A cartoon for phonologists, by a phonologist, Stephanie Shih (posted here with permission):
A pun on the organic of organic farming and the organic of the technical term homorganic in phonology.
The lexical items. First, the versatile item organic. The full NOAD2 entry:
1 of, relating to, or derived from living matter: organic soils.
– Chemistry of, relating to, or denoting compounds containing carbon (other than simple binary compounds and salts) and chiefly or ultimately of biological origin. Compare with inorganic. [1a]
– (of food or farming methods) produced or involving production without the use of chemical fertilizers, pesticides, or other artificial agents. [1b]
2 Physiology of or relating to a bodily organ or organs.
– Medicine (of a disease) affecting the structure of an organ. [2a]
3 denoting a relation between elements of something such that they fit together harmoniously as necessary parts of a whole: the organic unity of the integral work of art.
– characterized by continuous or natural development: companies expand as much by acquisition as by organic growth. [3a]
The organic of organic farming is the subsense I’ve labeled [1b].
The organic of the technical term homorganic is subsense 2. On the technical term in phonology:
denoting sets of speech sounds that are produced using the same vocal organs, e.g., p, b, and m. [AZ: all bilabial]
On Stephanie Shih. Stephanie is a 2014 Stanford Ph.D., now in Cognitive and Information Sciences at the Univ. of California, Merced. As she says on her desserts for breakfast site, in connection with a photo of her wielding a yummy dessert:
That’s me, Stephanie, a born and bred Bay Area, California native, food+travel photographer, and dessert designer. Oh, and I also moondaylight as a linguist, using computational modeling to study the way speech sounds pattern (phonology) in natural language, poetry, and music.
This blog originally started as a random collection of photographs for food projects I’d undertaken, but then I started getting requests for actual recipes and was sucked into the wonderful world of food blogging. Now, it’s a great platform for me to test out and share new recipes, both by others and myself, with the world. I like to think that it’s a way for me to share my food with lots of people, which is one of the things that brings me the greatest joy in life.
Food, phonology, music, and poetry.
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