Trace, used for locales like the Natchez Trace, refers to an informal road, like a deer trail or an Indian trail. This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of “Etymology of Geographic Term Trace” Hello, you have A Way with Words...
When someone talks about Hollywood or Wall Street, they’re probably not talking about a California city or a Manhattan street. It’s an example of what rhetoricians call metonymy. Metonyms like the White House or Downing Street are often...
Demonyms are the words for people from particular places, and Mike in New York has been turning them into a family road-trip game for decades. Some are predictable, such as New Yorker or Californian, but local forms and old associations quickly...
Frank in Coronado, California, wondered about bailiwick after hearing an attorney say that something wasn’t his bailiwick. The word combines bailiff with wick, an old term for a farm or village. In Middle English, a bailiff was a public...
Why are some American place names pronounced differently than the famous place they were named after? Why is Cairo, Ill., pronounced “KAY-roh”? Why do Midwesterners pronounce Versailles as “Ver-SALES” and the New Madrid Fault...
Grant talks about the surprising beauty to be found in, of all things, the names of shantytowns. This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of “Shantytown Names” You’re listening to A Way with Words. I’m Martha Barnette...