Old. Elderly. Senior. Why are we so uncomfortable when we talk about reaching a certain point in life? An 82-year-old seeks a more positive term to describe how she feels about her age. And: a linguist helps solve a famous kidnapping case, using the...
Channel fever is “the feeling of excitement or restlessness that sailors experience as their ship nears its home port.” This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of “Channel Fever” Here’s a cool term that you might...
Mary in Alexandria, Virginia, wonders when words like senior and senior citizen came to mean “elderly.” Senior comes from Latin senex, “old,” the source also of Senate and senile. In the 1930s, a politician helped popularize...
It’s the Up Goer Five Challenge! Try to describe something complex using only the thousand most common words in English. It’s a useful mental exercise that’s harder than you might think. Also, if you want to make a room dark, you...
“Empty heads make weary bones,” so don’t forget what you went looking for or you’ll wind up exhausted for no reason! This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of “Empty Heads” Hello, you have A Way with Words...
A college senior has invented a word to describe that anxiety we feel when there’s unfinished work looming over us. He calls it desgundes. As in, “that twenty-year-old in the library making a three-foot boondoggle must likely be dealing...