Week 11’s Crash Course Linguistics video addresses how language interacts with the human brain and the human mind.
Topics include parts of the brain involved with language, how we study brains and minds, and some common behavioral and physiological approaches used in psycholinguistic experiments. This week's Thought Bubble takes viewers through a brief bouba/kiki test. Closed captions are available in English.
For more about language and the brain, check out this 10-minute video from Scientific American Frontiers demonstrating how we can learn from an individual whose two brain hemispheres cannot communicate with one another. Language is the focus of 2:51-7:01. Computer-generated closed captions are available in English.
For a conversational introduction to the bouba/kiki effect and other psycholinguistic phenomena, listen to What words sound spiky across languages?, a 38-minute Lingthusiasm episode featuring an interview with Dr. Suzy Styles. This episode is available wherever you prefer to find podcasts, and a transcript is available here.
To learn more about aphasia, try out this quiz from the United States National Aphasia Association (answers provided after each question). For interactive experience with a frequently mentioned psycholinguistic phenomenon, check out this writeup and video selection about the McGurk effect.
Finally, see our past newsletter for a collection of videos and further resources about slightly more advanced topics in psycholinguistics.
Coming next week: resources about language acquisition!
Liz, Gretchen, and Lauren
About Mutual Intelligibility
Mutual Intelligibility is a project to connect linguistics instructors with online resources, especially as so much teaching is shifting quickly online due to current events. It's produced by Lauren Gawne and Gretchen McCulloch, with the support of our patrons on Lingthusiasm. Our editor is Liz McCullough.
Mutual Intelligibility posts will always remain free, but if you have a stable income and find that they’re reducing your stress and saving you time, we're able to fund these because of the Lingthusiasm Patreon and your contributions there.
For the 16 weeks of Crash Course Linguistics, Mutual Intelligibility will be sharing the video weekly, along with supporting resources. We will resume our regular link request and recommendations after the Crash Course Linguistics series. For more on how we usually operate, check out our about page.
If you have other comments, suggestions, or ideas of ways to help, please email mutual.intellig@gmail.com.