Tuesday, May 10, 2011

Gangsta rabble add their thang to Scrabble

According to an article in today's Daily Telegraph, Scrabble players are about to experience a massive shake-up from the slang massive. Hundreds of words from slang usage including thang and innit (and to be fair, Indian cookery and some technical jargon too) are set to appear in the new Collins Official Scrabble Words book.

On The Guardian's website, Sarah Churchwell talks about the new words and places them in the context of wider debates about new words entering mainstream use. For A2 students looking at language change and attitudes to change, it's a good article to read. As ever, the comments generated by the piece range from the deranged to the completely reasonable, so are worth a skim too.

Black British English vs MLE

The latest episode of Lexis is out and it features an interview with Ife Thompson about lots of issues connected to Black British English, i...