#prosodic

[arcann]

i hope one day i get fired for missing a prosodic accent i really do

[solipseismic]

ok. who would like to write my essay on the morphological structure and prosodic templates in modern hebrew.

[fipindustries]

I cannot stand the parodies of modern major general, they're overdone and simply not as good as the original. They've done them about everything, whatever topic, big or small.

And when i notice one of them my eyes will always start to roll.

The diction's always slurry when they rush the complicated words, and adding many fricatives will turn it so cacophonous. The slanted rhymes are silly and they keep just making more and more, please someone stop the parodies of modern major general.

The scanning of the lyrics in the meter is unbearable, they emphazise the syllables in ways that are untenable, in short in matters musical, prosodic and ephemeral, i cannot stand the parodies of modern major general!

[literaryvein-reblogs]

Writing Notes: Speech Development

Several stages of development have been distinguished in the first year, when the child develops the skills necessary to produce a successful first word.

FIRST 2 MONTHS

Apart from the cry patterns associated with hunger, pain, and discomfort, the first 2 months of life display a wide range of primitive vocal sounds reflecting the baby’s biological state and activities – as in the ‘vegetative’ noises heard while eating and excreting.

Some of the most basic features of speech, such as the ability to control air flow and produce rhythmic utterance, are being established at this time.

BETWEEN 6 & 8 WEEKS

There emerge the sounds generally known as cooing, produced when the baby is in a settled state.

Cooing sounds do not grow out of crying; rather, they develop alongside it, gradually becoming more frequent and varied.

They are quieter, lowerpitched, and more musical, typically consisting of a short vowel-like sound, often nasal in quality, and usually preceded by a consonant-like sound made towards the back of the mouth.

Strings of cooing noises soon emerge, and the sounds become more varied, as the baby begins to develop a greater measure of control over the muscles of the vocal organs – especially over tongue and lip movements and associated vocal-fold vibration.

BETWEEN 3 & 4 MONTHS

Cooing sounds begin to die away, to be replaced by sounds which are much more definite and controlled, often repeated, and produced with wide pitch glides.

It is a period commonly called vocal play, because the baby seems to take great pleasure in producing these noises, especially those made with the lips.

But it is perhaps more accurate to call it a time of vocal practice or experimentation.

AROUND 6 MONTHS

Vocal play gives way to babbling – a period of syllable sequences and repetitions which can last most of the second half of the first year.

To begin with, the consonant-like sounds are very repetitive:

Example: "babababa"

But at around 9 months, the babbling moves away from these fixed patterns.

The consonants and vowels change from one syllable to the next, producing such forms as [adu] and [maba], and there is a wider range of sounds, anticipating the sounds of the accent of English to be learned.

The utterances do not have any meaning, though they often resemble adult words – and of course adults love to ‘hear’ such words (especially mummy and daddy) in the baby’s vocalizations.

But babbling does not gradually shade into speech; indeed, many children continue to babble for several months after they have begun to talk.

Babbling is perhaps best summarized as a final step in the period of preparation for speech.

The child, in effect, ‘gets its act together’; but it has yet to learn what the act is for – that sounds are there to enable meaning to be communicated in a controlled way.

With the production of the ‘first word’, this final step is taken.

NOTE

However, the first word is not the first feature of adult language to be acquired.

From as early as 6 months, there is evidence that the child is picking up features of the melody and rhythm of the adult language.

Certainly by 9 months, strings of syllables are often being pronounced in conversation-like ways which adults interpret as communicative:

‘He/ she’s trying to tell us something’ is a common reaction to a piece of ‘scribble-talk’, and such speech-act functions as questioning, commanding, and greeting are ascribed to babbled utterances.

The melody and rhythm of often-used phrases, such as "all gone", are also likely to be heard long before the vowels and consonants are clearly articulated.

It is these prosodic features which are the first signs of real language production in children.

Prosody - the linguistic use of pitch, loudness, tempo, and rhythm; the study of versification

Source ⚜ Notes & References More: Children ⚜ Children's Dialogue ⚜ Childhood Bilingualism

[louaseau]

Now at 2k400! I hadn't written in english in months! "First chapter" officially done* :) *ready to be beta read and torn to pieces and polished to a diamond shine 💪

It took me over 1800 words and a lot of rewriting, but my favorite little guy is finally here 😁

[lyculuscaelus]

You must have noticed a certain pattern in these lyrics from EPIC: the Musical:

“Do what I/say and you’ll/see them a/gain—‘yes sir’”

“Teucer will/shoot any/ambush at/tack and”

“Why are my/eyes and my/heart and my/soul so/heavy” ”I keep on/tryin' to em/brace you both/why won’t you/let me”

“Here in the/root of this/flower there/lies such a/power to/take her on You must con/sume and di/gest it then/you’ll mani/fest a (being)”

“(We’ve) suffered and/sailed through the/toughest of/hells now you/tell us our/effort’s for/nothing?”

