Yasha, who grew up speaking Russian, recalls phrase used to comfort a child after a small mishap like a skinned knee. The phrase translates as “It will heal in time for the wedding,” and Yasha had assumed it was solely Slavic. So he was surprised to...
Kinbank is a new database that illustrates the global diversity of family terms. English, for example, specifies sibling relationships with just one of two terms: sister or brother. But most other languages have even more specific terms. In...
Jingoism, or “extreme nationalism,” derives from a drinking-hall song popular in the 1870’s, with the belligerent refrain: “We don’t want to fight but by jingo if we do / We’ve got the ships, we’ve got the men, and got the money too / We’ve fought...
First-century graffiti. People in ancient times could be just as bawdy and colorful as we are today. To prove it, we found some graffiti written on the walls in the city of Pompeii, and found plenty of sex, arrogance and good old fashioned bathroom...
A listener from northern New Jersey says that in his part of the state, a sloppy joe was not the mashed-up ground beef sandwich many of us also know as a loose meat sandwich, spoonburger, or tavern. For him, a sloppy joe was a deli meat sandwich...
We spoke on a recent show about the joking consolation parents offer to a crying child, “It’ll be better before you’re married.” A podcast listener in Siberia emailed to say that in Russian, a similar saying translates to, “It has enough time to...
