Talk the Talk

Radioactive waste takes a long time to decay. In the meantime, you have to warn people to stay away from it. But how do you make a warning sign that will still be understandable to people 10,000 years in the future? UWA linguist Daniel Midgley examines the problem of Yucca Mountain on this episode of Talk the Talk.

What was early human language like? A pair of researchers think they've reconstructed early human syntax from as early as 50,000 years ago. But have they got it right? How can we know about languages that no longer exist? UWA linguist Daniel Midgley surveys the evidence on this week's Talk the Talk.

Do you have an accent? Of course you do; everybody does. And now there's the Speech Accent Archive, an internet database that you can browse, containing sound data from hundreds of speakers of English from around the globe. What is it for, and how can you contribute? UWA linguist Daniel Midgley interviews Speech Accent Archive creator Steven Weinberger on this episode of Talk the Talk.

While English is the major language of the Commonwealth, there are hundreds of other languages and dialects. But many of these minority languages are under threat. What can we do to preserve the languages in our midst, and why should we? UWA linguist Daniel Midgley investigates on this episode of Talk the Talk.

This week on Talk the Talk, we're talking about spam. Not the spicy ham product, but the wretched dreck that clogs your inbox. Why do we call it 'spam'? How does your computer know if your email is spam? How do you know if an online review is for real, or if it's just spam-for-hire? Where is all this spam coming from, and why is there so much of it? UWA linguist Daniel Midgley gives you the real deal on this episode of Talk the Talk.

You say it many times a day, whether you notice it or not. It's "um". Far from being just a conversation-filler, it can make you a better speaker, and may even help children learn new words. UWA linguist Daniel Midgley will try to make it all clear on this week's Talk the Talk.

For 140 characters, Twitter can tell us a lot about ourselves. By looking at masses of tweets, word-crunching software can tell when we're feeling up or down, help us decide what stocks to buy or sell, and track the spread of illness through a population. UWA linguist Daniel Midgley puts it all together on this week's Talk the Talk.

UWA linguist Daniel Midgley talks the talk with Robert Lane Greene, language blogger, journalist, and author of the new book "You Are What You Speak: Grammar Grouches, Language Laws, and the Politics of Identity".

Are you a grammar grouch? Do you have language peeves? And if so, how can you recover? UWA linguist Daniel Midgley talks the talk with Robert Lane Greene, language blogger, journalist, and author of the new book "You Are What You Speak: Grammar Grouches, Language Laws, and the Politics of Identity".

They're reviled by spelling reformers, and loathed by English learners. They're silent letters. Why does English possess these orthographic curiosities? Do other languages put up with them? Are they useless leftover baggage, or could they be the quiet achievers that make English spelling work? UWA linguist Daniel Midgley breaks the silence on this episode of Talk the Talk.

Not every language uses the same words for colours. English has about 11 colour terms, while other languages get by with two or three. And it seems that people whose language uses different colour terms are able to easily tell the difference between colours that look just the same to us. Does our language warp our perception of reality? UWA linguist Daniel Midgley brings it into focus on this week's Talk the Talk.

Linguists and researchers are working on AusTalk, a database of Australian English. With a thousand speakers, it will be the largest repository of English outside the UK. But what's it for? What are we expecting to find? And how can you take part? We're joined by another UWA linguist, Celeste Rodriguez Louro, on this week's Talk the Talk.

Recent events in Libya have us wondering: How do you write 'Khadafi'? There are at least 96 permutations on his last name alone, and this causes problems for writers and search engines alike. How do we put Arabic script into English letters, and how do computer systems bridge the gap? UWA linguist Daniel Midgley spells it out on this week's Talk the Talk.

On every frazzled parent's reading list is a new children's book: Go the Fuck to Sleep by Adam Mansbach. Perhaps you wouldn't read it to a child, but you might wonder where the f-word comes from, and why we can insert it into some sentences but not others. UWA linguist Daniel Midgley will be dropping a few on this episode of Talk the Talk.

Are you plagued by Americanisms? Some people get irritated by words or phrases invented or popularised by speakers of American English. But many of the Americanisms that are twisting people's knickers (or panties) aren't American. What's behind this cross-continental scuffle? UWA linguist Daniel Midgley bridges the gap on this week's Talk the Talk.