For 341 years, the poets laureate of Britain have all been male. That just changed with the appointment of Britain’s new poet laureate, Carol Ann Duffy. Her work has been described as “dealing with the darkest turmoil and the lightest...
She's a pickin' and he's a grinnin'--it's another newsletter from "A Way with Words." Salut! Oh, hey, sure, it was a rerun this past weekend. A good one, though, with a brand-new word quiz to boot. It has...
You’ve heard people describe something momentous as “a watershed moment in history.” What is a watershed, exactly? Besides an Indigo Girls’ song, that is. This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of...
Why do aviators say roger to indicate they’ve received a message? A pilot phones the show about that, wilco, and similar language. This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of “Pilot Language “Roger”” Hello, you...
“Yo!” Why did people ever start using the word yo! to get someone’s attention? Grant explains that in English there’s mo’ than one yo. This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of “Etymology of Yo”...
What does dog hair have to do with hangover cures? Also, where’d we ever get a word like “dude”? And what’s the word for when unexpected objects form a recognizable image, like a cloud that looks like a bunny, or the image of Elvis...