Syntax

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;…

3 weeks 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…

3 weeks 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…

3 weeks 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…

3 weeks ago

How to Own Without ‘Have’: The Be-Languages

In languages like English, you 'have' a book. But in Russian, Irish, or Turkish, you would say "to me there…

3 weeks ago

The Sentence Tree: How AI Parses Grammar

Ever wonder how your smart assistant untangles a complex question or how machine translation works so well? It's not magic;…

3 weeks ago

The Ghost in the Object: Spain’s Personal ‘a’

Ever wonder why Spanish speakers say "Veo a María" but "Veo la mesa"? This grammatical quirk, known as the "personal…

3 weeks ago

Leísmo, Laísmo, Loísmo: Spain’s Pronoun War

In the world of Spanish grammar, a quiet war rages on. The combatants are three tiny pronouns—le, la, and lo—and…

3 weeks ago

The Forest for the Trees: Inside Linguistic Treebanks

Ever wonder how your phone understands complex questions? Behind every major advance in AI and search technology is a massive,…

3 weeks ago

Can a Language Have No Adjectives?

How would you describe a "big red ball" in a language with no words for "big" or "red"? Many languages…

3 weeks ago

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