Linguistics in the news - really!

Normally when I write of linguistics being in the news, what I mean is that there is a news item with a linguistic angle that I can write about, or that some news item is about language and I can discuss the 'proper' linguistics behind it. This time, the BBC has attempted a genuine linguistics item.

Anonymous from Stratford

There's a new film out called Anonymous, which puts forward the well-discussed theory that Shakespeare's plays were actually written by Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford (the so-called Oxfordian theory). This is not a widely-accepted theory, by the way, and the film has caused a bit of a ruckus among people that care about this kind of thing.