Post-Truth Named Word of the Year By Oxford Dictionaries
It beat out "adulting" and "coulrophobia" (fear of clowns) for the distinction.
It beat out "adulting" and "coulrophobia" (fear of clowns) for the distinction.
At the most extreme, some forms of constrained writing are even more self-limiting and end up being very, very constrained indeed.
Rhetorical devices can transform an ordinary piece of writing into something much more memorable.
THONG in Kent derives from the Old English word thwang, meaning “a narrow stretch of land.”
There's more to these workhouse members of our linguistics inventory than you might think.
He'd had enuf of the old way. Known for his uncompromising stance on many issues, in the early 1900s Roosevelt used the full power of his position to try to force through several hundred new spelling reforms.
It's human nature to conceive of abstract ideas through more immediate, concrete experiences—which is to say, through metaphors. Most of the words we have for abstract concepts began this way.
There is more than one image suggested by a half fried egg, and different languages have settled on different ideas of what this egg looks like.
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On Halloween, witches and werewolves, ghosts and ghouls, and demons and devils stalk the streets for tricks or treats. But the real tricks and treats—at least for the horror-loving word nerds among us—might just be the strange and far-flung origins of the
Here’s a look back at some of the buzzwords the campaign and candidates have given us—and a look into their surprising histories.
Pull apart the word "trivia," and you’ll be left with two fairly familiar Latin roots.
English has a number of prefixes that come from the concept of “half.” Why do we have so many? And what’s the difference between them?
A new book by cognitive psychologist Benjamin K. Bergen delves into the profane side of language to reveal a host of interesting and entertaining things you might not realize about our relationship with naughty words.
During last night's debate, the candidates were asked what they would do about the humanitarian crisis in the Syrian city of Aleppo.
When October’s chill grips the air, we reach for those familiar spooky stories we crave this time of year.
This video of Shaylee just sitting on the bed making up songs with her little sister Ivy shows the joyful, spontaneous side of language play that anyone with little girls will recognize.
The tool now tackles whole sentences rather than individual words.
Let me put this right up front. The headline to this post is slightly misleading, but not dishonest.
By some accounts, the average person owns 19 pairs of shoes. But it’s not just our closets that are overflowing with sneakers, loafers, pumps, and wedges. It’s also our vocabulary.
Concepts like "nose" and "tongue" share some of the same sounds no matter what language you're listening to.
This secretive jargon was deliberately designed to confuse the authorities.
Chances are if you’ve ever learned a language you’ll have stumbled across a few false friends—words that look (but don't necessarily sound) similar in two different languages, but differ entirely in their meanings.