Humans Who Read Grammars

People love languages; there are many game shows on TV which are language-based.  Most language quiz shows test contestants on their knowledge of the broadcasting language itself. For instance, English-language channels testing contestants on their knowledge of the English language and English literature: Wheel of Fortune ; e.g. CBS News Have you seen quiz shows on TV where they quiz contestants on languages other than the broadcasting language (or some major international language)? Wouldn't it be cool if there are quiz shows on TV where they test contestants on languages that are rarely or never broadcasted?  Here I will talk about the "dialect quiz shows" in China, which I think can be emulated in many other parts of the world. These shows are entertaining for the general audience (if done right), and can help raise the interest in regional languages. (In this blogpost, there are many pics/gifs of people struggling and failing. They are not suggesting that...

Following on from the preceding post on listening to the languages of the world by navigating audio samples on maps, here I will introduce Phonemica 乡音苑/ 鄉音苑, a website with user-contributed audio files of Sinitic (and some other nearby) languages, mapped by pins that are (supposedly) colour coded by linguistic affiliations. Even if you are not into Sinitic languages, it is fun to listen to, and familiarise yourself with, the various Sinitic languages. (You know, just in case, e.g., the next pub quiz asks you to distinguish the Cantonese vs. Mandarin vs. Taiwanese Mandarin versions of 'Let It Go'.) Version A Version B Version C (And just for fun, unofficial versions of 'Let It Go' in Taiwanese , Shanghainese , and 26 Sinitic lects .) The level of diversity amongst the Sinitic languages is similar to that amongst the Romance languages. At around the same time that Vulgar Latin was spread around by Roman soldiers, Late Archaic/ Early Medieval Chinese...