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October 16, 2008
Mark Liberman didn't watch the debate, either
Mark Liberman didn't watch the debate, either, but he's a linguist. He ran some word counts on the transcripts:
In the abstract, "Obama business wants wealth" vs. "here economic McCain policies" seems like a plausible account of a debate between these two men. Alas, this misses (what most people took to be) the big stories of the evening.Luckily, it's all on YouTube, including pre-digested thematic excerpts or collections, from the size of Joe the Plumber's health-care fine to Senator McCain's "I'm not Bush" line, the "health of the mother" exchange, the whole exasperation factor, and so on.
Still, I think my trivial word lists are not entirely without interest. In particular, I'm curious about something less down-to-earth than plumber: why did Barack Obama use the little words if and some more than three times as often as John McCain did?
Go read his speculations about IF and SOME at Language Log.
Posted by CrankyProfessor at October 16, 2008 9:17 AM