Among some African-Americans, the term Hannah means “the sun.” This sense is memorialized in the lyrics of “Go Down Old Hannah,” a work song from the 1930s. One writer said of this haunting melody: “About 3 o’clock on a long summer day, the sun forgets to move and stops, so then the men sing this song.” The great folklorist Alan Lomax also made recordings of prison workers singing this song. This is part of a complete episode.
More from this show
The so-called “lifestyle influencer accent” you hear in videos on TikTok and YouTube, where someone speaks with rising tones at the end of sentences and phrases, suggesting that they’re about to say something important, is a form of what linguists...
Meg in Cape Cod, Massachusetts, gets why the state highway department encourages drivers to use their blinkers when changing lanes, but placing a digital sign at the Sagamore Bridge that reads Use Ya Blinkah is, well, a lexical bridge too far. Meg’s...