John McWhorter has always seemed to me to be the descriptivist's descriptivist: language changes, deal with it, the way we speak is the way it is, etc. So to read his recent musings on the speech patterns of Donald Trump was astonishing and, frankly, glee-inducing.
Ahem, also about Trump: the article I've been pondering all week (is Trump a Russisan asset?). Find a sympathetic listener before you start reading because you WILL get logorrhea.
Here's a short article on why certain sounds in different languages seem aggressive to English speakers.
Germany's Özil set Twitter on fire this week with his dramatic resignation from the national football team. Here is additional analysis from The Atlantic.
Maggie Stiefvater explains book piracy.
This may have been my favorite thing all week: a look back at 1988 in 50 photos.
