Tablets from some of the world’s oldest civilisations hold rich details about life thousands of years ago, but few people today can read them. New technology is helping to unlock them.

The word, which is increasingly applied to nonphysical things, beat out others, including “gaslighting,” “incel” and “techlash.”

Scientists seek evidence for Neanderthal language from fossils, artifacts and DNA.

By Emma Young. This is the first demonstration that language affects whether we consciously perceive a stimulus or not.

Hannah Jenkins survived a cycling accident - but woke up no longer being able to understand English.

When Jews fled Spain during the Inquisition, they carried their language with them. Today, Ladino reflects the trajectories of the Sephardic Jewish diaspora, but can it survive?

Their desire for avoidance is a predisposition so common that it’s become hard-baked into Finnish culture.

A painstaking investigation of Europe’s cave art has revealed 32 shapes and lines that crop up again and again and could be the world’s oldest code

Why one syllable spoken at different pitches can have seven meanings

How much do you really need to say to put a sentence together?

For some 2,500 years, residents of this mountainous village have used an astonishing language that only they understand. But there are only six people left who can ‘speak’ it.

Practiced since as long as Hawaiians can remember, hoʻoponopono is necessary on an island where space and resources are limited and the community is key to survival.

How a cheesy joke from the 1830s became the most widely spoken word in the world.

Despite centuries of efforts to make standardised French the language of all of France, Occitan, which is intrinsically tied to the local culture, could not be suppressed.

What if walkie-talkie people named everything? A stamp would be called a licky-sticky. A defibrillator would be a hearty-starty. A bumble bee is a fuzzy-buzzy, and a pregnancy test would be a baby, maybe. A bra is a breastie-nestie, and a fork is a stabby-grabby. A hippo is a floatie-bloatie, and a nightmare a screamy-dreamy.

What can hyperpolyglots teach the rest of us?

Google Translate is moonlighting as a deranged oracle—and experts say it’s likely because of the spooky nature of neural networks. By Jon Christian.

After Brexit, the use of English is likely to be even more common.

Bahasa Indonesia was adopted to make communication easier across the vast Indonesian archipelago, but its simplicity has only created new barriers.