Talk the Talk

You've heard of Stonehenge, but have you heard of Manhattanhenge? Perhaps Carhenge would be more your style. Either way, all these henges give us a look at how words get created. How many words get made this way? More than you'd think. Linguist Daniel Midgley is back for this episode of Talk the Talk.

Computers are terrible at learning language. Would they be any better if they learned it like humans have to? A team of computer scientists has built a 'robot baby' that is interacting with people and learning to speak. Ground-breaking, or just creepy? Linguist Daniel Midgley babbles away on this episode of Talk the Talk.

It's official: 'bogan' has made it into the Oxford dictionary. It's language's highest bar to clear, and its inclusion means that by any definition, 'bogan' is truly a word. How do words get into the dictionary, anyway? And what do these words tell us about ourselves? Linguist Daniel Midgley brushes up on the lingo on this week's episode of Talk the Talk.

Apes don't have language, but they do gesture. They've even been observed using a special form of gesture with their young. Could it be primate baby-talk? What can we learn from our nearest relatives about how our language started? Linguist Daniel Midgley swings in for this episode of Talk the Talk.

Are there secrets in your search history? We sometimes submit search queries that we wouldn't admit to friends. And by looking at our searches, researchers can unearth things we'd rather keep hidden, including covert racism and sexual predilections. Linguist Daniel Midgley dishes the dirt on this episode of Talk the Talk.

Even with the huge vocabulary of English, we still haven't got all the words covered. Other languages have words that we don't have single-word equivalents for. Can they be mapped onto English? And why do we have gaps in our language? Linguist Daniel Midgley will translate the untranslatable on this episode of Talk the Talk.

Should we use the word 'rape' when it's not about actual rape? What about 'retarded' or 'gay'? The meanings of words can change, but sometimes this means conflict as we decide what's okay and what's not okay to say. Linguist Daniel Midgley gives his take on this episode of Talk the Talk.

Archaeologists have found the oldest known art from our early ancestors. These carvings are thousands of years older than the earliest cave paintings -- also in southern France. Who carved them, and why? And what's the link between art and language? Linguist Daniel Midgley goes palaeolithic on this episode of Talk the Talk.

Is it the Persian Gulf, or the Arabian Gulf? It depends on who you ask. But Google's map makers are finding that it's hard to stay impartial to political conflict when putting a name on a map can cause international tensions to flare. Who gets to name something anyway? Linguist Daniel Midgley explores names and naming on this episode of Talk the Talk.

Can baboons read? Not exactly, but in a recent experiment, they could tell the difference between real words and fake words. What does this tell us about animals, and what could it do for us? Linguist Daniel Midgley spells it out on this episode of Talk the Talk.

Passive Voice Day was held last week. The linguistic phenomenon known as passive voice is hated by editors, checked by computers, and used by all of us. But it's not well understood, and often misidentified in the press. How can it be spotted, and should it be eliminated entirely? Passive voice will be explained once and for all by UWA linguist Daniel Midgley in this episode of Talk the Talk.

Languages are disappearing. In the next hundred years, half the world's languages may be gone. But is this really a problem? What do we lose when we lose a language? And can the process be halted? We catch up with linguist Nick Evans, author of 'Dying Words', on this episode of Talk the Talk.

Big Tobacco is challenging government legislation that would put plain packaging on cigarette packets. They claim that removing a logo is similar to expropriating their property. Is a logo property? Why are cigarette makers fighting this so hard? What does a logo communicate? UWA linguist Daniel Midgley clears the air on this episode of Talk the Talk.

New evidence shows that humans used fire one million years ago -- a lot earlier than we thought. This tells us about our early ancestors, but it also tells us about language and how it started. What does fire have to do with language? UWA linguist Daniel Midgley discusses the burning issues on this episode of Talk the Talk.

What would life be like without numbers? The Pirahã people of the Amazon don't have them in their language, and have difficulty learning them. What does this tell us about the human mind? Linguist Caleb Everett spent some time among the Pirahã, and he talks with our resident linguist Daniel Midgley on this episode of Talk the Talk.