A South Carolina listener recalls that his father referred to the younger man’s girlfriend with a term that sounded like jing floogy or jing floogie. The word floogie has long been a synonym for floozy, a term applied to women, and often...
The word dungarees is a relic of the British colonial presence in India. Dungri was the name applied to a durable cotton cloth exported from India to England in the 1600s, and used to make sails and tents. Dungaree comes from the Marathi term...
You don’t really need those little rivets on your blue jeans. Those flat metal disks are leftovers from an earlier time, when jeans had to be much more durable. Such decorative elements that no longer serve a practical purpose are called skeuomorphs...
Why do we use the plural for pieces of clothing worn below the waist, like trousers, pants, shorts, and jeans? This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of “Why are Pants Plural?” Hello, you have A Way with Words. Hello, this is Rob calling...
The fabric called denim originated in the town of Nimes, France, hence the name. The fabric known as jean, originally from Genoa, Italy, was popular long before Levi Strauss and Jacob Davis and teamed up in 1873 to make durable work trousers using...
Someone should write a love letter to a new book called Letters of Note. It’s a splendid collection of all kinds of correspondence through the ages: Elvis Presley fans writing to the president, children making suggestions to famous cartoonists, a...