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Articles on Linguistics

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French, Spanish and Japanese are spoken faster than German, Vietnamese and Mandarin, with English somwhere in the middle. Aaron Amat/iStock/Getty Images Plus

Why somepeopletalkveryfast and others … take … their … time − despite stereotypes, it has nothing to do with intelligence

Language, geography, age and other factors can all affect how fast a person talks. But sometimes, these perceived differences are only in the listener’s head.
Pieter Bruegel the Elder / Wikimedia

Do languages become less complex with more new adult speakers? Research shows it’s not that simple

The idea a language should grow simpler if people need to learn it as adults has an intuitive appeal. But an analysis of more than 1,200 languages shows this doesn’t quite stack up.
Conditions in rural England around the turn of the 20th century offer a case study for cultural evolution researchers. Heritage Images/Hulton Archive via Getty Images

English dialects make themselves heard in genes

People with a common history – often due to significant geographic or social barriers – often share genetics and language. New research finds that even a dialect can act as a barrier within a group.

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