@elisestickles
assistant professor of English Language at the University of British Columbia. cognitive linguistics, metaphor theory, corpus linguistics, gesture studies. she/her, singular they is as old as Chaucer. http://elisestickles.com
🚨 Job alert in my group:
Want to do a PhD in Computational Linguistics working on figurative language (metaphor), on social media data, and in an interdisciplinary digital humanities environment, at one of the largest universities in Germany? Apply by March 30, 2026!
Contact me with any […]
Completely unsurprising, but also, what is happening when all the Waymos get stuck in a traffic jam of their own making and endlessly circle each other? Are the behind-the-scenes workers just messing around?
(If so, good for them.)
Me: I really need to log off social media and stop following the news so obsessively, so I can concentrate on my research
Also me: My research involves reading the news and social media
I probably should have thought this one through…
This is not how “men behave”, it’s how predators behave.
Also, if you know a potential boss will enquire about an applicant’s appearance, maybe consider steering your student AWAY from that job, instead of pushing her toward it?!
Highlighting the speaker who stood in front of the Surprise mayor and told him to consider what the Mayor of Ohrdruf must’ve thought before he died by suicide: “He might have thought ‘how is this my fault I had no jurisdiction over this’ maybe he said ‘this site was not subject to local zoning.’”
Last call for abstracts for the Cognitive Linguistics Association of North America Conference #CLANAC2 in Kelowna, BC this May 27-29, 2026. Any topics related to Cognitive Linguistics are welcome. Deadline has been extended to Jan. 30 and can be submitted here: ubc.ca1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_...
Oh to be clear it is 1000% better than the American broadcasts. Super entertaining and fun how they talk to lots of regular folks at the parties instead of the parade of B- and C-list celebrities
You could feel the camera person’s panic through the screen
The CBC NYE coverage is truly unhinged - the Vancouver feed is a half-empty roller rink in the PNE, a reporter in Regina just attempted an aerial dance move live on air, the NL feed closed with drunken sea shanties, and the co-host in Edmonton keeps putting on more jackets (he’s up to 10 layers)
Just noticed that @lingthusiasm.bsky.social is very close to a satisfyingly round number of followers on here
If you'd like to follow a podcast that's enthusiastic about linguistics, maybe head over there?
And if you think your followers might like to, give this a RT?
The LSA Awards Committee is excited to announce John Rickford as the winner of the 2026 Victoria A. Fromkin Lifetime Service Award!
John Rickford is Stanford University professor of Linguistics, emeritus & was LSA President in 1985. Join us in celebrating at #LSA2026! web.cvent.com/event/d45318...
Baby is back to the safety of its rooftop, where it is screaming for food while parents stand guard
This baby seagull and its parents have been living in this area of campus for a while now and it makes me so sad that now it’s ventured off the safety of the gym roof it’s being harassed like this 🙁
I just watched a grown man chase a baby seagull around until it ran into the street (thankfully it was not hurt)
And yes I yelled at him to stop but he didn’t hear me over the sound of his own rain boots stomping around
Wtf is wrong with people
🇨🇦 What’s the ultimate Canadian word? Earlier this year we told you about UBC scholars who had updated the Dictionary of Canadianisms on Historical Principles. Now, you can help crown the Canadianism of the Year! Cast your vote: docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...
This is of course fucking grim and all I can say is that Satan will be going to work in a snow plow before I turn a student away from my class for wearing niqab or anything else.
Fuck that forever.
(great column by @nolore.bsky.social)
open.substack.com/pub/noralore...
7 provinces! AB, BC, NL, NS, ON, QC, SK.
also, because I had to double-check that N&L's abbreviation is NL (not NF), I just learned from wikipedia its provincial flower is the pitcher plant. that is RAD.
6 provinces!
*Uto-Aztecan 🤦♀️
Also, fun fact: one of the show hosts, Ofelia Zepeda, is a linguist and poet at the University of Arizona, who published the only pedagogical grammar on O’odham. She won the Ken Hale prize and a MacArthur Fellowship. And here’s her dissertation! repository.arizona.edu/handle/10150...
I was also a bit gleeful at the thought of the “typical” classical music listener turning on their radio expecting Mozart or Bach and then, surprise! Uto-Atzecan! (Tucson was a more…stodgy…place back then.)
Although I didn’t understand the content, I enjoyed having it on while doing my homework and had a sense of how important it was to have indigenous language representation (looking back it’s sort of obvious that I was destined to be a linguist).
When I was in high school, the local classical radio station KUAT hosted a show called Desert Voices, broadcast in Tohono O’odham. The show went off the the air when the Nation got their own station - which was great ofc, but a bit sad that it was no longer integrated into the “regular” programming.
By my count you’re up to 5 provinces and it’s only 10am (pst)! 🇨🇦
Happy World Linguistics Day from Vancouver, BC, Canada!
Forgot the linguistics feed tag! 👐💬
What concept should we do next?
My cat is losing her hearing, so we decided we should use some basic gestures when talking to her.
It took her one (1) day to understand the sign for “food”. 😹
The verb "table" having opposite meanings in #Canadian and #American #English is just another example why speaking the same #language doesn't mean we speak the same
#linguistics #antonyms #dialect #meaning
You should do “table” (verb) next - that one really threw me at my first faculty meeting
