here.
See my article at http://www.westernalliance.org.au/in-brief-3/
See my article at http://www.westernalliance.org.au/in-brief-3/mhealth-using-mobile-technologies-to-improve-access-and-efficiency-in-health-care-delivery/
See my article at http://www.westernalliance.org.au/in-brief-3/sugary-drinks-and-public-health-the-bittersweet-solution-of-a-sugar-tax/
See my article at http://www.westernalliance.org.au/in-brief-3/eradicating-infectious-diseases-could-hepatitis-c-be-next/
Lots of things of course, starting with an excellent idea. However, are particular words important? In his article for The Conversation (27 February 2015), Owen Churches (Postdoctoral Fellow in Psychology at Flinders University) counts and charts the occurrences of words in the summaries of successful Australian Research Council Discovery Project applications. ‘New’ and ‘novel’ are very frequent (but oddly, not ‘innovative’), as are ‘understanding’, ‘Australia’ and ‘develop’. He also describes changes in word use over time. Well worth a look.
All languages evolve – if they don’t, they’re dead (Latin anyone?) New words arise from many sources. ‘Twerking’ was coined in the New Orleans bounce scene in the 1990s, and Miley Cyrus did the rest. Shakespeare alone added 1700+ words to English, including ‘amazement’, ‘bandit’, ‘dawn’, ‘hint’ and ‘secure’. Invaders, neighbours and trading partners have been hugely important. The number of words the Vikings added to the language is astonishing: ‘anger’, ‘call’, ‘give’, ‘knife’, ‘take’, ‘score’ – imagine modern English without those? In contrast, I doubt we’ll be using ‘twerking’ and ‘bezzy’ long.
Twerking and bezzy were just added to Collins Official Scrabble Words. Read Jennifer Down’s column in Overland here.