“Dangerous/oceans and/beaches I’ll/go where Po/seidon won’t/reach us”

“(While) you were so/focused on/turning my/men into (snacks)”

“(Sirens) know a/bout every/route and ho/rizon Now I know/how to get/back to my/island”

“There is no/price he won’t (pay)” “I am not/letting you/get in my (way)”

… (I remember finding more but can’t pull them from my vague memory. I’ll add some when I recall. You all are welcome to help, of course!)

Had to appreciate this specific prosodic element in Epic. All the chains of dactyls+the spondee at the end really remind you of the epic it’s based on—the Odyssey, an epic poem in dactylic hexameter.

An example for your curiosity:

ἦμος δ᾽ ἠριγένεια φάνη ῥοδοδάκτυλος Ἠώς, Now check this out: ἦ-μος /δ᾽ ἠ-ρι-γέ/νει-α φά/νη ῥο-δο/δάκ-τυ-λος /Ἠ-ώς, ‒ ‒ | ‒ ⏑ ⏑| ‒ ⏑ ⏑| ‒ ⏑ ⏑| ‒ ⏑ ⏑ | ‒ ‒ “When the early-born rosy-fingered Dawn appeared”

(Check the tags for more info)

[ttintricacies]

Can’t believe I’m about to make a linguistics-adjacent post about the hippo that’s gone viral in my country but oh well: if you want to shorten Moo-Deng’s name, in Thai we would most likely say “Deng”and not “Moo”.

I don’t want to assert that it’s for prosodic reasons only because there may be other parameters I just haven’t thought of yet but yeah.

That being said, I don’t think Thai people ever shorten her name(?), maybe it’s our affinity for having multi-syllabic names (e.g. we add honorifics or terms of endearment onto one-syllable nicknames).

For example, even if you were to shorten Moo-Deng, we’d add things like น้อง (nong) or อี (ee, though this would not be commonly used since it’s technically vulgar, but some guardians often use it to refer to their kids). This would make her Nong-Deng which would translate to “little sister Deng” which I think is adorable.

[coffeeadict61]

Humans Are Weird: Auditory Processing Disorder

Report # 306

Topic: Auditory Processing Disorder

APD: disorder of the auditory (hearing) system that causes a disruption in the way that an individual's brain understands what they are hearing.

Four days ago I was doing my monthly meeting with the electrical department, receiving updates on our monthly usage, needed parts, and checking up on general morale. (The transcript of that meeting is already turned in.) After the meeting we had refreshments and I discovered Lucy (previously mentioned in report #286) pouting in a corner. I inquired what was bothering her. She said, "The ship's head medic just diagnosed me with APD but he wasn't trained to treat it." I asked for further information on the condition. She listed several of her personal symptoms. "It means I don't always catch what people say. It feels like my brain doesn't want to listen. In one ear and out the other making me look stupid to however I talk to. It's connected to my misophonia, and the fact I was born really premature."

I was unsure how to comfort her so I made no effort. This seemed to work for Lucy kept speaking.

"And what's worse is there's nothing I can do! We don't have a speech therapist aboard or even any research materials! Its starting to affect my work performance. On top of decoding, hypersensitivity, and prosodic problems, I have integration issues which mean its really hard for me to focus on what people are saying when I'm doing something. Which freaking sucks when you're part of a team!" I had no clue what she was really talking about but gave her a hug (human gesture of enveloping one in your arms as a sign of comfort or safety), and she apologized for "venting" to me.

She then spoke on how her crew mates just thought she was "slow" or wasn't good at her job. They questioned if she was capable because she would follow directions incorrectly and she was worried she'd be replaced with someone "less problematic". I tried to assure her that I would help anyway I could on her behalf. Never again will I doubt a human's sincerity.

