The AI Con may as well be the answer to the question: what happens when a linguist and a sociologist come together to write a book? Co-written by Emily M. Bender and Alex Hanna, The AI Con isn’t just a book, it’s an instruction manual to guide readers through this era of AI hype. In short, this book does what academic scholarship does best: close read texts, historical patterns, marketing schemes, statistics, politics, and more—and find a way to connect these granular details and examples to bro...
May 19, 2025•1 hr 7 min
Justin Khoo, an associate professor of Philosophy at MIT, begins this episode with the assertion that philosophy asks the most fundamental questions we can possibly articulate—but this assertion is not innocent. Asking the most fundamental questions we can possibly articulate may come at the cost of undermining conceptual, schematic, ideological, and often disciplinary frameworks upon which scientific findings are predicated. Through discussion of code speech, political speech, philosophy of lan...
Apr 01, 2025•1 hr 22 min
Throughout this episode, Chiara Repetti-Ludlow, a postdoctoral research fellow at Carnegie Mellon's Neuroscience Institute, asks us to consider the essentials of speech processing and its constraints. We hear phonetics, but we understand phonology. How and why? To answer those questions, Chiara takes a highly interdisciplinary approach. We know that linguistics is an interdisciplinary field—it has to be. We can't divorce language from its cognitive, physical, and social apparatuses, nor can lang...
Mar 10, 2025•38 min
In early 2023, Susan Blum came on Tomayto Tomahto to discuss linguistic anthropology. 2 years later, she's back to discuss her work on schoolishness, ungrading, and linguistic ideology. From plagiarism to authentic learning, imperialist language ideologies to biased methods and metrics of Western science, this episode looks critically at what we "know," how we know it, and where the perpetuation of knowledge might hinder new discoveries. Science promises objectivity, but does it deliver? How mig...
Feb 02, 2025•45 min
A defining quirk of fields like English, Linguistics, Comparative Literature, etc is that the the objects of study mirror the medium through which the objects of study are explicated. Literary scholars produce literature to explain literature. We explain language through language, not always the same language, but a linguistic medium matches a linguistic medium nonetheless. Climate change is not the same as language, not at all. So why is it that we make sense of our climate through language? Jo...
Dec 19, 2024•41 min
"What frame allows you to take seriously the consequence of ideological overdetermination without conceding that it has a reality or a natural position?” This is one of many questions that Jonathan Rosa poses throughout this episode. What perspective allows us to see race and language as ontologically overdetermined without essentializing that overdetermination to the point of inextricability? Taking a few steps back, this episode is largely about questions and questioning. Why have certain fiel...
Oct 14, 2024•1 hr 16 min
While legal academia is no stranger to questions of linguistics, it has been estranged (until now) from the practice of adopting linguistic theory and methods. In Part 2 of our conversation, Alex Walker and I discuss the implications of applying optimality theory (OT) to law. By utilizing the formalism of OT, Alex argues our entire legal system and conceptualization of law will change for the better. Rather than conceptualizing law as a set of rules, Alex argues we should view law as a tapestry ...
Jun 29, 2024•45 min
Legal academia is no stranger to questions of linguistics. After all, law is, in some sense, a linguistic construction. But our entire legal system interfaces with language far more than we might think. For a long time, the relationship between linguistics and law has concentrated on philosophy of language and forensic linguistics. Lawyers and linguists become friends over debates about entailment conditions or Constitutional arguments predicated upon the semantic change of a singular noun ( arm...
Jun 21, 2024•41 min
Ben Zimmer, a language columnist for the Wall Street Journal, is a self-described "linguist, lexicographer, and all-around word nut," but I think this episode proves him to be a paragon of linguistic curiosity. He's committed to bringing the nuances and complexities of language to a general audience, and all through his work on words—which, as we know, are often persona non grata in the linguistics community. But nevertheless, this episode focuses on words and their political impact. Words—signi...
Apr 30, 2024•59 min
People often talk about language as "a window" into many things. Language can teach us about the mind, the brain, history, etc. But language is also a medium for discrimination, ridicule, oppression, unequal labor, and various other insidious practices. Linguistic oppression, as Kelly Elizabeth Wright tells us, isn't really about language, it's about how practices of oppression exploit language in their conquests. Kelly E. Wright uses language to study and address forms of oppression, labor, rac...
