Is there a term for words that simply feel good as you form them in your mouth and say them? Linguists sometimes speak of mouthfeel, an expression borrowed from the food world. They also talk about phonaesthetics, the study of the sensuous properties of sound, particularly as relates to poetry. Euphony describes the sound of words that are pleasant to hear. When speaking of wine, sommeliers use la bouche, or literally, “the mouth,” to denote the tactile sensation of wine once it passes the lips. This is part of a complete episode.
If you start the phrase when in Rome… but don’t finish the sentence with do as the Romans do, or say birds of a feather… without adding flock together, you’re engaging in anapodoton, a term of rhetoric that refers to the...
There are many proposed origins for the exclamation of surprise, holy Toledo! But the most likely one involves not the city in Ohio, but instead Toledo, Spain, which has been a major religious center for centuries in the traditions of both Islam and...
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