Ask or aks? How linguistic prejudice perpetuates inequality

By Amanda Cole, Postdoctoral Research Fellow (Institute for Analytics and Data Science) Department of Language and Linguistics, University of Essex
Ella Jeffries, Lecturer in linguistics, University of Essex
Peter L Patrick, Professor Emeritus of Linguistics, University of Essex

Teacher and artist Sunn M'Cheaux has been posting on social media about “linguicism” after a reader asked him about the word “ax”, saying: “Why did we struggle saying ‘ask’? Like when I was little, I always said ‘ax’. Like I couldn’t say the word correctly.”

M'Cheaux’s response counters the common idea that “ax” (spelled also “aks”) is incorrect: “ax” isn’t a mispronunciation of “ask” but an alternative…

Read complete article

~	Microplastics, pregnancy and the placenta: what we know and what we don’t

~	Yaba’s grip: how cheap methamphetamine is fuelling Thailand’s addiction crisis

~	Democrats dig in with a new type of campaign against Trump

~	Research shows children’s wellbeing drops when they start secondary school – here’s why

~	The First King of England: Æthelstan and the Birth of a Kingdom – a deep and nuanced analysis of a complex monarch

~	Sri Lanka moved to end elite impunity with arrest of former president

~	Lifetime trends in happiness change as misery peaks among the young – new research

~	Warming temperatures affect glaciers’ ability to store meltwater, contributing to rising sea levels

~	New study shows how Amazon trees use recent rainfall in the dry season and support the production of their own rain

~	Aid effort underway after Afghanistan quake ‘wipes out’ villages