Some teachers are using a controversial tactic to get young students reading: They let their pupils choose which books to read for class. Does it work? Also, should that line at the grocery store checkout read 15 items or less or fewer? And is the expression these ones grammatically incorrect?
This episode first aired October 17, 2009. Listen here:
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The owner of a yarn store in Juneau says a customer corrected her when she pointed out a special collection of buttons and said, "You should check out these ones." Is it incorrect to say these ones instead of just these?
A Syracuse woman wonders how bread and butter pickles got their name.
What do you call that jarring sensation when you see a radio personality for the first time, and he looks nothing like what you expected? The hosts talked about it in a past episode. Listeners responded with more words for this phenomenon.
Quiz Guy John Chaneski was rummaging around the A Way with Words Lost and Found Department, and returned with a quiz based on lost items and their owners.
The sign over the checkout lane says 15 Items or Less. A listener is adamant that it should say 15 Items or Fewer.
A Texas listener recounts an ongoing debate in her family's kitchen over the exact definition of the word spatula. Is it the kitchen tool used to spread icing and level measuring cups? Something you use to flip a pancake? That item with the plastic handle and the rubber blade for scraping a bowl? When she gets together with the in-laws to cook, the caller says, the request "Hand me a spatula" leads to confusion.
In Philadelphia, the expression the big mahoff, means "a bigshot," as in "Who do you think you are, the big mahoff?" But just what is a mahoff?
A shivaree, also spelled charivari, is a raucous, good-natured hazing for newlyweds. A discussion here about that word prompted lots of listeners to write in with their own stories about shivarees. Martha shares some of them.
In Britain, Canada, and some other English-speaking countries, the last letter of the alphabet is not zee, but zed. A caller who grew up in Guyana wonders why.
Sure, the present tense of sneak is easy, but what about the past? Is it sneaked or snuck?
A law student wonders about the origin of the word widget.
Is the word financial pronounced with a long I in the first syllable?
There's a story going around that the word posh derives from "Port Out, Starboard Home." Don't fall for it.
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This is the first time i've ever done this so I'm not sure if I'm doing it right.
I'm commenting on the X Y and Zed segment.
As a Canadian, I grew up with a cultural inferiority complex being utterly overwhelmed by the amount of US media flowing into Canada. We had a few sources of pride - hockey, Lorne Greene and good manners - but not much more. So I resorted to noble attempts to resist what I saw as US cultural imperialism. I'm older now and more easy-going, but your segment reminded me of how I've deeply internalized those areas of resistance.
Even now, pronouncing the last letter as 'Zee' and removing the 'u' in words like 'colour' evokes my private battle to maintain proper English in the face of the 'dumbing down' of the language by the big oafs to the South. Even though that meant calling it 'EEE-ZED Off Oven Cleaner'! I'm actually impressed that 'Zee' goes back to Noah Webster - I had always thought it was a marketing invention.
While I'm on the subject, I still bristle at the use of the term 'American' to describe citizens of the United States. Why did US'ers appropriate that word from other residents of the Americas like Venezuela, Honduras and Canada? That's why I dread Olympic years.
When I married my Brooklyn-born wife 18 years ago, she regarded all of my Canadian efforts as pathetic. And so, years of contempt had forced me into a more passive underground resistance. But your segment has reminded me that it's still there, eh?
Raphael,
I think there is a simple reason that 'American' describe citizens of the United States of America. It is the only country in the western hemisphere which has 'America' explicitly in its name; there is not Venezuela of America, American Honduras, or Canada of North America nor do there need to be since they are unique with their own names.
By the way, would you rather call US citizens "Uniters" or "Staters" or something else derived from the country's formal name, the United States of America?
Emmett
Emmett,
Some languages, actually do use something similar to "United Staters," such as in Spanish, which has the adjective estadounidense, a word also used as a noun. I believe French has something similar.
Carl
The full official name of Mexico translates as "United Mexican States" (Estados Unidos Mexicanos), so the only part we can use to distinguish the USA is the "America" part. Frank Lloyd Wright was fond of the term "Usonian", if that's of any help to you, and it seems HL Mencken collected a whole rack of suggestions (Columbard, Fredonian, Unitedstateser), none of which managed to catch on.
As to the absence of any other country with the word "America(n)" in its name, I'm somehow reminded of a scene early in the movie "To Sir With Love" where Thackeray (played by Sidney Poitier) meets the other teachers for the first time. As soon as he starts to speak, one of them blurts out "Oh, an American!" Thackeray corrects them by saying he's actually "British, from British Guiana", which because of its location in the New World would still make him an "American" to many people despite it being (at the time) part of the British empire.