Ahoy! In this week’s brand-spankin’-new episode: Great gifts for language lovers, nerds vs. geeks, “tow the line” vs. “toe the line,” the slang term “poutrage,” and the crust in the corners of your eyes after you sleep. Here ’tis: It’s been called...
Salvete! In this week’s archive episode, we revisit the musical language of railroad conductors’ calls, and chat with a Vietnam vet about a term he often heard while serving, “cumshaw artist.” We also talk about the influence of Spanish on English...
papertalk
n.— «When I first learnt about Maradona coming to India, I dismissed it as some speculation or what the English call ‘papertalk’.» —“India Welcomes Diego Maradona” by Rahul Bali Goal.com Dec. 6, 2008. (source: Double-Tongued Dictionary)
If you’re still wondering about how far back in time you could go and still understand the English spoken then, check out written and audio excerpts from the poem Beowulf. Also, this NPR report in which host Robert Siegel gets a lesson in...
Hello, everybody. Welcome to another newsletter from A Way with Words! This weekend we aired a repeat episode in which we discussed "drive safe" vs. "drive safely," the meaning of "paratereseomaniac," and the expression...
Why do we say that someone who’s pregnant is “knocked up”? The hit movie starring Katherine Heigl and Seth Rogen has a caller wondering about this term. This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of “Knocked Up: Pregnancy Slang in America, Wake...
