Conversation by numbers
Two weeks ago, I attended a lecture by Prof. Michael McCarthy at Osaka Shoin Women’s University, and sponsored by Cambridge University Press. The title was “The Learner’s Turn”, meaning both “It’s the learner’s turn to say something” and “How learners take turns in conversation”. Michael McCarthy is a linguistics expert specialising in corpora, and has [...]
Yes we can… what?
The newspaper headline yesterday (Thursday, Nov. 6th, 2008) was イエス・ウィー・キャン We can what? Americans pride themselves on being a can-do nation: not just a nation of practical people of ability, but also of an optimistic attitude that is expressed in that old chestnut: “The possible we do straight away. The impossible takes a little longer.” [...]
Japanese version of “The Office” and other Japan news
Thanks to Japan Probe, I discovered that the British comedy series The Office had a Japanese inspiration. Like The Office itself, people seem to either love it or not find it funny at all. And speaking of Japan news, those foreigners living in Japan may be glad to know that the term “gaijin” has been [...]
