The Wrong Way to name a car: international branding blunders
Product naming is an important part of branding and marketing, and one where international businesses can make costly mistakes if they fail to understand local
Category: Language
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A last-minute Christmas gift for spelling-challenged book lovers
Just enough time for one more gift idea for book lovers: “Spell It Out –The Singular Story of English Spelling”, by David Crystal. In the
Omnishambles: object-lessons in how not to contract out language services
“An object-lesson in how not to contract out a public service”. That’s how the Rt Hon Margaret Hodge MP, Chair of the Committee of Public
The Caledonian Mercury: “Scotland’s first truly online newspaper”. Plus, Useful Scots Words.
I’ve just discovered a “new” Scottish online newspaper that’s been around for nearly 3 years but which I hadn’t heard of until yesterday. It’s the
Empty-nest syndrome – a linguistic side-effect
I became an “empty-nester” when my daughter moved away in September to attend Leeds College of Music. Harry, our son, had left two years earlier. So
Nouning and verbing: an ask too far?
It’s been a while since I wrote about my (and your) favourite or least favourite words. But at Glasgow’s State of the City Economy Conference last week (9
Glasgow’s times present: international ambitions, but we won’t speak your language
I attended Glasgow’s 15th State of the City Economy Conference today. There was a lot of talk about the importance of global marketing, exports, tourism,
Glasgow’s times past
Looking for “doon the watter” links for my “Coping with Sandy” post, I discovered an amazing blog for anyone living in, from or interested in
Coping with Sandy: Hunkering and coorie-ing
Merriam-Webster’s “Trend Watch” reported a spike in lookups of the word “hunker” in the run-up to Hurricane (Superstorm?) Sandy. They give this CNN headline as
Ministry of Justice language services: FUBAR?
Interpreters in the UK have been up in arms over the Ministry of Justice’s 2011 language services framework agreement with a company formerly called Applied