After some of my own personal research I have made a list of the different types and their definitions for your education on the subject:

Hypersensitivity – Hypersensitivity to sound is often diagnosed as misophonia or hyperacusis. Misophonia is when people have adverse physical reactions to sounds, such as becoming nauseated by the sound of chewing or slurping. Hyperacusis, on the other hand, is characterized by a sensitivity to sounds. For some, this means that white noise can be deafening, even causing physical pain.

Decoding – Decoding difficulties involve a lack of figuring out words that are spoken. They hear the sounds, but their brains do not process them as words.

Integration – Integration applies to those who struggle to do multiple things while listening. Such multi-tasking may be writing notes and listening, or having conversations while typing an email.

Prosodic – Prosodic refers to people who have trouble with tone, inflection, and implied meaning. A question and exclamation are processed identically in their brains. Their speech is also often monotone.

Organizational – Finally, organizational, or output, is often characterized by not recalling information in a specific order or having difficulty with noisy situations.

Honestly, Humans are so diverse and unpredictable. To think that different "problems" or " abnormalities " within their mind or body can lead to even more similar issues astounds me. They are so intricate in a way my species has never been. Despite the struggles that their disorders, and conditions being, I think it's strangely beautiful. Maybe that's just me, but I have a new appreciation for them.

I am requesting the presence of a speech therapist, whether physically or digitally, to be readily available to our crew. We must also add APD onto our medics research requirements. It is not an overly complicated subject to be fluent in. I also request that Lucy's diagnoses be added to her list of wrongful termination along with her gender, age, and race. No one should feel their position is at risk because of a disorder or disability. I also request that a written copy of daily instruction be printed for her if necessary. She is one of our best electricians and I mean to keep her employed here as long as she wants.

Human Observer #5743

[sephirthoughts]

Maybe Reeve and 15, 26, 34 for the ask game? ^^' (15 is a free option. You don't have to do it, if yiu don't want to. ^^'')

Yayyy Reeve!!! i do have several opinions about him

Reeve pretty much 24/7:

same bro same

-15- pets or feelings about animals:

HE DID NOT CHOOSE THE HAMSTERVERSE, THE HAMSTERVERSE CHOSE HIM

-26- interactions with their friends

I don't know Reeve to have any canonical friends aside from Veld (Verdot), before Dirge, and I don't know much about their friendship, but I assume Veld was a hero of his or something because Veld is old as shit, and Reeve is only 35 during FF7. He was willing to risk his ass to help save Elfe, because she's his friend's daughter, even though she's with Avalanche. Yes, he uses his Cait Sith bots to go in his place, but even getting involved that much is a massive risk for him considering he's on the Shinra Board of fucking Directors. This suggests how highly he values friendships and demonstrates his personal integrity.

Reeve actually gets involved in a staggering number of situations considering he's a literal executive at the biggest company in the world, like…Reeve my guy when do you sleep buddy? (Also how did you make it to the top of Shinra with your conscience intact??)

I really wanted Reeve to have seen Vincent's file or some of his reports back in the day, like as a young Shinra employee, and been like "holy shit this Turk is amazing in a totally not gay way i am just going to take a copy of his photo for personnel management purposes thank you Veld." ALAS, Reeve was five years old when Vincent died. So no such luck unless he was Shinra's youngest employee ever aside from Sephiroth (lol).

HOWEVER. We KNOW direct from the cat's mouth that Reeve knows all about Vincent, meaning he DID study his files at some point, and was clearly moved by how sexy he was tragic his story was. HERE THERE BE HEADCANONS: Vincent was a pretty impressive guy even before the monster powers, and I absolutely HC Reeve as being a total Vincent fangirl, which makes him scruffing and then throwing the Cait Sith bot at Cloud even funnier. He and Vincent become friends through the Cait Sith bot, during the events of FF7 but they have that falling out because of the Marlene thing. However, he keeps helping the group and whatnot, which earns their and Vincent's trust back, and then eventually reveals his identity to the whole group.

Between FF7 and Dirge, he and Vincent stay in contact and even wind up meeting in person. By "meeting in person" I mean Vincent vampire ninjas himself into Reeve's office and scares the ever-loving shit out of him, because he wanted to meet him face to face, and they have a nice talk, before Vincent vampire ninjas away again, leaving Reeve with an even bigger totally platonic and not at all gay crush on the very dangerous and very sexy vampire man.

