Notices by Mignon Fogarty (grammargirl@zirk.us), page 4

I don't know anything about this program beyond its web page, but I think it's a clever idea, so I want to share it:

It lets you raise money for a charity through your #NaNoWriMo word count the way runners raise money for the number of miles they run.

This year's charity is We Need Diverse Books.

https://themightypens.org/about/how-it-works/

#Bookstadon #weneeddiversebooks

Quick rest on a bench after a pre-lunch run in the park.

@dangillmor A relative I consider to be especially informed didn't know that JJ is the same Jordan accused of ignoring sexual assault allegations from kids on his wrestling team. <mind blown>

It should be in every article. (As just one example of the many ways I agree with you that Big Journalism has failed us.)

This is a fascinating story about the foreign language effect, which finds that making decisions in a second language often leads to more logical choices.

For example, when given the trolly problem, more people will kill one person to save many when considering the scenario in a second language.

https://www.theguardian.com/science/2023/sep/17/how-learning-thinking-in-a-foreign-language-improves-decision-making

@Grizzlysgrowls @abolisyonista Sure!

Different style guides have slightly different formatting rules, but the Chicago Manual of Style uses this style for citing a conference presentation:

1. Presenter First Name Last Name, "Name of Presentation" (presentation, Name of Conference, Location of Conference, Date of Conference).

https://library.ulethbridge.ca/chicagostyle/other/lecture

Trundle, amble, roam, and shamble ... what are your favorite words for walking? https://www.quickanddirtytips.com/articles/8-words-for-walking-with-surprising-origins/

An interesting note on a NYT article about Hanoi literature.

AP style has long been to remove diacritical marks because its transmission technology couldn't handle it. But leaving these marks out in Vietnamese completely changed the meaning of some words.

This should be a #GiftLink: https://www.nytimes.com/2023/08/02/books/hanoi-vietnam-books.html?unlocked_article_code=cTBLsNSSBG-D4HcaDADdFvrLQshaugBOPn9w85IBGMX9uszXLQWj1MG5-9MPhWm0PmistxdceZGsvbu3hgkhF4nuXphHVqJ4g_okDCvB0dGMLC5Gl9YB8a_gFTF9pLB_YPkOFovhVlVMNQd60j4RHGfXET2YB7BwYSwAjHu3jopveXQmJaEElEMFMOsdTP2keWqGVj92smgWaXOnujyAAXgK_efCbPZSOCPbQ4-_UGA0AauScvTkPkl5aNPkxEeMrlMu0SAhmvyLOXNtk_DwV5phRszvH1zEJ4_zorUC34bAo0IMGgK6mgg58iE9dwePZwDim6EE9f5EqRE&smid=url-share

#AmEditing @edibuddies

Is there a name for the figure of speech "A is the B of C"?

For example "Jill is the Martha Stewart of woodworking."

It feels like a formulaic snowclone (e.g., "X is the new Y"), but I feel like I've seen a name for it somewhere that I can't remember.

I just wrote something on my to-do list and then crossed it off, because, dammit, I deserve to cross it off even if I forgot to write it down!

U.S. friends:

Yesterday, I discovered that neither of my parents knew they are eligible for a new COVID booster.

Check in on your parents, grandparents, and friends 65 and older to make sure they know they are eligible so they can make an informed decision.

#CovidIsNotOver

I love clever uses of incentives and tech: Cities are using traffic lights near schools that start red and turn green if an approaching car isn't speeding.

If you're good, you get to keep driving. If you're bad, you have to stop and wait for the light to turn green.

The average speed on the road almost immediately dropped to the speed limit as people learned the rules.

Instead of punishing people with tickets after the fact, it creates the behavior the city wants.

https://mass.streetsblog.org/2023/05/05/steal-this-idea-in-quebec-a-new-traffic-light-only-turns-green-for-safe-drivers/

I was on a podcast where kids quizzed two people to decide who was a fake and who was a real expert.

The host said early on, the kids thought the fake was the expert every time because the actors answered every question confidently and the experts would hedge or even sometimes say, "I don't know."

They eventually told the fakes to be less confident so the kids would pick the expert sometimes.

It just occurred to me this is now real life with #chatGPT (but nobody is telling it to back off).

@amelia That’s what it sounded like to me!

Finnish grammar foils pro-Russia trolls

Trolls trying to write the sentence "Nato cannot save Finland" in Finnish failed because the language has two different words for 'save,' with two completely different meanings.

https://yle.fi/a/74-20018878

Last week, I did a survey about which pronouns people prefer in a sentence that needs a pronoun for someone of unknown gender. It mirrors a survey I did back in 2007.

This is obviously not scientific, but I believe the respondents are a roughly similar group. Here's how much attitudes have changed.

#grammar #writing #AmEditing #Bookstodon

The American Dialect Society has chosen "-ussy" as the 2022 word of the year.

Chair @bgzimmer says, "The selection of the suffix -ussy highlights how creativity in new word formation has been embraced online in venues like TikTok,” Zimmer said. “The playful suffix builds off the word pussy to generate new slang terms. The process has been so productive lately on social media sites and elsewhere that it has been dubbed
-ussification.”

https://www.americandialect.org/2022-word-of-the-year-is-ussy

#woty #ussy #linguistics