Tom from Conshohocken, Pennsylvania, notices something odd while doing a tick check after a walk in the woods: Both tick and check can mean “a checkmark,” making the compound a kind of accidental synonym sandwich. The linguistic term for a word...
Quiz Guy John Chaneski presents a puzzle about fanciful sequels to real movies. John proposes new movies using a synonym of each of two words in a real title. For example, Vulgar Velour would be the title of what remake? This is part of a complete...
Here’s a clever unparalleled misalignment, in which the word or words in one phrase are each synonyms of the words in the other, but the terms themselves mean different things: break ground and Cleveland. This is part of a complete episode...
Unparalleled misalignments are pairs of phrases in which the words in one phrase are each synonyms of the words in the other, but the phrases themselves mean different things. For example, the phrase blanket statement can be paired with cover story...
The autocomplete function on your phone comes in handy, of course. But is it changing the way we write and how linguists study language? Also, suppose you could invite any two authors, living or dead, to dinner. Who’s on your guest list and why...
A kangaroo word is a word that contains letters that appear in the same order and form a synonym. Examples include the verb regulate, which contains rule; masculine, which contains male; blossom which contains bloom; and precipitation, which has...