Reeve eventually leaves Shinra and starts his good-guy club and all that, and he and Vincent reconnect during Dirge, where Reeve is doing this weird matryoshka doll thing with himself inside Cait Sith inside a suit of himself, but whatever i don't kink shame. Apparently Vincent finds that very cool (or hot if you ship them) because they spend the rest of the game helping each other (or secretly making out). Much like almost all of my ships, whether you ship Reeve and Vincent or not, my HC for their relationship is pretty much exactly the same, except in the ship version they fuck.

Anyway I HC that Reeve and Vincent are friends. That was a long thesis, just to work up to this one point.

ps. my ship name for reeve and vincent is reeventine because it's more prosodic (fancy talk for rolls off the tongue), and also, reevince just looks like re-evince, which is a word already

-34- feelings abut themself

This is important to how Reeve feel about himself i promise: CAIT SITH SPEAKS FUCKING KANSAI-BEN. I have no idea why they chose Scottish accent for the English version but they have inadvertently canonized Reeve's hometown dialect being either Kansai-ben, or Scots-gaelic. Which means that little Reeve had one HELL of an accent, and had to meticulously dialect-train himself, to speak in the accepted nonregional vernacular (Kanto or newscast English) for his Shinra job. HEADCANONS BEGIN: This suggests that he's self-aware enough to know what will help him get ahead, and is willing to do what it takes to succeed…but like, in a NORMAL way, not like the rest of the Shinra execs, who are all literal psychopaths. Not exaggerating. Actual psychopaths. He's a classic overachiever and apparently pretty charismatic, despite never having been listened to ever not even one single time during a Shinra board meeting. Luckily he's also a good person deep down and when it really counts, he does the right thing.

In conclusion, Reeve thinks highly enough of himself to have very strong drive and ambition, and to go against the flow and make conscience-based decisions, even when it puts him at risk, but not enough to disconnect the coffee I.V. and get a good night's sleep once in a while.

unpopular but correct opinion: reeve was hot even back when he was cosplaying some kind of pirate clergyman back in the Dirge of Cerberus days

Thanks for the ask! Hamsterverse forever!

[max1461]

can you explain what’s happening physically when i stress a syllable? like when i say bag and then big what’s changing is the shape of my mouth, position of my tongue, etc. and when i say obasan and then obaasan what’s changing is the amount of time i’m spending making the a sound. what changes between donde and dónde? physically i mean?

So, the phonetic realization of stress (in other words, what's physically happening you stress a syllable) differs by language. It can be quite complex, and involve a variety of factors such a pitch, volume, duration, phonological conditioning, and prosodic effects.

In English, the primary phonetic marker of stress is that stressed syllables are both longer in duration and louder in volume than unstressed syllables. There may also be some sort of "inherent" (i.e. non-prosodic, I'll get to that in a minute) pitch component, but I'm not sure. These are the only phonetic differences between, say, the noun permit and the verb permit, as spoken in isolation. In the former, the first syllable is stressed, so it's longer and louder; in the later, the second syllable is stressed.

There's also a phonological component; stress interacts with the individual sounds in a word and my change the way they are realized. English has different sets of vowels which occur in stressed and unstressed syllables, and so stress will often be accompanied by a vowel shift, such as the way the final vowels differ between the words record (noun) and record (verb). More subtly you might get other rules; for instance American English has flapping of /t/ and /d/ to [ɾ] following a stressed vowel.

Finally, there's a sentence-level prosodic component: English prosodic events such as pitch accents attach themselves to stressed syllables, and thus in an actual sentence the shape of the overall pitch contour will often be enough to locate the position of the stresses within words, even without e.g. volume information.

The summary is basically that English stress is "inherently" realized as an increase in volume and duration, and in addition interacts with the rest of the phonological system so that there may be more elements to the realization than this in context.

I can't answer in nearly as much detail for Spanish, but what I can say is that Spanish stress is primarily realized as pitch, with some amount of increased duration as well. I don't know if there's a volume component, nor do I know anything at all about Spanish prosody (although presumably it respects stress in some way). There are almost certainly phonological rules that interact with stress too, but I don't know them.

[i-scan-your-poems]

Is metrically analyzing text like different kinds of chords in music? Like, technically you can come up with a name for everything but it's not usually common or useful

I think that's a good analogy! Every use of language (well, every use of more than one syllable of language) has prosodic features, which in English includes every syllable being stressed or unstressed (or sometimes having a secondary stress). I've been reading recently about rhetorical clausulae, specific rhythms that ancient Roman orators intentionally put at the ends of sentences because people liked how they sounded; those specific rhythmic patterns are significant, but there are lots of patterns in a speech that you could describe just as easily but that weren't used very much and weren't really a "thing".

