Raffaella Zanuttini publishes op-ed on language change
February 22, 2015
Professor Raffaella Zanuttini recently published an op-ed article in the Pacific Standard. The article, titled “Don’t Fear Our Changing Language,” describes language change as a logical process that provides insight into the human mind rather than something to be feared or resisted.
We consistently find people who decry change and fear it will bring about the demise of English as we know it. But it’s totally harmless and offers us a window on the complex system that underlies our knowledge of language.
One language change discussed in the article is the use of so in the speech of young Americans, a phenomenon that has been researched by the Yale Grammatical Diversity Project.