Mar 31, 2024•54 min
There’s a lot that I can say about Emily M. Bender, but I think that a philosophy professor of mine said it best when he described her as the “cutting edge of technology and AI and linguistics and ethics.” Obviously some of her cutting-edge-ness concomitantly stems from the cutting-edge-ness of large language models, deep fakes, and 'artificial intelligence' inventions. But out of all the computational linguists, Emily M. Bender stands out to me because she's made the problem of unregulated AI p...
Feb 25, 2024•52 min
To study language is to study something uniquely human. To study language throughout time and history is to study the evolution of something uniquely human, to determine the variables and constants which shape human existence. Historical linguistics remains one of my favorite subfields of linguistics because it’s so much more than just one subfield. To study language diachronically (through time), historical linguists can examine many different aspects of language at once. We can wonder about th...
Feb 13, 2024•39 min
Picture this: it's early January, 2024, and hundreds upon hundreds of linguists have gathered for the Linguistic Society of America (LSA)'s annual meeting in New York City. With so many language nerds in one place, I couldn't help but interview as many people as I could about their favorite linguistics fact. This episode contains tantalizing tidbits of information about everything from onomastics, non-concatenative morphology, and the McGurk effect—to historical events effecting language change,...
Jan 23, 2024•42 min
Steven Pinker, the Johnstone Family Professor of Psychology at Harvard University, has studied the mind through a myriad of lenses, including language. Throughout Steve's career, he’s published books and articles on topics such as language acquisition, rationality, human nature, trends of global violence, writing and style, and language structure. He went from academic, to public intellectual—in 2004, he was named one of Time Magazine's 100 most influential people in the world today. And inevita...
Dec 29, 2023•44 min
Although Cory Shain (currently at MIT, soon to be at Stanford) studies language, therefore making him a “linguist,” his research could easily be classified as belonging to a number of other disciplines. To understand the computations responsible for language processing, he engages heavily with computer science. To study the functional organization and architecture of language in the brain, he uses methods of neuroscience. To round out the complexities of his research, he pulls from the theories ...
Nov 11, 2023•44 min
I've heard it said that the best way to concretize a friendship is to interview your friend on a podcast. So that's what this episode is: a conversation between myself and my brilliant friend, Joseph Rager. Despite studying both Linguistics and Romance Languages and Literatures at Harvard during undergrad, Joseph is now pursuing a doctorate in Comparative Literature at UC Berkeley. How does his knowledge of linguistic methods and theory inform his analysis of literature and poetry? If literature...
Oct 20, 2023•49 min
It’s rare to meet your academic inspiration incarnate, and even rarer to take a class with them, so I was enthralled, overjoyed, and sweating my pores out when I got the chance to take Professor Nicole Holliday’s Language and Society class. This past semester, I witnessed all that Professor Holliday brings to linguistics: superb teaching, endless energy and enthusiasm, an insatiable love of learning, and innovative research methods. Her experiments seek truth and action: from politicians, to ASR...
Jun 18, 2023•49 min
What can the bilingual brain accomplish more efficiently than the monolingual brain? Megan Zirnstein, a cognitive science professor at Pomona College, researches bilingual cognition, a topic of particular interest throughout this episode. In addition to discussing Professor Zirnstein's research, we talk about the field of cognitive science and bilingualism research: where it's headed, where it came from, and why it's such a multidisciplinary and slightly amorphous corner of academia. And of cour...
May 29, 2023•35 min
We did it, Joe: Tomayto Tomahto has been in existence for over a year. That's one year, 12 episodes, and way too many instances of editing audio into the wee hours of the morning. But it's all been worth it. In this episode, I'm joined by Professor Donna Jo Napoli from Swarthmore College—an absolute legend in the field of linguistics. She's an author, a mathematician, a linguist, a teacher, a dancer, and she's so, so passionate about the power of language. We talk about the intersection between ...
Apr 21, 2023•40 min
What if I told you that it was ChatGPT, not I, who wrote each and every one of these scintillating episode descriptions? Well, you'd probably laugh uncontrollably at my hilarious joke. Robots can't use the word "scintillating" correctly—or can they? Whether we like it or not, linguistically conscious AI are becoming more and more prevalent. In light of the decline in actual writing, I thought it would be prudent to interview the brilliant, funny, talented computer scientist and computational lin...