One thing that complicates the analogy: the actual series of stressed and unstressed syllables (which every use of language has) is different from the metrical form (which really only metrical poetry has). When I scan a whole poem and then say that it's "iambic tetrameter", I'm talking about an abstraction, I'm formalizing the reader's or writer's internal sense of how the line's basic rhythm goes; but when I make a post scanning something that's only one line long and isn't part of a poem, what I'm doing is noticing that that phrase's/sentence's rhythm happens to fit within a common or conventionalized metrical form.

Hopefully this answers your question!

[hoursofreading]

Her name was Caitlyn, and she represented a company called Canary Speech. Canary Speech had developed a tool that analyzes human speech for “vocal biomarkers.” Caitlyn explained that vocal biomarkers are qualities below the level of human hearing that correlate with emotional and physiological conditions. By listening to just thirty seconds of recorded speech, Canary Speech could return a health audit that breaks down the user’s mood, energy, anxiety, and degree of depression, and identify pre-Parkinson’s traits, as well as early signs of Alzheimer’s. Caitlyn played a video in which she prompted a woman to speak for thirty seconds on any topic. The woman described her morning. She had woken up and fed her child. Her child had played with their dog. “Canary is analyzing the audio,” Caitlyn said. “You have medium anxiety and medium depression. Your energy score is at forty-six. Your power is at seventy-eight. Speed is medium, at forty-eight. Dynamic is twelve.” I could feel a collective intake of breath. A woman raised her hand and asked what would happen to someone’s diagnosis if the sound quality were poor. “That’s why we record forty seconds,” said Caitlyn. “So we get more audio than we need.” The woman’s question poked a hole in the dam, and more questions poured forth. Another woman identified herself as a therapist. “To be told you’re mildly depressed will make you depressed,” she said. “How can we be confident this won’t fall into the hands of corporations that will figure out how to sell things to depressed people?” asked another woman. “What about cultural differences?” said someone else. Caitlyn attempted an answer, but before she could produce anything cogent a male voice boomed from the back of the room. “WE’RE TALKING ABOUT MICRO-PROSODIC FEATURES BELOW THE LEVEL OF HUMAN PERCEPTION,” the voice said. The large and formidable man to whom this voice belonged rolled down the aisle on a mobility scooter. He introduced himself. He was a veteran of the original Alexa build and Canary Speech’s cofounder. “What is the baseline you’re comparing it to?” someone asked. “You compare it to a generic baseline.” “What is generic? Man? Woman? Teenager?” “These clues are generally universal.”

An Age of Hyperabundance | Issue 47 | n+1 | Laura Preston

[gwempire]

I am screaming internally at how words in mando'a will have a double vowel, usually 'aa' like 'chaabar' (to fear) or 'haalas' (chest), and the stress will be on the single vowel syllable, but only half the time. Sometimes it swaps, like 'haatyc' (visible) or 'naakla' (peaceful), and I cannot work out why?? Like, maybe it's because a 'stronger' vowel sound, like a diphthong, takes precedence like in 'jai'galaar' (shriekhawk). However, 'baatir' (to care) stresses the first syllable while 'laamir' (to jump) stresses the second. Surely their spelling similarities would indicate that they follow the same prosodic conventions, but no, apparently not? It's not word class either, because 'chaabar' and 'baatir' are both verbs. I understand that languages don't have perfect consistency, but good God? Mando'a is supposed to be a simple language. This is stupid and I hate it. From now on, 'aa' is the stressed or 'drawn out' syllable. I make the rules now. It's MY bad Star Wars conlang and I'll spell however I want.

[frank-olivier]

Fumi (Speak Japanese Naturally)

The Japanese verb construction, with its system of stem forms and affixed endings, exemplifies the agglutinating nature of many Asian languages. By adding suffixes to unchanging stems, Japanese verbs can express a wide range of grammatical information like tense, aspect, modality and politeness levels. This agglutinating process is a defining feature Japanese shares with other language families across Asia, such as the Altaic languages.

However, Japanese also exhibits a unique characteristic that sets it apart - its pitch accent system. As a pitch accent language, Japanese uses contrasting pitch patterns to distinguish word meanings. This accentual system interacts with the morphological processes of verb conjugation in systematic ways.

