Lawrence from San Antonio, Texas, wonders if spelling is a factor in the different meanings of awful, which describes something negative, and awesome, which describes something positive. Spelling doesn’t come into play here; in fact, for years...
How do languages change and grow? Does every language acquire new words in the same way? Martha and Grant focus on how that process happens in English and Spanish. Plus, the stories behind the Spanish word gringo and the old instruction to...
Travis in Bozeman, Montana, wonders why awesome feels positive while awful is negative, even though both come from awe. Awful is the older word, going back at least a thousand years, when it meant “full of awe,” commanding respect or reverential...
My postillion has been struck by lightning is one of many lines found in foreign language phrase books that have no real purpose. Mark Twain complained about the same thing in his essay, “The Awful German Language.” This is part of a...
Awfully might seem like an awful choice for a positive adverb, as in awfully talented, but it makes sense given the history of awful. Once intended to mean “filled with awe,” it’s now a general intensifier. The process of semantic weakening has...