Linguistic Typology

Why Do Some Languages Use Postpositions?

Ever wondered why Japanese speakers say "box in" instead of "in the box"? This seemingly small difference is no accident;…

4 months ago

Who Did What? Case vs. Word Order

Ever wonder why you can't scramble an English sentence, but you can in languages like Latin or Russian? This analysis…

4 months ago

5 Languages You’ve Never Heard Of

Journey beyond the familiar and discover languages that defy expectations, from a whistled language that echoes through Canary Island valleys…

4 months ago

The QWERTY Problem: Typing in a Non-Latin World

How do you type a language with thousands of characters on a keyboard with only a few dozen keys? The…

4 months ago

Building Sentences Backwards: The Verb-Final World

Ever felt like you're waiting for the punchline of a sentence? In languages like Japanese, German, and Hindi, that's the…

4 months ago

The Grammar of Nothing: Null Subjects

Ever wonder why you can say "Piove" in Italian for "It's raining", but "Is raining" is wrong in English? This…

4 months ago

The Mountain of Tongues: The Caucasus Sprachbund

The Caucasus region, a "Mountain of Tongues", is home to a dizzying array of unrelated languages. Yet, through centuries of…

4 months ago

Germany’s Word-Engine: The Logic of Compounds

Go beyond the humor of long German words and discover the powerful logic that builds them. This article deconstructs the…

4 months ago

The Uphill Verb: Grammar of the Himalayas

In most languages, you simply 'go' somewhere. But in the Himalayas, the very grammar of the language forces you to…

4 months ago

The Vanishing ‘We Two’: The Lost Grammar of the Dual

You know singular and plural, but what about a third option? Many languages, from Ancient Greek to modern Slovene, once…

4 months ago

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