Verbs in Japanese can be categorized into two main accent classes - heiban (unaccented) verbs that maintain a high pitch throughout, and verbs that have an accent falling on the second-to-last mora. When undergoing conjugation, the pitch patterns change in a rule-governed manner depending on which accent class the verb belongs to.

For example, the heiban verb taberu 'to eat' maintains its unaccented high pitch across conjugations like tabeta (past) and tabenai (negative). In contrast, a verb like kaku 'to write' has an accent on the second-to-last mora ka, and this accent shifts in the past form kaita and negative kakanai to avoid a sequence of accented moras.

These pitch accent alternations in verb conjugation follow set patterns based on the verb's accent class. They reflect a linguistic system that is unique to Japanese while still operating within the agglutinating framework shared across Asian languages. The interaction of pitch and morphology is a defining feature of Japanese verb grammar.

So while the core verb construction adheres to the agglutinating typology widespread in Asia, the pitch accent system and its integration with conjugation patterns represents an innovative phenomenon specific to Japanese. This dual nature highlights Japanese's role bridging the morphological conventions of its Asian linguistic context with its own highly developed prosodic system.

Japanese Verb Conjugation (February 2021)

The Pitch Accent of Verbs in Japanese (April 2021)

Saturday, May 25, 2024

[literaryvein-reblogs]

Writing Notes: Metrics

Poetic Language is organized into rhythmical units which appear in print as lines.

In Europe, the traditional study of versification, or prosody, was based on the rules of Latin scansion.

Poetic lines would be analysed into combinations of stressed and unstressed syllables known as feet.

Five types were formerly prominent in English verse, as shown above.

Lines would then be classified in terms of the number of stressed syllables they contained, as shown above.

In theory, there is no limit; in practice, most English metrical lines are found to be 5 feet or less; when they exceed 6 feet, there is a strong intuitive tendency to break them into 2 parts.

Combinations of foot-type and line length produced such designations as iambic pentameter – the heartbeat of much English poetry – and analyses in these terms were the staple of traditional metrical studies, which traced the norms of English poetic rhythm and evaluated the way poets deviated from these norms.

As a system of description, it worked quite well in giving an account of the regular lines of traditional poetry.

But it came to be criticized on several counts:

It was often mechanically applied, with students being taught to identify the form of metrical patterns at the expense of their function, or role, in a poem.

It was unable to cope well with lines containing unusual rhythm sequences.

With the bulk of modern poetry no longer using such metrical patterns, but working instead with ‘free’ kinds of verse, the traditional system of description came to be viewed as largely irrelevant.

Today, metrists work in several alternative ways, not restricting themselves to the notion of stress, but bringing in other prosodic systems, such as tempo and intonation, and a general concept of rhythmical weight.

Source ⚜ Word Lists ⚜ Notes & References

[drlinguo]

Hello, Since you are a polyglotic language scientist (Idk is that even a right adj. 😅), I wanted to asked some:

1. Are there any languages beside English (since I really know only English) that the prosodic features change how the sentences are interpreted?

2. Why are theoretical syntactian are scary? (Regarding meme I saw from you or other lingblr)

Thanks :)

1 Are there any languages beside English (since I really know only English) that the prosodic features change how the sentences are interpreted?

I would imagine that almost all languages have at least one construction that changes the meaning according to prosodic features (Disclaimer: I am not proficient in many languages, so that statement is speculative). For example, many particles in German have a distinction between their stressed and unstressed versions.

Er ist DOCH krank. 'In contrast to what we believed before, he is (really) sick' vs Er ist doch KRANK. 'As we know, he is sick.'

In many languages, it is also possible to change the meaning of a sentence from declarative to interrrogative by changing only the prosody of the sentence.

Estás bromeando (falling vs. falling-raising intonation) 'You are kidding.' vs. 'You are kidding?'

2 Why are theoretical syntactian scary? (Regarding meme I saw from you or other lingblr)

Nooo! Theoretical syntacticians are very very nice people :) But I get what you mean. Speculation: In syntax, you see what you want your system to do (generate grammatical phrases), and what you don't want (generate ungrammatical phrases) -- in comparison to, e.g. semantics, where everything is a bit more fuzzy, or morphology, where there are many idiosyncrasies. So, syntacticians have the impression to be more strict, because their theories have to do some things and avoid others. But that is pure speculation. I would think, I am not scary 💁.