Feb 13, 2023•31 min
This is a truly interdisciplinary episode. Pressor Susan Blum (Notre Dame) is an anthropologist, a cultural, linguistical, anthropologist. We talk about the intersections between linguistics, politics, legislation, food, semiotics, literary theory, pedagogy, as well as such icons as Saussure and CS Pierce. In other other words, this is a truly teleological episode, one that will teach you why and how linguistics applies to other disciplines and to the world around us. Listen, go read Professor B...
Feb 05, 2023•30 min
Ladies an gentleman...the director of Brown's Language and Thought Lab: Professor Roman Feiman!! Have you ever wondered about the intersection between psychology and linguistics? Well, wonder no more. Listen to this episode and learn about everything from psycholinguistics, to child language acquisition, to language and thought; semantics and pragmatics; descriptions vs. grammar when mapping words to the world; philosophy of the mind; marketing techniques enhanced by an understanding of linguist...
Jan 14, 2023•44 min
It is a truth universally acknowledged that Professor Toni Cook is a genius. That's why I'm taking her Intro to Linguistics class at Pomona College. In this episode, Prof Cook and I tackle a lot: language as a tool for social control, the importance of understanding historical linguistics, intensive vs diminutive verb reduplication, various prestigious characteristics of dialects, linguistic colonial legacies, the relationship between world-view and language, and feminist semantics. Will you be ...
Nov 25, 2022•29 min
AAAaand I'm back! I'm back with a banger of an episode and a smashing success of a guest: the fabulous Robin Danzak, a professor of Communication Studies at Emerson College. Join me as she takes us on the journey (pun intended) of her career. We'll talk about language and community, bilingualism, antiracist pedagogy, and so much more. We'll travel to Italy, Florida, and New England; we'll touch on power, identity, storytelling, politics, and the importance of education. Professor Danzak is one o...
Oct 17, 2022•30 min
What's the relationship between language and power? Why are dialects a gatekeeper? What exactly is sociolinguistics? Join me and Professor Heather Littlefield as we discuss the relationships between language and gender, race, ethnicity, economic opportunities, and power. Any study/paper/TedTalk/article/person she mentioned in the interview is linked below. Special thanks to Molly Herman, Lindsay Villone, Eleza Kort, and, of course, Heather Littlefield. Ted talk by John Baugh Further work by John...
Jun 03, 2022•28 min
How do languages evolve? Why do dialects emerge and then fade? What happens if a language dies out? What does culture have to do with language? In this episode, Professor Luke Gorton answers all these questions and more. So please, sit back, relax, and welcome into your ears...an actual, real, linguist! Special thanks to Luke Gorton, Eleza Kort, and Jim Kernohan. If you have any questions, please feel free to email Prof Gorton at lagorton@unm.edu.
May 21, 2022•22 min
Welcome to episode 4, where my interviewees will answer question three: what sorts of privileges and/or limitations does your accent give you? Join me on this emotional journey as I, along with several fully grown adults, unpack our frustration over the fact that people don't talk about accents and dialects more often. Stay tuned for future episodes where I interview college professors!
May 16, 2022•18 min
Historic milestone alert: this is the 3rd episode of Tomayto Tomahto. I know most of you must be squealing in excitement at the very thought of this podcast's longevity, and so I'll ask you to kindly pipe down so you can fully appreciate this episode in all its glory. In this tertiary episode, you'll hear from the interviewees as they answer question two: what does your accent mean to you and what does it signify about you? All that, plus three gripping commercials centered around the theme of s...
May 06, 2022•17 min
Welcome back to Tomayto Tomahto! For episode two, my interviewees answer question one: How do you define your accent and/or dialect? Special thanks to Phil Robson, John Lee, Sarah Jacobs, Kate Hamblet, Mark Connolly, Jeanine Bell, Patrice Jean-Baptiste, and Marisela Funes.
Apr 24, 2022•21 min
Welcome to Tomayto Tomahto! In this principal episode, you'll learn about accents and dialects: what they are, how they come to be, and what they communicate about a person. Study by Amee Shah at Stockton University Study by Nicole Holliday at University of Pennsylvania
Mar 28, 2022•8 min
