In this episode, we talk to Mary Laughren about research into the languages of Central Australia in the mid-twentieth century, with a focus on the contributions of American linguist Ken Hale.

In this episode, we examine the formalist aspects of the linguistic work of Edward Sapir and Leonard Bloomfield, and see how their methods were turned into the doctrines of distributionalism by the following generation.

In this episode, we discuss the leading American linguist Leonard Bloomfield and his connections to the psychological school of behaviourism and the philosophical doctrines of logical positivism.

In this episode, we explore the historical background to linguistic relativity or the so-called ‘Sapir-Whorf hypothesis’.

This clip is a brief audio update on what’s been happening with the podcast, and what’s going to happen in the next few months.

In this episode we talk to Andrew Garrett about the life, work and legacy of American anthropologist Alfred Kroeber. Kroeber achieved a number of firsts in American anthropology: he was Boas’ first Columbia PhD and the first professor of anthropology…

In this interview, we talk to Marcin Kilarski about the history of the documentation and description of the languages of North America.

In this episode, we begin our exploration of American linguistics by looking at the innovative contributions of Franz Boas (1858–1942) and his circle of students.

In this interview, we talk to Peter Trudgill about how the structure of speaker communities may influence the structure of languages.

In this interview, we talk to Philipp Krämer about the history of the study of creole languages and present-day efforts to standardise creoles around the world.