mastodon 4.7.3Post-doc researcher & lecturer in #linguistics; #semantics, #typology, #openscience, #evolution, #complexity, though I have yet to write anything on the latter two. (he/him)
Avatar: Pixel-art depiction of a person with short blond hair and a widow’s peak hairline, blue eyes and a dark green shirt with a dark grid-like pattern, all on an emerald green background.
Header: Photo brutalist concrete buildings behind a quadrilateral pond and green lawn, underneath an overcast sky.
2x small grants won (1 rejected),
2x large grants submitted (1 rejected)
3x journal papers published,
3x proceedings papers published,
4x invited talks given,
5x conference presentations given (1 rejected),
5x reviewer of jounal papers
3x classes taught,
1x conference co-organizer
infinitely on the job market #IchBinHanna
links to my work at https://kerbach2.github.io/
“leading AI models perform worse for users with lower English proficiency, less formal education, and non-US origins” -MIT Media Lab
https://news.mit.edu/2026/study-ai-chatbots-provide-less-accurate-information-vulnerable-users-0219
RE: https://mastodon.social/@europeanspodcast/116214990870495197
Finally got around to this great (as always) episode of The Europeans about Mastodon, and reminded me to say thanks again to @headword@lingo.lol for hosting this instance!
Ever wondered why we order double martinis and double espressos, but not double lemonades or double hot chocolates?
New paper out by E. Moon that argues the semantics of cocktails and coffee drinks have a particular measured part that can be doubled that other drinks do not.
Lots of fun data and food for thought in this paper: https://doi.org/10.16995/glossa.23419
“if you want to boost the productivity of your scientists 10x, you have to be willing to increase their funding 10x (or something like that). Of course, this is much harder and much more expensive than simply buying them $20/month Claude subscriptions” Emin Orhan
Happy to report that my paper, Transitioning developmental paths in modal flavors: an experimental pilot study, co-authored with Remus Gergel, has been accepted to Evolutionary Linguistic Theory.
In this paper we introduce a new experimental paradigm for testing pathways of diachronic development which shed light on the conditions necessary for semantic change.
Pre-final draft: https://www.uni-saarland.de/fileadmin/upload/lehrstuhl/gergel/publications_gergel/Modal_development_experiments.pdf
Hoping to get some thoughts on the highest regarded #linguistics journals by #linguists regardless of rankings. Maybe drop the name of two or three in a reply?
A friend was suprised to see "bolt" in the category "eat voraciously" in yesterdays NYT Games' Connections, so I did a little corpus study:
Of 100 randomly selected occurences of "bolt" in COCA, 0 mean 'to eat'
Of the 123 occurrences of "bolted down" in COCA, 4 mean 'to eat' and 1 'to drink'.
So I'm not suprised he was suprised.
RE: https://toot.cafe/@baldur/116476110099547066
Looks like using AI doesn't just make you dumber, it makes your work dumber too
Skeptical of diachronic semantics because you can't ask speakers of, say, Middle English, for truth value judgments?
In this new (paywalled) paper we show how the conditions diachronic semantic change can be tested using experimental synchronic methods: https://doi.org/10.1075/elt.00065.erb
Just read:
The material making of language as practice of global domination and control: continuations from European colonialism to AI
By Bettina Migge & Britta Schneider
TLDR: the sorts of rhetoric and ideology seen in enterprises in the european colonial era (1400-1960), are seen in the AI-pushing tech industry today
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00146-025-02389-5
here recommending The Vocal Fries podcast episode Algospeak (Ep 142).
They discuss the topic of how people adjust their language to get around or harness the algorithms with Adam Aleksic, author of a recent book on the topic.
Edit: check it out here! https://www.buzzsprout.com/1930383/episodes/17650624-algospeak
