fierceawakening:

isaacsapphire:

mollokoplus:

tygermama:

thefreelancerdivision:

tygermama:

thefreelancerdivision:

tygermama:

empressofthelibrary:

substantiating-shadows:

ihoema:

revengeance:

novena5:

revengeance:

I’m so fucking pissed off I just realized they’re called pancakes because they’re cakes you make in a frying pan fuck english.

Waterfall

Oh my fucking god I’m furious.

…did you think they were called pancakes because they’re pansexual? what the fuck lmfao

Ok so in linguistics when you study morphology, you study the smallest and largest components if what it might mean to be a word; because theres actually no real definition of a ‘word’ (or even a ‘language’ but thats another story). There are two main theories about the way that we store words in our brain. One is by every potential combination of morpheme <lexicon based> and another is by smallest morpheme (unit of meaning).

Lexicon Theory (1) is that we memorize/store ever word that has a complete unbounded meaning to it. This is how the lay person thinks about language. Knowing more words means knowing more if the language and we think we teach children language by teaching them words (talk about controversy there lemme tell you). So you separate “intelligence” from “intellect” from “intellectual” all distinct words, right? But couldn’t we make this system a little smoother by cheating a bit?

Morpheme Theory (2) says that every root, suffix, prefix, infix is stored separately and every time you go to retrieve a word you create the entire word, so every time you say ‘unintelligence’ your brain is processing ‘un + intell(ect)+ (ig)ence" to create “unintelligence”. Now this theory would account for the least amount of overall storage space in your brain. Kinda like carrying around a keyboard to type on instead of a dictionary to point words in to communicate.

Now, this is a great theory but in many experiments (and im sorry to be a terrible scientist but i cant source rn so you’ll have to trust with me) the results we get are not strictly in line with theory 2 but also not theory 1. So like many things in life ~its complicated~. What happens is (theoretical ofc but so is the explanation for gravity, kids) that every person has a slightly different configuration of what their lexical entries/“words” (morphemes) stored in the brain/. And this depends on how you acquired your language. And im not talking about second language or non native speakers although those are of course where the most drastic variations are seen.

No, if you used the word “butter” a lot in your childhood for some reason and also the word “ball” and those two words were very separate for you and strictly meant “food item” and “shape”, respectively. Then when you hear the word “butterball” the first thing that you picture in your head is…. a ball of butter.

BUT if you are someone who, like me, grew up knowing both “butter” and “ball” as separate BUT ALSO knew that the turkey we made on every thanksgiving was a Butterball turkey and that the brand name was Butterball. Then when you say to me “butterball” my lexicon will jump first to those two morphemes put together as that word and I’ll think– turkey! And never come close to picturing anything to do with butter or a ball even though to someone else it might be obvious that thats a compound word. I didnt have to recreate that word, it was already complete with its specific meaning.

Now. Children dont learn language, they acquire it. And one process that happens on acquiring it is that they build a lexicon (a mental dictionary). At the very beginning, a childs brain is not going to start doing the hard linguistic analysis that leads to Morpheme Theory 2. They store new “words” like a list and then at a certain point say ‘hey how about we simplify this list so its a lot shorter’ (remember: dictionary v. Keyboard). Now, this list of “words” gets simplified in different ways based on the individual.

A. So some people might keep “because” as one ‘word’.

“Because” = reason for an occurrence or expl.
“Waterfall” = that cascade of water from height
“Pancake” = this specific food item
“Closeknit” = intimate

B. While others might store such words by their parts

“Cause + be(ing)” =reason for something existing
“water + fall(ing)” = liquid moving in certain manner
“Pan + cake” = edible item x relating to an object ‘pan’
“Close(ly) + knit” = specific configuration of yarn

And the amazing thing is that because when we retrieve a word like “closeknit” by route A, we are going directly to an adjective which is used to describe perhaps the bond of friend ship and nothing to do with knitting, then the brain doesnt even go near the second potential storing of the word. You never think of knitting if you’ve only ever used that word as an adjective for emotional intimacy. Someone who DOES knit quite a lot and uses that as an adjective for the actual stitch of a knitting needle will almost certainly have the word stored in the manner B.

SO TO FINALLY COME TO A CONCLUSION. I AM SO SORRY FOR THE INTRO TO LINGUISTICS LESSON YALL DIDNT READ:

Someone thinking of a pancake has no reason to think of a “pan” and “cake” separately and so for whatever reason this was brought to their attention, the lack of previous consideration for this fact is what seems mind blowing when suddenly a new morpheme based meaning is given to the word. Language works in mysterious ways, and yall need the space in the brain to like breathe, remember and see shit; so language takes up as little space as necessary in the mind.

TL;DR People arent stupid for not “realizing” this, even if this language is their first language. Languages work without you understanding them, they are like the bumblebee. Our ideas about how language works are usually based in prejudiced social shit that should stay away from linguistics.

WHY ARE PEOPLE NOT MAKING THEIR PANCAKES ON GRIDDLES

I’ve read pancakes referred to as ‘griddlecakes’ before

it’s ‘flapjacks’ that’s making me wonder what it’s cooked on

1. What the hell is a griddle

2. THAT’S WHAT A FUCKING BUTTERBALL IS??? FRESH PRINCE OF BEL-AIR HAS HAUNTED ME FOR YEARS WITH THAT

3. Yeah this happens to me with words really frequently ngl

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Griddle

What the–who the hell just HAS a griddle to cook on then if it’s a restaurant thing??

you can buy them. some are electric and you just plug it in and go, others go on the stovetop, my parents have one for when they go camping

We had a cast-iron griddle when I was a kid. It was used not just for pancakes but for grilled cheese sammidges, too. Then Mom got the Farberware electric one and stopped using the cast-iron one. No idea what happened to it.

My mind is blown by the revelation that somebody old enough to be on Tumblr doesn’t know what a griddle is.

I grew up with a frying pan-like sorta square shaped pan, big enough to fry four grilled cheese sandwiches on simultaneously, which was also used to make pancakes. Incidentally, that was literally the only things we used that pan for. There are also griddles made of cast iron that are intended to go across two stove burners at once, although the cast iron griddles can also be used for cooking over a fire and are so used in car camping.

Griddles with integral heating elements are also common, from non-commercial griddles for home use being pretty common and cheap small appliances that can sub in for a stove top in a pinch (6-8 sandwich sized usually, also frequently seen at charity pancake breakfasts and car camping) to enormous commercial griddles up to almost the size of a twin mattress found in almost every commercial kitchen, frequently visible to customers in dinners, where, depending on the menu, up to almost all the cooking is done.

I was dumbfounded when I realized “recognize” is LITERALLY “cognize again” (That is, “realize you’ve encountered this thing before”) and “cooperate” is literally “operate together” (“work with another person to do a thing”)

THEY LOOK LIKE BIG WORDS BUT THEY ACTUALLY LITERALLY MEAN WHAT THEY SAY.

This still occasionally makes me mad.

Linguistics, man. 😤😂