Author Archives: Ed Battistella

About Ed Battistella

Edwin Battistella’s latest book Dangerous Crooked Scoundrels was released by Oxford University Press in March of 2020.

Arithmetic Depends on Grammar

Posted on December 10, 2012 by Ed Battistella

If you get all of the presents in the song “The Twelve Days of Christmas,” how many presents do you get? 364 (because of the AND) Here’s the formula: ((1 x 12)+ (2 x 11)+(3 x 10)+(4 x 9)+(5 x … Continue reading →

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Deep (structure) thoughts

Posted on December 7, 2012 by Ed Battistella

It’s Noam Chomsky’s birthday, and through a combination of serendipity and procrastination I’ve just finished a mini-review of Chomsky’s Linguistics (ed. by Peter Graff and Coppe van Urk and published by the MIT Working Papers in Linguistics. It’s a 700 … Continue reading →

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An Interview with Alena Amato Ruggerio

Posted on December 3, 2012 by Ed Battistella

Dr. Alena Amato Ruggerio is an Associate Professor in the Department of Communication at Southern Oregon University, where she teaches rhetoric, the way humans create and share meaning through the exchange of symbols. She’s an award winning teacher whose interests … Continue reading →

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Non-words for November

Posted on December 2, 2012 by Ed Battistella

Here are the Non-Words for November. One more month to go. Thanks to Becky Bartlett for cudgedit and to David Brown for the idea behind chronosomnia. hensive, adj. able to be grasped or held, metaphorically or physically. 1 Nov uningratiate, … Continue reading →

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