Cara in San Diego, California, wonders why English has monologue and dialogue, but unicycle and bicycle rather than monocycle and dicycle. The dia- in dialogue means “through,” as in diagonal and diameter, not “two,” and duologue is the term for a...
Some 50 years ago, says Susan from Burbank, California, she and a friend made up a game involving prefixes and suffixes, which led to such nonsense words as epidormithry and postpreparize. This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of “Prefixes...
You pick up what you think a glass of water and take a sip, but it turns out to be Sprite. What’s the word for that sensation when you’re expecting one thing and taste something else? Also, slang from college campuses, like ratchet and dime piece...
Is it acceptable to make a brand-new adverb simply by adding an -ly to an adjective? A scientist wants to know, and specifically a term she uses, nuclearly.
Quiz Guy Greg Pliska drops in with a word game called “False Opposites.” They’re pairs of words whose prefixes, suffixes, and other elements make them appear to be opposites, even though they’re not. For example, what seeming opposites might be...
Unless you’ve been hiding out in a galaxy far, far away, you know that this is an election year. Grant and Martha talk about current political slang. Ever hear of glass pockets? Or horseracism? Is there an etymological connection between caucus and...
