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Language Evolution
Long before today's debates, immigration was already transforming the American accent into something distinctively its own.
In this excerpt from The Breath of the Gods, Simon Winchester explores how the Sumerians first named the wind and shaped our early understanding of the natural world.
Delirium is one of the most perplexing deathbed phenomena, exposing the gap between our cultural ideals of dying words and the reality of a disoriented mind.
The tonal Native American language differentiates words based on pitch and makes Spanish conjugation look like child’s play.
In Georgia, it's becoming less common to pronounce words like "prize" as "prahz."
The use of the letter x as an unknown is a relatively modern convention.
The structure is fully developed in humans, partially developed in chimps, and completely absent in Old World monkeys.
In order to figure out how English might evolve in the future, we have to look at how it has changed in the near and distant past.
Bees learn and culturally transmit their communication skills.
5mins
We are ~99% genetically identical to chimpanzees. But there are three key traits that separate us.
How to say “I love you” in Basque, the "most loving" cities around the world, and where most of America’s singles live — and so much more!
Use words with plosives and affricates if you really want to make sure everyone knows you mean business.
An increase in genetic regulatory elements explains how modern humans evolved bigger brains than other hominins.
How drugs, demons, and the search for immortality gave us words we use everyday.
Despite the fact that both species shared a similarly large neocortex, scientists still have many questions about how closely the function of their brains resembled our own.
The human brain is only the latest chapter in the ancient story of thinking on Earth.